More Disaster Readiness for Businesses
Other disaster preparedness resources
The Small Business Administration (sba.gov)offers a number of resources designed to help small businesses shore up their emergency preparedness, including links to templates and worksheets that will help you gather the data you need to put together the various written documents. The SBA's Disaster Preparedness and Recovery Plan outlines the various ways in which the SBA can assist businesses recovering from disasters.
The SBA's main form of support for businesses is the Disaster Loan Program. The organization has two types of disaster loans designed specifically for small business owners:
The SBA Business Physical Disaster Loan provides loans of up to $2 million to help businesses and nonprofit organizations within a disaster area repair and replace real property, machinery, equipment, fixtures, and leasehold improvements.
The Economic Injury Disaster Loan offers up to $2 million in loans to help small businesses, small agricultural cooperatives, and certain nonprofit organizations that suffer substantial economic distress because of a disaster. Loan proceeds can be used to meet financial obligations and working capital needs that could have been met if a disaster had not occurred.
As of March 2015, the SBA had approved nearly 2 million disaster loans for more than $53 billion. But the SBA is only one organization that offers resources designed to help small businesses prepare for and recover from disasters.
The American Red Cross also provides resources for small businesses that are preparing for the possibility of disasters and emergencies. American Red Cross Ready Rating™(readyrating.org) is a self-guided online program designed to help member businesses, organizations, and schools assess their level of emergency preparedness. The core of the program is a 123-point assessment that is used to gauge one's level of preparedness. Members also have access to a variety of online tools and resources to help create and refine a disaster preparedness plan. Examples include a hazard vulnerability assessment worksheet, an emergency response notification procedures document, and a damage assessment form.
Preparemybusiness.org hosts a variety of sources on disaster preparedness for business owners, including:
Downloadable educational information on how to prepare your business for a disaster
An archive of webinars to help you plan your disaster preparedness and recovery strategy
A framework of testing strategies to implement in order to assess your disaster preparedness
Resources from the SBA on the types of disaster assistance available to businesses
Finally, the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety(disastersafety.org)offers a variety of resources, including research reports and an online tool that allows you to enter your Zip code and receive information about specific risks in your area.
Disasters are unpredictable, and they can put you, your employees, and your business in jeopardy. But many of their worst effects can be prevented, or at least mitigated, through a structured disaster management plan.
A catastrophe is defined as an event causing at least $25 million in insured property losses and affecting a significant number of property/casualty insurers and policyholders.
