There are many significant and game-changing benefits of a VoIP business communication system. These benefits are especially useful for small businesses looking to enhance their communication plan. Among the benefits are total mobility, scalability, and flexibility.
Additionally, there are significant up-front and ongoing cost savings, which are crucial for small businesses during hurricane season. However, as a business owner or decision-maker, you know there is one critical benefit that stands above and apart from the rest: disaster recovery. Additionally, it’s essential to consider your insurance policies to ensure that your business is protected during these challenging times.
Long-Term Preparation
Long-term preparation is essential for any business to navigate the challenges posed by the hurricane season effectively. To protect your business and employees, creating a comprehensive plan that includes hurricane preparedness tips is crucial.
Start by reviewing your insurance coverage, including commercial property insurance and business interruption insurance, to ensure you are adequately protected against the potential impact of a hurricane or severe weather event. Develop a checklist that outlines the steps to take when a storm hits, such as securing critical equipment and ensuring remote access for employees who may need to work from off-site locations.
Stay informed through the National Weather Service and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to monitor approaching storms and high winds. It is also essential to equip your business with the necessary tools, such as radios for communication during disruptions. By having a solid plan in place, you can safeguard your business data and maintain the safety and integrity of your commercial property, helping you keep your customers and restore operations more effectively post-storm.
Short-term preparation: As a hurricane approaches
Short-term preparation is crucial for any business during the Atlantic hurricane season. This includes any areas prone to major hurricanes. To protect their businesses, stakeholders must have a reliable communication system in place to ensure that their team is prepared to handle the impacts of the hurricane’s winds and water. Specific business operations should include a plan to shut down non-essential services, while also making arrangements for on-site safety measures. Additionally, businesses should review their flood insurance policies to be ready for potential insurance claims that may arise after a hurricane. It’s essential to expect the unexpected and have a strategy for preparedness and response that helps you keep your employees safe and prepared. By taking these steps, you can help restore normal operations as swiftly as possible after a storm, ensuring the safety of both your staff and your business.
How Does VoIP Disaster Recovery Work?
VoIP phone systems use a broadband internet connection for audio and video transfer, including videoconferencing. If the internet goes offline due to issues like hurricanes or floods, an automatic failover process kicks in. This process switches to a secondary connection, maintaining ongoing connectivity. It supports various communication methods, such as voice, video, and text. Once the internet connection is restored, the system switches back to the primary connection. This ensures a seamless communication plan for your office.
Also, during a power outage due to a catastrophic event (or any other reason), calls can be forwarded from digital phones (i.e., phones designed specifically and exclusively to work with VoIP systems) to any other operational phone, including cell phones and landlines. Forwarding is canceled once power returns.
The Role of Backup Power Systems in Disaster Recovery
What if you want to continue using one or some of your digital phones during a power outage? No problem! We are here to assist with your hurricane preparedness efforts. Connect your computer(s) and digital phone(s) to a backup power supply, which handles the load until power is restored, to ensure your communication plan remains intact. Just keep a couple of things in mind for your hurricane preparedness plan:
- This element of your business continuity plan only works if your Internet Service Provider is unaffected by the power outage during a storm.
- Like all backup generators, a VoIP backup power system has limited capacity. It’s best to minimize usage until normal operations resume and the backup battery recharges. Business leaders often prioritize connectivity to critical assets and emergency contacts. This is a key part of their evacuation strategy.
The Importance of Multiple Data Centers
What happens when a power outage affects your VoIP vendor? If the vendor has a single data center located in an affected area, you will not be able to use your VoIP system until the vendor restores power.
However, there is a safe and reliable way to avoid this gap in your business continuity plan. The answer is to choose a VoIP vendor with multiple data centers. At Carolina Digital Phone, we have not one, not two, but THREE carrier-class data centers Located in downtown Greensboro, NC, Research Triangle Park, NC (known as North Carolina’s MCNC.ORG), and in the Equinix Data Center in Dallas, Texas, these sites are vital for disaster preparedness.
This geographically-dispersed data center strategy virtually guarantees that our system will always remain operational 24/7/365, even during storm events. This is regardless of the threat (e.g., hurricane, flood, etc.) That may be happening locally, or even across North Carolina or the U.S. Southeast, especially during the hurricane season.
The Final Word
In today’s business world, “going off the grid” can lead to serious financial losses. This is especially true for small businesses. Even a short disruption can halt internal communication, collaboration, and productivity. Furthermore, it can damage a company’s reputation, particularly if they are unprepared for emergencies like hurricanes. Few things frustrate customers more than hearing “your call cannot be completed as dialed,” especially during critical business hours.
When you make your VoIP business communication system part of our disaster recovery plan, you will have peace of mind knowing that even if you are affected by disruptive events, you will enjoy continued operation and be “open for business”!
Learn more about our tools, technologies, and policies for supporting your disaster recovery plan! Contact us today at (336) 544-4000 to discuss how we can help you prepare your business for any potential emergencies.