Disaster Planning: Be Prepared

Cover Your Assets

Entrepreneurs are optimistic and don’t want to dwell on the dark side. Unfortunately, bad things can happen—a fire or flood can wipe out inventory, a storm can cut electricity for days or longer, a customer can be injured on your premises. These occurrences can be financially costly and emotionally draining, unless you plan ahead with adequate insurance and disaster planning.

Make sure you have all necessary insurance policies in place before you open your doors for business. At a minimum, you need a business owner’s policy (BOP) to cover your business assets as well as provide liability protection in case third parties (customers) suffer injury. If you have any employees, you’ll need workers’ compensation as well as short-term disability in some states.

You’ll need to avoid insurance gaps. If you use your personal car for business driving, make sure your car policy covers accidents while on business. If you have a home office, check with your insurance agent to determine whether your homeowner’s coverage provides protection for your business assets and for liability claims from business visitors. You may need to add onto your homeowner’s policy or obtain a BOP.

With storms and other natural disasters making headlines, don’t fail to plan for the worst case scenarios. Be certain to regularly back up data on your computer (preferably to offsite servers) so you can recoup information if computers are damaged. Think what you’d do if your business location was not operable; maybe you and your staff could work remotely. Write plans for you and your staff to follow in case of emergency.

Learn about the types of insurance you may need for your business from InsureU.

Barbara Weltman, Guest Blogger
View more posts by SCORE’s Guest Bloggers

1 Comment October 16, 2009

Telecommunications: Can You Remember Your Phone Number?

A friend of mine was telling the story about her car breaking down right before an important meeting. Her cell phone had no signal so she borrowed someone’s phone to call her husband at work. Then she realized she didn’t know his phone number. Huh? Didn’t know his phone number? How can that be? She’s married to the man!

That was when she realized that because she tied everything to speed dial, she didn’t know any phone numbers except hers (because she had to verbally give it out often).

After hearing this story, I realized that I don’t know phone numbers either. So when I bought my new land phone, I didn’t set up speed dial. This has forced me to remember numbers again.

How about you? Do you know that important phone number?

-Peggy Duncan, SCORE Atlanta
View more posts by Peggy

1 Comment September 25, 2008