Disaster Planning For Your Small Business
BOSTON (CBS) - There are almost 28 million small businesses in the U.S. right now and close to 80% of them have one employee, the owner. Most small businesses, especially ones run from home, have not given enough thought to planning for disasters, natural or manmade.
Disaster Planning For Your Small Business
If you are running a small business could you recover if your building was destroyed in a flood, fire or hurricane? What if you were recovering from an illness and couldn't work? What if your computer crashed?
So if you have a small business treat it like a big business and have a disaster plan.
Here are some things to consider:
Insurance. You need insurance. If you work from your home let your homeowner's insurance carrier know you have a home office. Increase the liability and property damage coverage.
Consider purchasing disability insurance, the loss of your income stream would be of major concern to you and your family.
Also an umbrella policy which is simply insurance that covers a liability that your homeowner's policy or auto policy will not cover.
Are you storing items you sell on e-Bay? Are they insured properly?
If you drive your car or truck for business such as a realtor, a consultant or carpenter be sure you have the proper coverage. Yes, it will cost you more, but it truly is cheaper than a future problem.
Record keeping. Paper or computer? If you are using a paper format for your record keeping is the file cabinet fireproof, locked, bolted to the wall?
Using your computer? How often do you back it up? Is the backup off site or on site? Consider using the Cloud to backup material daily. Using a memory stick? Leaving it at the office? Key information like contact files, are they are on your computer, cell phone?
What records are so important to your business if they were lost your business would go down the toilet? Protect those!
