Free Business Continuity support for Flooded businesses

Many things can destroy a business but flooding can do it quickly and without much warning.

Where possible if you can put in place solutions in advance to help prevent damage or at least control the extent of it � this will help ensure business continuity and disaster recovery.

There may be some investment needed to put in place the necessary protection for your business, however many services can be obtained without any charge to provide free business continuity:

Basic check list to ensure Business Continuity:

1. Visit the Environment Agency website and within their flood advice pages you can obtain a free download of their Flood Plan.

2. Local Council - Visit the website or contact your local council for information.

3. Speak to your Insurance Company where you should be able to locate a free Business Continuity Planning Tool.

4. The National Flood Forum has on its website a directory called the 'Blue Pages Directory' which offers many services and products that can help protect your property.

5. The contact details for Floodline is 0845 988 1188

6. Community Support Groups can help and offer useful advice. Be in touch with your local council, libraries, local websites and local newspapers.

7. It is incredibly important to backup your computer data - Ideally using automatic data backup software as this will ensure data is backed up, and is always available and up to date no matter what happens. Having an alternative venue on standby to work from and a spare machine with broadband connection or a wireless dongle is useful.

8. In 2011 the Association of British Insurers recommended that one of the things people should do is:

'Make sure that you have emergency telephone contact numbers for your insurers, local authority and utility companies in a safe waterproof place.'

You can store the above information on your phone or with the Depositit Business SAFE that is an online filing cabinet and free of charge and allows businesses to store critical details safely off-site and access them from anywhere via their laptop, tablet or Smartphone. Also an Emergency Alert Service is available as part of the service.

Flooding is terrible and when it happens much work is needed to get back to normal again. Putting in place some of the above free business continuity tools should help.