Quite recently, the Philippines was hit by a 6.1 magnitude earthquake. The CBP team was able to provide continuity of service to its clients because it diligently followed its disaster recovery plan.
The earthquake certainly managed to have an effect on us. Like any business, CBP has no immunity from natural disasters. Walls were damaged, glasses were broken and some equipment was destroyed. We are just thankful that we had comprehensive Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity plans in place. Without them, things could have been much worse.
Experiencing a natural disaster was a timely and practical reminder of the value and importance that every business should place on their disaster recovery planning activities. While you always hope that you’ll never need to use it, you quickly find that proper planning pays off in spades if the need arises. For businesses, every minute of operation counts. Prolonged downtime results in significant losses.
While formulating a disaster recovery plan for a business can be costly, its absence could cost your business so much more. Not having a DRP may put the company at risk of financial loss and reputation damage. Moreover, clients may not be forgiving when it comes to failures and delays of service.
CBP’s workplaces are modular with redundant power, internet connectivity and hardware. While there can still be issues that may affect the delivery of time-critical tasks, in the event of catastrophic failure, staff can be quickly relocated to nearby unaffected CBP buildings incurring minimal downtime.
Our disaster recovery plan doesn’t make us impervious to mishaps, but it does allow us to mitigate risk and reduce downtime to continue servicing the needs of our valued clients.
