The resources to guide us toward better preparedness and help us answer these questions are just a click away. Visit www.ready.gov and www.redcross.org to start. They contain a wealth of information about what you can do to prepare your family.

National Preparedness Month 2005 is a nationwide effort to encourage Americans to take simple steps to prepare for emergencies in their homes, businesses and schools. Agility is proud to be a coalition member helping support the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the American Red Cross throughout September to highlight the importance of emergency preparedness and promote individual involvement through events and activities across the nation, such as first aid trainings, town hall meetings and much more.

September is an ideal time for families to update their emergency supply kits and family emergency plans and to become better informed about different threats and local emergency plans. Many things can change over the course of a year, and it is imperative that the entire family have the most up-to-date emergency contact information and Family Communications Plan.

National Preparedness Month is also the ideal time to get involved in preparing other businesses in your community. One often overlooked component of a disaster recovery plan is your vendors, advisors and key customers. We don’t consider the impact an interruption of their service and commitment might have on our organization in the event of a regional disaster such as Hurricane Katrina.

Agility is sponsoring free web seminars each Wednesday in September to help any business have a better understanding of Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity planning. For more information on these seminars, visit our website http://www.agilityrecovery.com/agil/webinars.htm. Please consider inviting those individuals who are vital to your business to attend these seminars.

A complete crisis management plan is crucial to ensuring fluid, continuous operations in an emergency. But for many businesses, creating and maintaining a complete crisis management plan is too much of a commitment - from both a time and cost perspective.

That’s why Agility is offering our members a new consulting opportunity – the Crisis Management Workshop. This 5-day Workshop, conducted at the client location, is modeled on the same simple, turn-key format as our ReadySuite package solutions. It provides a cost effective solution for companies who understand the need for a viable emergency management plan yet have neither the time nor resources for a long term engagement.

Why develop a Crisis Management Plan?

Any business interruption turns life on its head. What if you can’t get to your alternate site? What if your cell phones no longer work? What if governmental authorities bar the way to your business? Planning what to do after a disaster is just as important as what to do beforehand – it may be even more important. A sound crisis management plan helps you address the important decisions that people will be looking to you to make. It facilitates a smooth transition between normal business operations and catastrophe response.

Put simply, a crisis management plan assures:
Effective coordination of activities among involved employees
Clear instructions for all in the event of a catastrophe
Continuity of operations during and immediately after the crisis

Crisis Management Workshop
Agility’s consultants will educate your key team members on the crisis management planning process and assist with the development of a complete plan, including the following and more:

*Plans for catastrophe notification and communication, both internal and external.

Agility’s consultants will assess the persons and organizations that require notification and develop a post-catastrophe plan. This includes entities such as staff, suppliers, clients, local government, law enforcement, FEMA and the media.

*Development of an Emergency Operations or Command Center.

Immediate response requires communication to the outside world and a central location for management and recovery teams to communicate. Teams will need to track responsibilities, conduct regular briefings and more. Agility will develop a plan for an emergency operations center to assure fluid operations and communications during an event.

*Plan for addressing employee needs.

Depending on the severity of the catastrophe, employees may require additional support in order to manage the aftermath. Consider a regional event –what if employees housing is destroyed? Where will employees sleep and their children go to school? Will they require counseling? Agility will help you proactively address these issues.

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The 5-day Crisis Management Workshop offers the above assessments and more at lower project costs than traditional consulting engagements due to its accelerated timeframe. As an added benefit, there is minimal staff disruption with this short and guided workshop style engagement. The workshop will result in a customized crisis management plan that is specific to your business – letting you get back to business as usual knowing that you are prepared for any risk.

Call your Agility representative or 866-364-9696 if you would like to learn more about the Crisis Management Workshop package.

Several years ago, local insurance agency Haylor, Freyer & Coon, Inc. was given 30 days to find new phone service after Telergy, Inc., its phone-service provider, went out of business.

"We were able to find another phone provider, but having disaster-recovery service would have really made that time less stressful," says Cyndy Smith, vice president of technology at Haylor, Freyer & Coon.

Subsequently, the agency has spent the last two years creating a disaster-recovery plan.

"It is a really time-consuming process, but definitely worth the effort," Smith explains.

Haylor, Freyer & Coon currently has the tools to resolve business interruptions. The agency's data is backed-up remotely and off-site. A third party will provide emergency telephone support via the Internet and redirect e-mails if the servers go down.

However, according to Smith, the plan was missing an integral piece: What should the agency do to house employees and service customers if headquarters at 231 Salina Meadows Parkway was lost?

The answer: become a member of Agility Recovery Solutions, Inc., a company specializing in disaster-recovery and business-continuity services for small and mid-size businesses nationwide. Companies that contract with Agility receive access to services including disaster-recovery plan formation, mobile-unit use, and telephone capability.

"Agility can come in with a mobile unit and satellite services, set up in the parking lot, and provide a cool and experienced head during the disaster situation," Smith says. "Having that voice of reason during a difficult time is very beneficial to us."

Haylor, Freyer & Coon became a member of Agility two months ago. Smith encourages other businesses to formulate disaster-recovery plans, though she says becoming a member of Agility doesn't make the plan complete.

"We are still putting together plans for employees and testing scenarios," Smith says. "What you don't prepare for is usually what happens."

Haylor, Freyer & Coon is a privately held insurance agency, employing 250 people in 10 locations across Central New York.

Business interruption is especially damaging to insurance companies during a regional disaster, says Robert Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Services, based in Charlotte, N.C.

"People expect that their insurance agency will be open and ready to help them," Boyd says. "The insurance company might suffer from that same event, but if they are a member of Agility, we will have them open to customers in 48 hours."

AT&T statistics have reported that if a business suffers an interruption and doesn't have a plan to recover, 80 percent of those businesses won't exist within two years, according to Boyd.

"A month is too late to recover because customers have already gone elsewhere," he adds. "We guarantee to have your business up and running in 48 hours."

Misconceptions

Agility reports that only 25 percent of nationwide businesses have a recovery plan. Most of these plans consist of backing up data, which doesn't keep a business running after a disaster.

Boyd says that the hurricanes of 2005, especially Hurricane Katrina, made businesses realize that they needed to develop a disaster plan.

"You can't just work off cell phones and buy more computers if something happens," he explains. "If the disaster is a regional event, finding those things becomes increasingly difficult."

Boyd also says that just backing up data isn't good enough. Businesses need to consider how and where the data will be stored.

"You have to have a plan," Boyd says. "Back up your tapes and take them home, or store them online, but make sure you can access the data when you need to."

Businesses should also consider having a secondary site to work in if something should happen to the main office. However, taking headquarters employees to a branch office will most likely strain resources.

"We had a New Orleans-based client try to bring his employees to his second location in Baton Rouge," Boyd says. "There was obviously no room so Agility brought mobile units in to resolve the space and systems issue."

Boyd says having business-interruption and businesscontinuity insurance is good, but not enough to recover from a disaster.

"Having that insurance only provides funds and lost revenue, it doesn't help the business re-open or find a new location or find fuel," he says.

Lastly, though some companies hire a team and make a disaster-recovery plan, they don't test it. Actually going through and testing assumptions at least once a year is critical to the success of plans, Boyd says.

"Katrina clients thought they could recover in their parking lots, but that wasn't possible," he explains. "Test your plans and see if your assumptions break down."

Plans should be stored safely off-site or hosted electronically by a third party.

Suggestions

A company with up to 200 employees can become a member of Agility Recovery Services for as little as $250 a month. The cost of membership increases dependery on how much technology (computers an( servers) a company needs to recover from business interruptions.

Ninety percent of Agility's member pay $250 monthly. Clients that call Agility are billed for any out-of-pocket expense or "incurred costs," according to Boyd.

"The client doesn't pay for things until they actually need them," Boyd says. "For example, if we have to send a client a new server, then we send them the freight bill and that is the only thing they pay."

Suffering an interruption to business is devastating for most companies. Boy encourages businesses to assess their location risks: Do you live in a hurricane or earthquake zone? Is your business locate next to a nuclear power plant or a railroad line?

Once a business has assessed its situation, it can adapt a disaster-recovery plan to fit the circumstances.

Secondly, Boyd says to identify critical business functions that need to be completed despite a disaster.

"You know you have to do payroll and accounts receivable," he says. "Manufacturing might not be occurring, but finances, customer service, and sales are important."

Companies should also consider personnel loss: What happens if the only person who knows how to do payroll is unavailable?

Thirdly, businesses should examine their supply chain, Boyd says. If your partner goes down, will it affect your business just as badly as if you went down?

The appointment of a crisis manager is an important step in the formation of a business-recovery plan. This individual should determine how everyone will leave the building safely, in addition to other concerns.

"At the time of the disaster, if there are too many people trying to make decisions, nothing will be done," Boyd says.

Additionally, though most companies say their employees are their most important asset, very few companies have a plan for their people. Creating a communication plan is essential. If cell phones don't work and there is no access to land lines, how will you connect to staff, clients, and vendors? Boyd suggests having an on-line phone tree or community voicemail box. He also says that businesses should try to have four contacts for all employees.

"The sooner you can locate employees and let customers know you are in business, the easier it is to mitigate the consequences of the damage," Boyd adds.

Companies should assemble an emergency kit including: a notary stamp, flashlight, special forms, and other key items. In the event of a disaster, having an emergency kit stored off site can be extremely helpful.

Boyd also recommends reviewing insurance coverage.

"People think insurance covers everything, but it has a lot of exclusions," he says. "Sit down with your insurance agent and make sure you are covered."

Lastly and most importantly, Boyd advises the testing of a company's plan to make sure the restoration and recovery of communications goes smoothly.

"Every day we support our clients in mock disaster tests," Boyd says. "It is an important part of the recovery plan. We do 400 a year, almost a client a day."

Boyd adds that implementing his suggestions isn't hard, only time-consuming.

"It takes diligence to create a plan," he explains. "Part of our standard offering is helping clients with all these issues."

Agility Recovery Services has rescued three clients in New York this year: an insurance company in November; the snowstorm-impacted H.R. Keller & Co., Inc. in Buffalo, and a Long Island-based company that needed a new power system.

About Agility

General Electric (GE) founded Agility Recovery Services in 1988 to act as disaster-recovery provider. Agility sold computers and mobile units to IBM and SunGard Data Systems. IBM and Sungard utilized the products to help large Fortune-2000 businesses recover from interruptions.

"Companies like New York Life used to pay $1 million a month for these services," Boyd explains. "They might not know Agility was in the background helping, but we would provide communications, or space, or power."

Today, Agility has restructured its business plan to provide its services to midsized and smaller businesses, six million of which are located in North America, Boyd says.

Greenwich, Conn.-based Generation Partners, a privateinvestment firm, purchased Agility from GE in 2002. Boyd was hired in 2004 as part of a new management team.

Agility currently employs 70 people: 20 in Toronto, 20 in Charlotte, and 10 in Atlanta. Remaining employees are spread throughout North America, along with 100 locations in which Agility stores its mobile units.

Agility houses the majority of its computer components in Toronto and Atlanta.

The company has 80 to 100 clients in New York State, including insurance agencies, banks, law firms, medical facilities, schools, and manufacturing plants. Agility is currently signing new clients at a rate of 100 a month nationwide, Boyd says.

"Clients want us to be that logistical quarterback for them," he concludes.

Before Hurricane Katrina, Gillis, Ellis and Baker Insurance, a New Orleans-based independent insurance brokerage that writes casualty insurance, liability benefits, health, employment, risk management and seismic vessel coverage, had offices across the street from the Superdome--today half of GEB's employees are scattered between Texas, Georgia and points-in-between, while the other half are busy taking claims in a 24-foot by 60-foot single-wide emergency recovery mobile unit parked in Baton Rouge, La.

Anderson Baker, president, said GEB began taking claims by turning data over to an outside entity while Agility Recovery Solutions of Charlotte, N.C., set up his operations in a mobile unit in Baton Rouge, La.

"During the interim we had a service take our claims and forward them to our carriers," Doug Mills, GEB chief operating officer explained. "We were happy to come to this trailer this morning and find a note attached saying, 'We are glad you are here, it gives us hope.'"

Baker said that after all the 2004 hurricanes, GEB rethought their disaster recovery plan and chose Agility Solutions to get them back in business.

GEB Insurance, an Assurex Global partner, wrote $45 million in premiums at its downtown New Orleans office in 2004. Eighty five percent of its business is commercial and 15 percent personal.

Concerned about other agents
"A few of my very good peers at other agencies did the same thing," Baker explained. He said an overwhelming majority of agents affected by Hurricane Katrina did not subscribe to Agility, or as far as he knew, any other service.

"Because I know them well and they are good, professional associates of mine, I hope they made other arrangements--but I am fearful that is not the case," Baker said.

Business lifelines, provided by Agility Recovery Solutions through all types of disruptions, enabled GEB to access equipment and share its critical disaster experience. Agility maintains distribution centers with more than $35 million in computer equipment in stock and maintains access to more than 100,000 constantly available mobile units. Agility works with its members to tailor their disaster recovery plans individually through a consultative approach and client preparedness plan. GEB signed up for its services in advance and therefore Agility was ready and able to respond on an instant's notice.

Back in business
GEB began taking claims from its 4,000 customers Sunday, Sept. 4, with 12 to 18 employees manning the banks of phones in the air-conditioned mobile recovery unit. Baker said GEB will take claims and forward them to carriers seven-days-a-week, at least 15 hours each day.

GEB has been in business since 1933, and has developed a close relationship with their clients for more than 25 years.

"Without Agility I would be sitting around staring at television all day, knowing that there is nothing I could do," Baker said. "Being set up in an emergency trailer gives me a purpose in what I am doing right now and what I am doing with my life by being able to do what I promised my customers I would do.

"This is the only time we have to deliver our product," Baker explained. "Of course we can issue Certificates of Insurance all day long, and our customers often think that is good service, but that's not service compared to what we are encountering now--and without Agility I would be unable to fulfill that promise. We would be absolutely dead and our clients would suffer."

Many businesses without recovery plans
Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility, estimates that almost 70 percent of the businesses in the United States do not have a backup recovery plan.

"In the wake of a disaster like Hurricane Katrina, statistics indicate that about 68 percent of the businesses affected will not survive because they do not have a backup recovery plan in place," Boyd explained. "If an insurance company does not have a way to recover their business, if they do not have their data backed up, if they do not have a place to go, or a place for phones to ring and cannot respond to claims--they are going to lose those customers.

"Hurricane Katrina had a monumental impact on the region. Right now we are recovering 10 companies on the Gulf Coast, insurance companies, construction companies and associations," Boyd said. "We have had representatives in the affected area since Sept. 1 when we started receiving calls for help and have been recovering people since then."

Agility has been assembling its single-wide, and double-wide mobile units with generators, air-conditioning, high-tech equipment, satellite systems and teams to assist the large number of people displaced in Louisiana, Mississippi and other Gulf Coast states.

Agility's first goal was to establish campuses to house its clients in Baton Rouge, and other parts of Louisiana, as well as Mobile, Ala. Boyd said some clients have moved to secondary sites they had set up in other areas, such as Chicago.

"Even if they weathered the storm, even if they find a place and can get back into business, a month from now, those customers are going to go someplace else, to another physical location," he said. "It is vitally important to get back into business quickly, to get into contact with customers and let them know you are there for them."

To put the magnitude of the disaster caused by Katrina into perspective, Boyd said that when 9-11 occurred, Agility had a total of 17 declarations, all of which only involved shipping equipment to clients that were able to recover at their own facilities.

"With Hurricane Katrina, there isn't any infrastructure, we are going to end up deploying 10, 15, 20 or more mobile units," Boyd estimated. "When it is all over we will probably end up recovering 30 companies. It will dwarf any recovery effort that has ever happened to the industry, and on a completely different scale."

He said Agility has created a place for people to work and live and that it will do this over and over.

"It couldn't have been done if Agility hadn't been around for 17 years and had relationships with FedEx and other essential companies and able to get through the Federal Emergency Management Agency," Boyd explained. "FEMA was not letting anyone into Mississippi without a pass, we really relied on resources we had developed over time."

"As an agent, and if I can round up my employees, I am confident we will get through this, survive this and deliver what we promised to our clients," Baker said. "I hope I have a city to insure a year from now and there are lots of people like me who are going to get back and make it happen."

Baker said that how long it takes to get everyone's claims settled will depend on what the policyholder decides to do. He said a lot also depends on how their policy is worded and whether or not they have to rebuild to be fully compensated.

"If they decide to move on and don't rebuild, they could be penalized," he explained. "An insurance policy isn't written to let you torch your house and get paid for it--it is designed to permit policyholders to be put back whole--which means you get a new house there."

Baker said he was sure there is going to be some leeway and some interpretation to the policy, probably in the insured's favor, but said there will be a lot of his clients who simply don't want to live in New Orleans any more.

Baker said he can foresee there will be lots of discussion about which claims are due to flood and which are due to wind.

"Definitions have pretty much been determined by the law, but I suspect this will be resettled after this process," Baker said.

He explained that the typical homeowner living in New Orleans is often asked about flood insurance, and in many cases it will be required to take out a mortgage. But in many areas that are not considered to be a flood zone, the insurance is not mandatory.

"Every spring we send out a letter to each of our policyholders saying it's time to check up on your flood insurance coverage," Baker said. "And we have many policyholders who read that letter and say, 'We'd better get some.'

"While flood insurance is something you are aware of, a lot of people who do not live in a flood zone, that are in Zone C, simply do not buy it," he explained.

When New Orleans is rebuilt Baker thinks it will be very different.

"The local is going to see a changed city. It will not be the slow, carefree city it used to be, it will be on guard, it will be wary," Baker said.

“When an emergency or interruption occurs, our biggest defense is preparedness,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility. “Developing a plan and identifying preparedness and response resources within our communities are simple steps we can take to prepare ourselves, our family, business and community.”

Based on nearly 20 years of business continuity planning and recovery experience, Agility developed a four-part business continuity Web seminar series, which will be presented throughout the month of September. The goal of the series is to help businesses begin or update their business recovery plans with defined action steps to address the four key elements of recovery: power, space, technology and connectivity.

These educational seminars are open to all businesses as well as the general public. Additionally, Agility will work with its partners and team member network to encourage individuals and organizations to proactively take action in their communities to prepare for the unexpected. For more detailed information, visit www.preparemybusiness.com.

“America’s businesses form the backbone of our economy; small businesses alone account for more than 99 percent of employers and provide nearly 45 percent of the nation’s payroll. Yet, these businesses are those who have traditionally been unprepared for the unexpected with an executable business continuity plan,” says Boyd. “Agility believes that every business – regardless of size – should have access to business continuity services that are simple and easy to use. National Preparedness Month is the perfect venue for us to educate businesses on the recovery resources required and available.”

More information about the partners and events for National Preparedness Month can be found at: www.ready.gov

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ABOUT AGILITY RECOVERY SOLUTIONS
Agility Recovery Solutions is located in Charlotte, N.C. The company’s core value is their ability to support businesses dealing with disasters. Within 48 hours, Agility links employees, customers, and corporate executives—no matter what the need, so they can continue operations. Solutions range from simple technical support to a full mobile office recovery.

The Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1 - November 30, averaging almost ten named storms per year. Several nationally renowned hurricane experts are predicting that this season will be more active than usual, with anywhere from 13-17 named storms and a 74 percent chance of a major hurricane hitting the U.S. The state of Florida is predicted to be four times as likely to encounter a hurricane as in an average year.

"Complacency is the enemy of the IT world," Jeff Biggs, Peak 10 senior vice president, Operations and Engineering, said. According to Biggs, although no hurricanes made landfall in the United States in 2006, three tropical storms did. "People tend to think, well, there weren't any hurricanes last year so we're safe. That's not a responsible reaction if you're talking from the perspective of a successful business in a high-risk location with loads of crucial customer data on unsecured, non-redundant equipment," he said.

The partnership between Peak 10 and Agility provides Peak 10’s clients the ability to recover their business operations in a fully-configured mobile office environment virtually anywhere. Agility’s mobile offices are equipped with all the technology and satellite connectivity needed to access and utilize secure data hosted at Peak 10 data centers.

“Once the secure connection is made, a client’s employees are able reconnect with customers or clients, make transactions and basically resume all normal business operations,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility. “Together with Peak 10, we offer businesses a total recovery strategy.”

Agility’s mobile office environment includes the power, technology, space and connectivity organizations need to recover their operations after an interruption. The company has access to over 100,000 mobile offices throughout the United States and is capable of recovering anywhere from 10 to 1,000 or more employees.

Peak 10 utilizes its geographically diverse data center network throughout its ten facilities in seven markets to provide scalable business continuity solutions that ensure availability, security and integrity of critical data and business applications 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Utilizing Peak 10 solutions, businesses hit by disasters can immediately recover technology infrastructure, data, and applications through mirrored production environments and also gain much needed access to office space, communications equipment, bandwidth and hardware.

About Agility Recovery Solutions
Agility Recovery Solutions is the leading provider of business continuity solutions to small and medium-sized businesses across North America. At time of business interruption, Agility provides its members with the space, power, connectivity and technology needed to resume “business as usual.”

Visit AgilityRecovery.com for more information.

About Peak 10, Inc.
Peak 10 is the leading independent data center operator and managed services provider in the eastern United States, delivering scalable, economical and reliable solutions for hosting and managing complex information technology infrastructure.  The company combines its ten data centers and portfolio of managed services with localized engineering and support to serve market-leading companies including Rivals.com, Global Knowledge, Pergo, Churchill Downs, LendingTree and the Jacksonville Jaguars.  Peak 10 owns and operates world class facilities in Richmond, Va.; Nashville, Tenn.; Louisville, Ky.; Tampa and Jacksonville, Fla; and Raleigh and Charlotte, N.C. The company was recently ranked as one of the fastest growing private companies in America for the second consecutive year by Inc. magazine. For more information on data center solutions from Peak 10, visit www.peak10.com.

MyAgility’s innovative tools and resources allow Agility ReadySuite customers to enhance all aspects of their recovery plans, including:

• Specify resource needs for time of recovery
• Develop an internal communication strategy
• Identify and store vital supply-chain contacts
• Input, update and store fixed-asset inventory information
• Upload and store critical documents such as insurance policies, product warranties, data back-up procedures and more

“We’ve learned through our 17 years of recovering businesses that, at time of disaster, having a plan and access to that plan is critical,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility. “MyAgility will help businesses plan for and, if necessary, survive any disaster.”

MyAgility is now included in all of Agility’s ReadySuite membership solutions.  There is no additional fee. “Agility’s vision is to provide all businesses, regardless of size, access to simple and easy-to-use continuity solutions. We’ve built our business around offering affordable services. MyAgility provides our clients with a critical value-added service,” says Boyd. 

ABOUT AGILITY RECOVERY SOLUTIONS
Agility helps businesses restore their operations and recover their people after a business interruption or disaster. Within 48 hours, Agility links employees, customers, and corporate executives—no matter what the need, so they can continue operations. Solutions range from simple technical support to a full mobile office recovery.

AIGSB “invited [Agility] to participate in The AIG Edge because [it] demonstrates an unparalleled commitment to [its] clients and provides stellar customer service,” said Vincent C. Tizzio, President of AIG Small Business. “By going above and beyond what is generally expected, [Agility] consistently earn[s] loyalty and praise from [its] clients.”

Within 48 hours of being alerted to a business interruption, Agility delivers its clients ReadySuite, which includes any or all of the four key elements of business recovery, based on the client’s need at time of interruption:

• Power - generators
• Technology - PCs, Intel servers, tape drives, printers and fax machines
• Space - Office space complete with desks and chairs
• Connectivity - Satellite for voice and Internet access

Membership into the Agility ReadySuite network is $250 per month.

“Business continuity became a hot topic among small and mid-sized business after Sept. 11, 2001, and the 2005 hurricane season reemphasized the importance of continuity planning,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility. “We’ve helped business across North American prepare for and recover after interruptions for over 18 years. We understand the challenges small and medium-sized business face in regards to continuity planning and developed ReadySuite to overcome these issues.”

The AIG Edge is can be accessed thorough the AIG Small Business Web site (www.aigsmallbusiness.com).

About AIG Small Business
AIG Small Business® (AIGSB) is a unit of the property and casualty insurance companies of American International Group, Inc. (AIG).  AIGSB is dedicated to serving the small business market segment by providing unparalleled service and responsiveness, combined with cost-sensible insurance products.  AIGSB is also able to call upon the experience and expertise of other AIG units and companies.

About Agility Recovery Solutions
Agility Recovery Solutions is a leading provider of business continuity solutions to small and medium-sized businesses across North America. At time of business interruption, Agility provides its members with the space, power, connectivity and technology needed to resume operations. The company has a 100-percent success rate in recovering its members after interruptions. Agility responds to interruptions caused by hurricanes, fires, floods, power outages, server failures and more. Visit AgilityRecovery.com for more information.

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Editor’s Note: Agility Recovery Solutions is not affiliated with AIG Small Business® or any other member companies of American International Group, Inc. (AIG).  AIG Small Business receive any consideration or benefits from transactions that may result from Agility Recovery Solutions’ participation in The AIG Edge.

"Our endorsement of Agility is part of our continuing effort to provide the best service and support to our members. We feel it's vital that we highlight the importance of being prepared," said David VanDelinder, IIAT Executive Director.

The Agility Recovery turn-key solution includes the delivery of everything necessary to get a business back up and running within 48 hours of any declared emergency. If need be, Agility will provide a mobile office fully equipped with power, communications and computer equipment. Work stations in which core personnel can conduct business and maintain the all-important connections to keep a business going.

"Statistics show that 60 percent of businesses suffering a serious loss never reopen, and of those that do, more than 25 percent will close within three years. When we discovered that Agility helps their clients build a continuity plan and then backs that plan with extensive equipment and resources, it became apparent that this solution is the best for all of our members," VanDelinder added.

"The Agility ReadySuite membership was designed to provide small and medium-sized businesses access to disaster recovery services," said Bob Boyd, president of Agility Recovery Solutions. "For a minimum monthly fee, a small business can have access to our service and the ability to recover their business in the event of an interruption. The ability to recover your business when faced with a disaster is invaluable," said Boyd.

Agility Recovery Solutions is a former division of GE Capital IT Solutions. It has more than 16 years of experience providing disaster recovery solutions. Agility has successfully responded to 100 percent of all emergency declarations.

IIAT will educate all member agencies on the benefits of the Agility Recovery turn-key solution. "We feel strongly that our members will see the true value that Agility provides organizations, regardless of size. The statistics don't say that only the large survive; in this case, all organizations that suffer a loss are affected," said VanDelinder.

“We so firmly believe in the value of Agility’s recovery services that we are Agility members ourselves,” said Benson Yeung, senior partner for Triware Networld Systems, L.L.C. “Not only will this partnership allow us to offer our clients this valuable service at a low cost, but Triware is covered in the event of business interruption, giving our clients added confidence that we will still be able to support them in any disaster.”

“We believe that all organizations, regardless of size, should have access to continuity services that are simple, cost effective and easy to use,” stated Andy Boyd, a regional director with Agility. “We are excited to partner with Triware – Benson and his group clearly understand the value of such services.”

About Triware Networld Systems
Headquartered in Santa Clara, CA, Triware Networld Systems, L.L.C. is a leading computer network related service & support provider covering the San Francisco Bay Area. TNS has been highly successful since founded in March 1991, with 100% of its business originating from referrals.

Within 48 hours, Globecomm and Agility provided a complete portable communications facility with satellite connectivity back to Globecomm's Long Island International Teleport. This network will be used to support voice and Internet connectivity. Globecomm and Agility are on call 24 x 7 to support other clients in the region.

David Hershberg, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Globecomm Systems Inc., said, "Globecomm and Agility have demonstrated the ability to respond quickly and effectively in restoring vital communications services in the face of this terrible disaster. We are on call with our partner Agility and ready to further respond if necessary. Globecomm continues to expand on its relationship with Agility providing products and services that can serve immediate recovery efforts as well as providing a back-up plan for Fortune 500 enterprises and turn-key solutions for small to medium size businesses."

About Agility Recovery Solutions
Agility Recovery Solutions is the premier provider of on-site, client-centric business recovery and continuity solutions across the United States and Canada. Formerly a division of GE Capital, the company has a long and successful history in the industry. Agility Recovery Solutions offers the most comprehensive range of flexible, cost-effective and practical business continuity and recovery programs; all of which are geared to developing and delivering custom solutions onsite to their customers. Agility offers Quick-Ship Technology, Mobile Recovery Services, Satellite and ACD support services, Power generation, and Consulting services.

With operational facilities in Toronto, Atlanta and Charlotte, and access to inventory throughout North America, Agility Recovery Solutions is strategically located to provide its disaster recovery solutions within 24- 48 hours of a declaration. For more detailed information, please visit www.agilityrecovery.com.

About Globecomm Systems
Globecomm Systems Inc. provides end-to-end value-added satellite-based communication solutions by leveraging its core satellite ground segment systems and network capabilities, with satellite communication services capabilities. The solutions Globecomm offers include general contracted complex communications networks, militarized commercial off the shelf products and services, voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP), video broadcast, business recovery, satellite-based terrestrial restoral, content delivery and other networks on a global basis. Globecomm's customers include communications service providers, commercial enterprises, Internet Service Providers, content providers and government entities.

Based in Hauppauge, New York, Globecomm Systems also maintains offices in Washington D.C., Hong Kong, the United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates.

Strohl Systems will market this new solution to its nearly 800 credit union and community bank customers who currently use Strohl's PLANet online business continuity planning tool. Under the agreement, Strohl has negotiated preferred pricing for PLANet customers only.

"This new offering was designed to provide a cost effective means for banks and credit unions to continue serving customer and member needs after a disaster has occurred," said Eric Strohl, vice president with Strohl Systems. "We are pleased to be able to provide this kind of offering to our PLANet customers from a group as well respected for service delivery as Agility Recovery."

“Having access to Agility in the event of a disaster is critical for our business,” says Domenick Riccio, CIO of Gila Group. “During our 16 years of business, we have never experienced a catastrophic outage, but we have a commitment to our clients, our employees and our partners. They expect us to be here for them, no matter the severity of the situation.”

If Gila Corporation is ever temporarily displaced because of fire, storm, flood or any other disaster, company officials will call on Agility to provide an on-site mobile recovery, which includes mobile office space, generators, computers, servers, satellite phones, Internet connections, desks, chairs, fax machines and more. Agility will have Gila Corporation operational within 48 hours of declaring an interruption. As part of its solution, Agility will provide technology to Gila Corporation in case a server or any other critical piece of technology fails during normal operations.

According to a recent study by Forrester Consulting, only 25 percent of businesses feel they are "very prepared" to recovery their people.

“The benefit of our recovery plan is that we’ll be able to recover onsite, anytime, with any and all of the technology we need,” said Gila’s Riccio. “Whether it’s a fire, flood or regional event, we’ll be up-and-running, providing a place for our employees to continue building the trust of our clients and partners.”

Specifically developed for credit unions and other financial institutions, ReadySuite Financial is a modular workspace that is fully equipped with power, satellite communications, Internet access, computer equipment and traditional branch amenities such as teller counter, customer lobby area and check counter. Additionally, the mobile units may house desks, chairs, and additional technology to maintain critical bank-office functions.

“When the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council recommended that all credit unions strengthen their business continuity plans, CUNA went in search of the best businesses and technologies to help credit unions continue operations during crisis conditions, should they ever need it,” says Wes Millar, senior vice president of Strategic Services for CUNA. “A solid disaster recovery and communication plan is important, but Agility provides the office space, technology and necessary data communications for credit unions to continue to service customers.”

“Credit unions can be overtaken by all kinds of events from a computer virus to a regional disaster,” says Bob Boyd, CEO of Agility. “Regardless of the situation, their customers rely on them to be available, anything else is unacceptable.”

For more information, visit strategicservices.cuna.org, or contact Tom Lybeck, product manager for CUNA’s Strategic Services, at (800) 356-9655, ext. 4109, or by e-mail at tlybeck@cuna.coop.

About CUNA Strategic Services
CUNA Strategic Services, owned jointly by Credit Union National Association (CUNA) and the state leagues, provides credit unions with access to high quality products, services and technologies delivered with a competitive advantage made possible through volume pricing and strategic program development. CUNA serves more than 90 percent of America’s 9,000 credit unions, which are owned by nearly 87 million consumer members. Credit unions are not-for-profit cooperatives providing affordable financial services to people from all walks of life. For more information, visit strategicservices.cuna.org.

The alliance was formed to address the complex and threatening risks facing organizations today and the criticality of maintaining operations through the life of a disaster. Risk Solutions International’s ability to provide its clients with world class solutions and thought leadership for assessing, mitigating and managing the impact of their operational risk will now include portable recovery solutions designed to develop and deliver custom solutions on-site through its partners at Agility Recovery Solutions.

In line with Risk Solutions International’s strategy to ensure its clients’ long term viability, Agility Recovery Solutions understands how today’s risks may impact the continuity of an organizations core business operation, and therefore offers the most comprehensive range of flexible, cost-effective and practical disaster continuity and recovery programs; all of which are geared to developing and delivering custom solutions onsite to their customers.

“Be it a bomb threat, epidemic, or a power outage or an ‘everyday’ incident, when an crisis occurs, an organization discovers they are unable to proceed with basic business functions.” said Duane A. Lohn, Executive Vice President, Business Strategy and Alliances, Risk Solutions International. “However, Agility Recovery Solutions reconnects an organization with its business lifelines— helping you stay connected with customers and employees; ultimately, allowing you to survive.

According to Bob Boyd, Chief Executive Officer of Agility Recovery Solutions, “Stats show the 90% of companies unable to resume operations with 5 days of a disaster will go out of business. Simply put, when it comes to disaster recovery, businesses that plan will survive. Those who don’t, will not.” Boyd adds, “Our hope is that all businesses, regardless of size, will have a clearly defined recovery strategy. The Agility RSI partnership helps extend our reach and takes us one step closer to achieving that goal.”

To prepare for a business interruption, many companies use internal recovery capabilities for some or all of their technology requirements. There are three primary reasons for this trend; the desire to minimize data loss through data replication, the need for quicker recovery through hot standby processors and the desire to reduce perceived high costs and high risks associated with commercial recovery vendors.
While internal recovery is a viable strategy for some businesses, there are many challenges that may encourage a business to consider alternate recovery tactics. For example, the initial costs required for building full recovery capability and the costs required to maintain a mirrored environment can be prohibitive and/or more judiciously allocated.

Another challenge to internal recovery is assuring the backup capability addresses the entire recovery workload not just the highest priority applications. Because it is difficult to separate the applications and data into logical workloads, it is difficult if not impossible to separate the highest priority applications at the internal recovery site and to use a commercial facility for other applications. As a result, those that desire high availability internally tend to have a fully redundant data center.
For businesses struggling with the challenges of recovery internally, QuickShip technology can play a very cost-effective role in strategic recovery efforts.

QuickShip Technology Solution
QuickShip technology vendors can supply companies the required servers, tape devices, printers, fax machines, PC's, network equipment – all within 12 to 24 hours. Ensure QuickShip solutions are fully testable and depending on recovery time objectives, can address requirements for Tier One, Tier Two and Tier Three applications. The benefits to utilizing a QuickShip solution in place of developing and maintaining a mirrored environment include:

• Reduced upfront and ongoing expenses:
o Purchase only the minimum amount of equipment needed in the first 24 hours
o Other back-up equipment does not have to be purchased and/or replaced
o Reduced requirements for maintenance, software, power and cooling
o Reduces duplication of upgrades and technology refreshes
• Save valuable time and resources
o Technology expertise and assistance available for implementation and trouble
shooting
o Consulting assistance to determine requirements, viable strategies and plan
development
• Utilize vendor's resource base instead of acquiring secondary equipment
o Application priorities should be able to be changed through simple changes to
the contract
o Ensure vendor will ship everything you need, exactly when you need it
o Additional production capability available for occasional or seasonal requirements
o Cost effective way to back up technology that is being phased out
• Address entire workload, not just priority applications.
o Ability to ship technology in waves within predetermined time frames according to
established recovery priorities

QuickShip can be a highly valuable addition to any internal recovery plan; reducing upfront and ongoing expenses and conserving valuable time and resources. Helping companies recover with less risk and less cost.
Paul Sullivan is VP and General Manager of Agility Recovery Solutions, the premier provider of disaster recovery and business continuity solutions across the United States and Canada . For more information about Agility's turn-key recovery solution visit www.agilityrecovery.com.

As a benefit of membership, IGAF Worldwide offers its 150 member firms a number of services and discounted rates with alliance partner companies around the world. The new partnership with Agility Recovery will offer IGAF Worldwide member firms discounted access to Agility Recovery’s ReadySuite service. Under the plan, within 48 hours of a business interruption, Agility will deliver whatever a firm needs to get back up and running and connected to customers, including:

• A mobile office, up to 48 seats
• Computer technology, up to 3 Intel servers
• Satellite capabilities for phone and Internet access
• Power generator
• Unlimited access to emergency hotline
• Roadmap to recovery plan
• Access to consulting services
• Testing options available

“As an association, IGAF Worldwide’s goal is provide our members with as many means as possible for improving individual firms’ practice development,” said Kevin Mead, Executive Director of IGAF Worldwide. “The ability to recover quickly from a disaster and provide much-needed services to clients can be a key component of effective practice management. We are very pleased to be able to offer access to Agility Recovery’s services to our members as a benefit of IGAF Worldwide membership.”

"When someone doesn't have a house, we don't have the luxury of saying we're in the same boat," said Sam Rogers Jr., chief financial officer of the insurance agency, which contracted with Charlotte, N.C.-based Agility Recovery Solutions.

Within 48 hours, the company will provide trailers for insurance agencies and other businesses to use if their home office is hit by a storm and they cannot use their equipment.

"The trailer comes with 10 computers, four satellite phones, a fax line and five Internet hookups," Rogers said. "We can take our backup data and put it into their computer system and continue to serve our clients."

Providing emergency service for the company's 13,000 customers is critical in times of a large natural disaster, he said.

Customers can upload information about damage to their homes or businesses, and it can then be transferred to a claims adjuster who will use the information when inspecting damaged structures, Rogers said.

Many companies might have a disaster-recovery plan for their data, but there are other important factors business owners and managers should consider before a natural disaster occurs, said Bob Boyd, president of Agility Recovery Solutions, which was founded 17 years ago.

"They might not necessarily know where their workers are going to go," he said. "Where are your people - the people who make your business function - going to work?"

Boyd said the disaster-recovery industry typically has focused on servicing the Fortune 1000 companies, including banks and insurance companies that are required to have data-recovery capability.

Since he joined Agility in 2004, he said, his focus has been "to bring the service to businesses that traditionally haven't had the ability to afford these services."

There is a yearly contract, and the cost begins at $250 per month, Boyd said.

The company provides two sizes for the mobile offices: a 12-foot-by-70-foot single-wide trailer for 18 people and a 24-foot-by-70-foot double-wide trailer for 50 people, he said.

"All (office) components needed to function are inside it."

Most clients need office space for between 50 and 100 people, he said.

After hurricanes Katrina and Wilma last year, Agility Recovery Solutions provided mobile offices to a total of 42 companies from Beaumont, Texas, to Miami.

Nearly two years ago, Agility began targeting three markets: insurance agencies, banks and credit unions, and Certified Public Accountants. Last quarter, it added 400 new clients, including medical facilities and retail and manufacturing companies, Boyd said.

He noted that Agility has signed up nearly 100 members of the Florida Association of Insurance Agents.

Rogers, of Rogers Gunter Vaughn Insurance, said that in addition to storms, the trailer could be used if the business's office is damaged by fire or rendered inoperable by some other event. "We've been lucky so far; we haven't had to use it," he said.

The Pensacola law firm of Beggs & Lane contracted with Agility in June for a double-wide trailer with nearly 50 work spaces and office equipment if a disaster occurs, said the firm's administrator, Ron Martin. It also will receive a generator for its building, he said.

"(Hurricane) Ivan hit us two years ago. We just got back into our building last August. We had to totally rebuild," Martin said, noting that employees had to relocate to five different sites. "I wanted to have a backup plan if we had another disaster like Ivan."and be there for your taxpayers.

By RICK ROTHACKER

A major uptown office tower could be closed at least a week after a burst water pipe shorted electrical systems, displacing tenants such as Wachovia Corp., accounting firm Grant Thornton and a radio studio.

The incident left companies scrambling for temporary space, instructing employees to work from home and moving computer servers to alternate locations. Yellow police tape cordoned off the main entrance Tuesday, and signs at other doors instructed employees to call managers.

The pipe failed around 1 a.m. Monday in the high-rise portion of the 27-story, black glass building at 201 S. College Street, said Mike Delev, general manager with Houston-based Hines Interests, a real estate firm that bought the building in June.

The leak short-circuited the building's electrical distribution system, Delev said, leaving a large portion of the tower without power. Property managers and outside experts are working to get the building "up and running," he said, declining to give an estimated time for the reopening.

A recording Tuesday at a phone number for the building said the tower would be closed until Sept. 24. Tenants found out about the problem early Monday and are being updated with conference calls.

Under escort, some tenants have been given limited access to the building to retrieve needed items, Delev said. Generators are providing emergency power.

Bob Boyd, chief executive of Charlotte business continuity firm Agility Recovery Solutions, said it was unusual to have a whole building knocked out by such an incident but noted businesses face numerous threats to operations. He urged companies to have backup plans for technology, office space, communications and other necessary functions.

Businesses "think that the risk of a disruption comes from a hurricane or earthquake or something major," said Boyd, who doesn't have any clients in the building. "Eighty-five percent of them are due to common things."

At the 25-year-old Charlotte Plaza building, the burst pipe knocked out a number of radio shows that originate from a street-level studio. The closure silenced Danny Fontana's talk show on WDYT-AM (1220) and the rest of the radio station's lineup, as well as the "Bill Rosinski Show" that airs on sports station WFNZ-AM (610 and 1660).

"It's really frustrating," Rosinski said. "I was all jacked up for the show on Monday because of the way the Panthers' game went. It's been tough to sit around on my thumbs with so much going on."

In the meantime, WFNZ has been airing Sporting News Radio's "Tony Bruno Show" in place of Rosinski's. Working with the property manager, the studio got power back late Tuesday and, barring any problems, planned to have its shows back on the air today, said Casey Shannon, executive vice president of CRN Communications, which produces the Fontana and Rosinski shows.

"It stings financially," Shannon said. "You're not putting on (advertising) spots that pay money."

Other tenants include investment bank Edgeview Partners, law firms and the restaurant Bentley's on 27. Wachovia, which has about 1,300 employees on 13 floors, told employees to work at home or sent them to other bank locations around town.

The closure came at a bad time for accounting firm Grant Thornton: The deadline for filing corporate tax returns following an extension was Monday. Luckily, the firm had already filed most of its clients' returns and was able to submit the remaining ones electronically from locations in Greensboro and Columbia, said Mike McGuire, Carolinas managing partner.

While many of the firm's accountants operate from client locations, about 100 administrative staff members need a place to work, McGuire said. While it waits for the building to reopen, the office is routing phone calls to Dallas, moving computer servers to Greensboro and taking temporary space on Tyvola Road.

"It's like we had a hurricane, but it only hit one building," he said.

Be Prepared

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security labels September "National Preparedness Month," encouraging individuals and businesses to be ready for emergencies. For more information, see www.ready.gov. Agility Recovery Solutions has posted information at www.preparemybusiness.com.

Start with a given: If you are a midsized company, you need to develop, test and maintain a comprehensive disaster recovery (DR) and business continuity plan. And, don't start with the excuses that you can't afford it, don't have the time and don't have the resources.

At least, that's the advice from IT managers who have had to rely on their disaster plans.

Christine Forbes, vice president for technology at St. Louis-based insurance company The Daniel and Henry Co., turned to her DR plan after a series of summer storms knocked out much of the electrical service in the city in 2006.

"Make sure you have a plan in place, and that you revisit it frequently. We did have a plan, and we realized it wasn't enough," Forbes said. "We were fortunate that we actually had revisited it before the power went out. So when it happened we had a much better plan in place." The DR plan allowed the agency to keep processing storm-related claims.

While the wrath of Mother Nature -- best exemplified by earthquakes and hurricanes such as Katrina -- has drawn attention to disaster planning, plenty of companies still fail to develop and test plans.

"People have started to think more about disaster recovery. But the struggle in SMBs has been how to do it in terms of manpower and money," said Gary Chen, a senior analyst at Yankee Group Research Inc. in Boston. "Disasters are more prevalent than people think. But it's usually the smaller stuff, things like doing construction and cutting power lines or plumbing lines." 
 
Get business buy-in. Companies that aren't planning for the worst run the risk of losing customers that require vendors to have a proven DR plan, being fined for lack of regulatory compliance, or even facing bankruptcy. Knowing the risks can help a CIO get executive and departmental backing for a plan.

"There is plenty of evidence that shows that if companies go offline for 10 days or more they have a better than 60% chance of going out of business," said Mike Karp, a senior analyst at Enterprise Management Associates in Boulder, Colo. "The CIO has to tell the CEO what the cost is of not doing it. If we spend a half million dollars on this, how much is it going to cost us if we don't do it? You start to lose customers, employees and customer satisfaction levels. All of these things start to pile up on the debit side of the ledger."

First planning steps

Forbes and others offered their advice on how to start preparing for a DR plan:

Make the commitment. "It's a lot of effort, it's an ongoing plan, and you have to constantly update it," Forbes said.

Have good backups. Swamy Gundar, director of IT at Sentry Credit Inc. in Seattle, advised, "Make sure you have backups of everything, most importantly base images of all your servers. If you do have to rebuild, you don't have to spend hours and hours searching for CDs or whatever."

Like Forbes, Gundar is a client of Agility Recovery Solutions Inc., a Charlotte, N.C.-based company that provides mobile data centers. Gundar also suggested IT professionals shouldn't trust tape. He backs up crucial data on at least two types of media in at least two locations.

Know what you need. One key to Gundar's plan is tracking which servers he has, the services they support and what licenses and access methods he needs in an emergency. "There is so much equipment that you may have and you don't realize you have that you don't realize are critical to a system until they go down," said Gundar, whose list of equipment and applications fills a 10-page spreadsheet.

Test. Forbes advised that companies go through the phone trees that will help to notify employees; practice evacuation of buildings; and test data restoration to make sure data is backed up properly. Gundar added that some of his clients require Sentry to not only have a recovery plan, but also to test it on a regular basis.

Identify which services must be restored immediately. "We have 15 servers here. We had to know what our critical services were. Was our BlackBerry server critical? Probably not, but email was," Forbes said.

Know what you will need if you move to a hot site or a mobile data center. Forbes and Gundar have done that with Agility Recovery. In testing his plan last year, Gundar discovered that he didn't have all of the CDs, licenses and access codes he needed. Forbes discovered that the satellite data services provided through a mobile center required a clear southern exposure.

Leverage relationships. Some of the insurance carriers that Forbes' agency works with had local office space where agency employees could utilize PCs, network access and fax machines. Other employees could work from home offices as long as the core servers were up.

Know who has to be involved in a recovery. Gundar said a plan must identify which employees should be in the building or backup data center, who is responsible for tasks such as rerouting phone service, and who should back up those people.

Learn from those who went before. Gundar noted that some organizations, in particular universities, may have posted their DR plans on the Internet. He said he encourages IT managers to use those plans as free guides for building or modifying their own plans.

James M. Connolly is a freelance writer based in Norwood, Mass. He can be reached at jamesmconnolly@verizon.net.

Gillis, Ellis & Baker Inc. pitches risk management as its overriding philosophy for clients, and by practicing what it preached, the New Orleans agency survived to serve battered clients and even kept growing after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

“The key to that was the disaster recovery program we established,” said W. Anderson Baker III, president of the Big Easy firm. “It allowed us to increase our penetration in the market. Certainly, that was not the design—the design was our survival—but it had that effect.”

He said the agency landed a lot of new clients after Katrina “by being there. Most agents are back, but many were unavailable for long periods of time.”

GEB didn’t do it alone. Two key support providers were Agility Recovery Service, based in Charlotte, N.C. (which also played a key role in helping companies devastated by the World Trade Center disaster in September 2001), and Artizan Internet Services, based in Windsor, Conn.

“In the spring of 2005, we recognized that the disaster plan for our own office was little more than a telephone tree and a backup tape for our data—what coat pocket did I leave it in?” Mr. Baker said. The agency contracted with Agility in spring 2005, paying $3,000 annually as a retainer.

Within two days of Hurricane Katrina hitting New Orleans on Monday, Aug. 29, 2005—damaging GEB’s offices across from the Superdome—Agility provided the agency with a trailer in Baton Rouge that contained computers, servers, satellite phones, fax machines, copiers, desks and chairs.

Ironically, the agency contracted with Artizan only several weeks before Hurricane Katrina hit, Mr. Baker recalled. They were hired as part of the firm’s contingency planning of what to do if dislocated.

“We asked, ‘If the building exploded, what would happen to our data?’ So, by coincidence, we hired Artizan and uploaded data weekly to them beginning perhaps two weeks before [Katrina]. We uploaded our data to them just before the storm hit,” he said, noting the service cost only a few hundred dollars in advance.

Mr. Baker was at his country home in Mississippi when the storm hit Monday. The closest phone was in Jackson, Miss., two-and-a-half hours away in the office of Fox-Everett, another Assurex Global partner agency.

Mr. Baker got to Baton Rouge and the trailer provided by Agility on Thursday. Artizan, he said, was taking claims for them by Wednesday. “They were handling claims for you two days after the storm, automatically,” he said. “Then they started charging us pennies per call, plus phone time. The cost was insignificant and paid for by our insurers.”

Mr. Baker said the trailer was “nailed down” by Saturday, and his agency was back in business by Monday, with all electronics up and running. Employees started filtering in by Monday as well.

“There was no rhyme or reason to where they stayed,” Mr. Baker said. He estimated it was about a 10-hour drive from New Orleans to Baton Rouge because of storm damage to roads—normally a 90-minute trip.

“Underwriters paid most of the claims submitted directly,” he said. “But no one had a permanent address anymore. People were staying in Houston, Memphis, even Atlanta. People just went to various post offices and filled out change of address forms.” Clients ranged from homeowners to multihospital systems, “and about 95 percent of them had claims,” he noted.

The agency’s evacuated offices in New Orleans contained 14,000 square feet, so it was also quite an adjustment to set up shop in Baton Rouge—working out of a 500-square foot trailer.

Subsequent to the trailer, Mr. Baker said, the agency found semi-permanent space of 1,500 feet, “class C space at best,” in Baton Rouge. The agency returned to its own quarters in November 2005—not too bad considering the storm’s massive destruction.

“What is important to note about this agency is that their employees are forward-looking,” said W. Taylor Busby, marketing director of Agility, noting that GEB had two main concerns—getting up and running, and helping clients get back up to speed as well.

Both Mr. Busby and Mr. Baker cited a New Orleans law firm for which GEB did a presentation about how important it is to do advanced disaster planning for a potential recovery. Now, that client is saying, “‘If it were not for Gillis, Ellis & Baker, we do not know what we would have done [as a result of Katrina],’” Mr. Busby said.

Maintain Communication

• Create a phone tree with the landline phone number of where employees will most likely evacuate. Prepared as if cellular service will not be available.
• Create an employee e-mail list containing personal e-mail addresses for use if company e-mail is unavailable.
• Establish an online message board for continuous employee communication during an interruption.
• Schedule daily conference calls to keep employees up to date on emergency situation.

HR and Financial Information

• Ensure payroll continuity through an interruption to increase employee loyalty and encourage a speedy return to work when operations are restored.
• Develop an overtime pay policy for employees who may work extra shifts.
• Cash is king: keep extra cash on hand for unexpected expenses.
• Be flexible with employees who experience a personal loss; additional personal time may be required. Transportation, housing and childcare may be compromised in the aftermath of the disaster and employers should take into consideration alternative means for their employees.
• Plan for professional counseling and support for employees who may be dealing with personal losses.

Agility is preparing for the potential of hundreds of business recoveries in the wake of the wildfires. If needed, Agility will deliver its clients the ReadySuite mobile recovery solution, which includes any or all of the four key elements of recovery:

POWER – Generators
TECHNOLOGY – PCs, servers, tape drives, printers and fax machines
SPACE – Office space complete with desks and chairs
CONNECTIVITY – Satellite for voice and Internet access

In addition to the four elements of recovery, Agility has technical and logistical resources ready to mobilize and install equipment at member locations.

Agility has experience responding to hundreds of organizations following local and regional disasters, including but not limited to hurricanes Wilma, Rita and Katrina and the events of Sept. 11, 2001. In its 18-year history, Agility has maintained a 100 percent success rate in recovering its clients.

"The impact of a business interruption can be stunning," said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions. "Statistics indicate that about 60% of the businesses affected by a disaster will not survive because they do not have a recovery plan in place."

Creating a basic, executable and up-to-date disaster recovery plan is one of the most important steps businesses can take to protect themselves and assure business as usual - no matter what the scenario.

When Kettering Tower in Dayton was devastated by fire in October 2006, Society member William Duncan’s CPA firm, Thorn, Lewis and Duncan, relied on their business continuity plan to keep their business operating.

About 60% of the businesses affected by a disaster will not survive because they do not have a recovery plan in place.

"We were very fortunate to suffer only minor water damage and no smoke damage," Duncan said "We had backed up our files daily; so when we were forced to evacuate our office, we could still access the files we needed to keep working."

Having the files, hardware and software your business depends upon, along with a secondary location from which to operate, are key features of any plan. Below are ten key steps to developing a successful business continuity plan.

1.  Assess your risk - both internally and externally.

Which disasters will most likely impact your business?! Though major disasters dominate the headlines, most business interruptions are caused by everyday events such as power outages, human error and technology failure. It is important to assess the risk for catastrophic occurrences, such as fire or flood. However, it is equally if not more important, to assess exposure to more commonplace risks.

When floods devastated many Findlay area businesses last August, Moses & Dieterly CPAs Inc. was spared, but they weren't as fortunate in regards to their water heater.  "We came in one morning and found the water heater had burst, leaving more than an inch of water in the office,"
Donald Dieterly, CPA said. "We keep all our paperwork away from the floor now."

2. Assess critical business functions.

Evaluate and document how your company functions and determine which processes, employees, equipment and materials are critical for your daily operations. Critical business functions include: billing, payroll and service fulfillment. List these functions and determine a process for restoring them in the event of an interruption.

3. Plan for an alternative site.

What would you do if your building was inaccessible tomorrow? Where would you go to continue basic business operations? Review your site requirements and determine a plan for recovery. Alternate site options include employee's homes, a branch or second location, the site of a similar business, or a vendor that provides mobile recovery.
For Thorn, Lewis and Duncan their alternate site included William Duncan's basement.
"Our plan was to move the server to my basement and that worked well for us," Duncan said. "We could access the files we needed to then work from our clients' offices."

4. Consider supply chain preparedness.

Even if your business has a continuity plan, what about key vendors? Business continuity plans include maintaining supply chain logistics in the event of a disaster. Talk to your key vendors and suppliers about their recovery plans. Develop relationships with alternate vendors in case your primary vendors experience an interruption.

5. Appoint a crisis manager and develop an emergency management plan.

Planning what to do after a disaster is just as important as what to do beforehand. A crisis manager and sound emergency management plan help facilitate a smooth transition between normal business operations and catastrophe response.

6. Back up your data.

In today's highly technical economy, information is more valuable than ever. Having an automated, daily backup system for important data is crucial. Be sure to store your data in an offsite, safe, and secure location, preferably 50 miles or more from your site. Periodically checking that the back-up is working correctly is also important, along with making sure your business has the hardware and software needed to successfully access this information.

"We did not have a list of each employee's hardware and software before the fire," Duncan said. "Had we experienced a catastrophic event, it would have taken us several days to figure out what equipment needed replaced." Realizing this deficiency in his continuity plan, Duncan's CPA firm now keeps an updated list, saved both on- and offsite, of all hardware and software used by the firm.

"In the case of a dire emergency, having that information will make it easier for us to order the computers and all the necessary software we require to be back up and running within three days," Duncan said.

Dieterly agrees that having a list of the hardware and software his firm needs would be invaluable in a dire emergency.  "If we had not been spared from the flood waters, we could have been at a total loss," Dieterly said. "We always back up our files offsite, but we did not have a list of computer vendors or the tax programs and other software we would need replaced to run effectively. In our new plan we will keep lists of all this information as well as the contact information for all our clients’ offsite."

7. Create an employee, vendor and key client communication plan.

Develop a 24-hour phone tree for all employees and their spouses or closest relatives and keep it up to date. Make sure your employees know ahead of time how to exchange or obtain information should standard lines of communication fail. Also, compile a list of your critical clients and vendors and store it in an offsite location. Determine a process for contacting them should your systems go down.

8. Assemble an emergency kit

An emergency or disaster recovery kit should contain items such as fresh water, non-perishable food, flashlights, extra batteries, battery-powered AM/FM radio, first aid kit and copies of important documents and records. For a complete list of recommended items, visit www.Ready.gov, an emergency preparedness site from the Department of Homeland Security.
9. Take a look at your insurance coverage.

Is your insurance coverage adequate? Sit down with your agent to make sure you are insured for potential risks. Make sure you keep photos of your building, equipment lists and policy information stored in a safe and secure offsite location.

10. Test your plan.

Make sure your plan is workable - annually test the plan and update it as necessary. Make sure to re-educate employees when any changes to the plan are made.

Having seen their plan in action, Thorn, Lewis and Duncan changed some key aspects of how the firm does business. "We were taking baby steps toward becoming paperless before the fire, but now we have accelerated that process," Duncan said.  “Last year, we successfully moved all our accounting and auditing files to a paperless format, and we are doing the same with our tax files in 2008. This way we can be sure we have all the information we need in case of another emergency."

The Ohio Society of CPAs has partnered with Agility Recovery Solutions to offer discounted services for Ohio Society members. Agility provides complete services, including power solutions, remote work spaces, computer equipment, data backup solutions, and emergency Internet connectivity. For information, call Agility at 866.364.9696 or visit www.agilityrecovery.com.

Additional Resources
A Guide, to Business Continuity Planning
By James C. Bames

Business Continuity Planning: A Step-by-Step Guide with Planning Forms on CD-ROM
By Kenneth L. Fulmer, CBCP

"CMRM: Advanced Business Continuity Planning & Management Course"
By Sentryx

Homeland Security’s Ready Business
http://www.ready.gov/business/index.html

FFIEC Information Technology Examination Handbook
http://www.ffiec.gov/ffiecinfobase/html_pages/it_0l.html

Agility’s ReadySuite disaster recovery solution provides financial institutions with access to the critical resources needed after an interruption. Open Solutions members and clients will have access to fully-equipped workstations, in which key personnel can conduct important business operations through temporary connections until the permanent facility is back online. With nearly 100,000 mobile office units across the United States and Canada, a unit can be shipped to an institution within 48 hours of a disaster declaration. These mobile office units are wired for voice and data communications and designed to fulfill institutions’ requirements for short-, medium- or long-term usage.

“Financial institutions are expected to be in constant operation, period. Clients count on them to be accessible, especially during times of unfortunate devastation, ” Taylor Busby, vice president, marketing, Agility Recovery Solutions, said. “Our ReadySuite solution lets institutions quickly and effortlessly regain operations after an interruption, providing clients with the instant responsiveness that they must have. Through our partnership with Open Solutions, we will be able to extend that responsiveness to their clients, and we are excited to provide them with solid disaster recovery options.”

“Credit union and banking clients must stay continuously linked to customers and members during natural disasters to successfully operate their businesses and provide customers and members with the best service possible. And, disasters strike when you least expect it,” Michael Nicastro, senior vice president and CMO of Open Solutions Inc., said. “But having a viable solution that allows an institution to quickly reconvene business rather than halting all client transactions and inquiries is imperative to a successful disaster recovery plan. Agility is regarded as a reliable and key provider of disaster recovery solutions, with a 100 percent success rate, including close to 40 recoveries in the wake of the 2005 hurricane season. We know definitively that our partnership with Agility will greatly benefit our client base.”

As a company, we strive to provide members with the absolute highest level of protection, consistent innovation and unmatched knowledge in the areas of disaster recovery and business continuity. Over the years to come, we promise to continue to provide our members with continuity services that are affordable, simple and easy to use.

Our dedication to industry innovation is evident in the strategies we’ve put into place in recent years:

• MyAgility, our online planning portal, added significant depth and functionality to your Recovery Roadmap.
• Agility’s alert notification system allows you to send text and e-mail messages at the push of a button.
• New telephone redirection capabilities aid our members within the first 24 hours of recovery.
• We doubled our satellite capability in an effort to provide unprecedented flexibility and connectivity. 
• Our educational Webinar series helps thousands of members each year strengthen their resiliency programs. (We have 39 Webinars planned for 2008.)
• Our technological arsenal was upgraded with new Blade and P-series servers, Vista and multiple tape drive formats.
• We added a Phoenix distribution center for faster deployment of resources.
• Our recently-expanded testing program provides a level of service unprecedented in the industry.
• Lastly, your recovery options at time of recovery are enhanced through our established relationships with Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs). Mobile recovery is no longer your only option.

If you have any questions or want to speak with a client services representative, please call 866-364-9696.

Thank you for your business and for the trust you place in ours.

Bob Boyd
President & CEO

Contact: Lee Freedman (C: 704-287-6150; lee.freedman@agilityrecovery.com)

Agility Recovery Solutions Recovering Businesses in Iowa and Montreal.
Four “disaster declares” and 13 “alerts” received by disaster recovery company.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (June 17, 2008) – Agility Recovery Solutions, a provider of disaster recovery and business continuity solutions to companies throughout North America, is currently recovering key operations at businesses in Iowa and Montreal. In addition, Agility is working with other businesses to determine recovery strategies.

When an Agility member declares a disaster, Agility delivers any or all of the four key elements of recovery, including power, technology, space and connectivity resources.

Agility is currently recovering four member-companies’ operations:

• A foodservice vendor in Cedar Falls, Iowa, lost its Internet access, a critical function of its front-office operation. Agility restored connectivity with a satellite dish within 24 hours of the disaster declaration.
  
• An insurance agency in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, received a generator and satellite connection from Agility within 24 hours of the disaster declaration.
  
• In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, a large financial sector of a Fortune 500 company required 100 laptop computers for use by employees displaced by the flooding. The laptops arrived onsite within 24 hours of the disaster declaration.
  
• Unrelated to the flooding in Iowa, a Montreal-based insurance division of a global financial services company experienced severe damage from a tornado and hail storm. Agility-provided mobile office space, generator, satellite connectivity and technology is onsite. The company’s operations were restored on June 17.

In addition to the recoveries, Agility is working with 13 other Iowa businesses. These businesses are on “alert” status, meaning they’re experiencing a threat to their operations but have not yet initiated an Agility recovery.

“We’re monitoring disaster activity throughout North America and are ready to deploy resources to members in need,” said Bob Boyd, Agility’s president and CEO. “Our promise is to deliver within 48 hours. I’m happy to say we’ve cut that timeframe in half and have had our members up-and-running when they needed us most.”

About Agility
Agility specializes in disaster recovery and business continuity businesses of all sizes. Within 48 hours, Agility delivers equipment and helps restore normal operations. Agility membership begins at $250 per month. If an Agility member requires assistance, it pays all the costs associated with the recovery. Agility does not profit on disaster recoveries.

More information is available at AgilityRecovery.com.

The original text is available at
http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/midwest/2008/06/20/91195.htm

The endless rains and floods in Iowa have wreaked havoc on businesses there and a Queen City company is among those coming to the rescue.

Locally based Agility Recovery Solutions works with companies nationwide on disaster preparation and relief. Companies large and small buy monthly memberships starting at $250 and up in exchange for Agility's ongoing consulting and recovery services.

That explains how a Cedar Falls food company and two insurance agencies in Cedar Rapids looked to Charlotte for help when the floods came this month.

For the food company, Agility restored Internet service within a day-and-a-half, shipping a satellite dish and finding a link to get the company back online. One of the insurance companies lost power and Internet service, with Agility providing a generator and a satellite dish. For the other firm, Agility delivered 100 laptops for employees within 17 hours of the request.

"They're paying to have us there when they need us," says Lee Freedman, Agility communications manager. "When things like this happen, most of us are trying to figure out our personal lives. That's where our service comes in, we help figure out your business life."

And it seems there is no shortage of work.

By Lauren Berry
lberry@charlotteobserver.com

With employees and customers at stake, businesses have to be ready for anything, from hurricanes to power outages.

So Bob Boyd and his team at Charlotte-based Agility Recovery Solutions helps their 3,000 subscriber businesses develop plans to handle every type of disaster before it happens – and put those plans into place once it does.

Boyd said Agility has worked with everyone from food distributors to credit unions facing everything from server failures to flooded offices.

The company's ability to bail businesses out when times get rough have been tested by Hurricane Katrina and, most recently, by this summer's flooding in the Midwest.

Boyd said Agility has increased its client list by about 125 percent a year since its 2001 start.

Here, he talks about how disaster planning works for businesses. Comments are edited for clarity and brevity.

Q: What kind of companies do you most often work with?

You name it, we've written it – we've really worked with companies across the board. But the largest companies, they already have very complex disaster recovery programs and, in some cases, they don't have the same risk.

With a large chain, something goes wrong at one location, you can go to another one. But with small businesses, that's not an option. Most of our customers have one to five locations with 25 to 200 employees at those locations.

We went to the insurance world, the banking world and the CPA (certified public accounting) world to start off with. With insurance they already understand risk, so we figured they would be more apt to buy.

Every small business goes to their insurance agency, goes to their banks, their CPAs – now, when they go there, they're going to hear our name.

Q: What was the largest disaster that your company has worked with?

Hurricane Katrina, just in terms of scale and scope. The entire landscape and all of the basic infrastructure was destroyed. We had 50 members in the direct path and 25 recoveries that were made.

The floods in the Midwest had the potential to rival that; had the levies downstream broken, a number of other places would have flooded. We were lucky to only have to make four recoveries out of 100 members.

Q: What is the first issue to be addressed when dealing with a disaster?

Planning. It's hard to address a disaster if you don't have a plan beforehand.

You have to realize that, if your interruption is specific to your business, it only affects you. But if it's something that's widespread, you're fighting against everything else. You need a generator – well, guess what, so does everyone else.

Consider Hurricane Hugo – a chainsaw that cost $60 one day cost $300 the day after Hugo hits. If you're a company, you have to already know how you're going to get that chainsaw.

Q: What do you think is the most important thing to look for in an employee?

It's really all about passion. When it comes down to it, we're all about trying to help people. We're really in the business of doing good, and there are very few businesses that can say that.

We look for highly customer-service-focused individuals – you have to have that. Disaster can happen at anytime, so we need someone who's willing to go out there and do their job at 3 in the morning.

Agility provides mobile disaster recovery in the event of a business interruption, such as a natural or man-made disaster. If an Agility member ever experiences an interruption, Agility will provide any or all of the four key elements of recovery: power, technology, space and connectivity within 48 hours. The ReadySuite Financial solution for banks and credit unions provides a mobile branch, complete with teller counters, manager's office, computers, servers, satellite for Internet and phone, power generator and more.

Also, as part of the solution, ReadySuite members have access to Agility's $35 million in technology resources to resolve server failures, power outages or any other service interruption.

"In the wake of the recent floods in Iowa, many businesses realized how vulnerable they were by only having a data back-up plan," said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility. "Your data may be ready to use, but what will you do if your building is flooded? People recovery should be a mandatory piece of any disaster recovery plan and Fifth Third officials truly understand this need."

"As a processing partner, we need to ensure that our financial institutions have products and services to meet all of their needs, even in the event of a disaster," says Angela Brown, senior vice president and general manager of Financial Institution Services, Fifth Third Processing Solutions. "We're committed to our clients' success and longevity. Our financial institution clients have commitments to their customers, members, employees and partners, who expect and rely on their services, no matter the situation. Agility's solutions offer our clients access to the most robust disaster planning and recovery solutions in the market."

About Fifth Third Processing Solutions
Fifth Third Processing Solutions processes over 26.7 billion ATM and POS transactions per year for more than 2,880 financial institutions and over 158,356 retail locations worldwide, including the Armed Forces Financial Network (AFFN), First Niagara Financial Group, Sovereign Bank, The Kroger Co., AutoZone, Abercrombie & Fitch and The Finish Line. Annually, Fifth Third processes $179.1 billion in credit card sales. According to The Nilson Report (March 2008), Fifth Third Bank is the fourth largest bankcard acquirer.

About Agility Recovery Solutions
Agility Recovery Solutions is a former division of GE with 18 years of disaster recovery and business continuity experience. Agility helps businesses restore their operations and recover their people after a business interruption. The company's turnkey, packaged recovery solutions are available to businesses across North America. Visit www.AgilityRecovery.com for more information.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Agility Recovery Solutions is partnering with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and its National Preparedness Month initiative for the fourth consecutive year. National Preparedness Month is each September and is a nationwide effort to encourage Americans to develop disaster recovery plans to prepare for emergencies.

Agility will offer four free disaster recovery webinars throughout the month for organizations and individuals to learn more about emergency planning in their workplace, communities and homes. Topics include:

Sept. 3, 2008 – 10 Steps to Business Preparedness
Sept. 10, 2008 – The Human(e) Side of Crisis Management
Sept. 17, 2008 – How Effective is Your Business Continuity Plan? Be Informed!
Sept. 24, 2008 – Give Back! Easy Steps to Help Prepare Your Community

Webinars are at 2 p.m. EDT and will feature nationally-known experts. More information is available at www.preparemybusiness.com.

“America’s businesses form the backbone of our economy; small businesses alone account for more than 99 percent of all companies and provide nearly 45 percent of the nation’s payroll,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility, a provider of disaster recovery services throughout North America. “Yet, these businesses are the ones who have historically been unprepared in regards to business continuity plans.

“We believe that every business – regardless of size – should have a disaster recovery plan in place so that they can stay in business. National Preparedness Month is the perfect venue for us to educate the general public on the basics of disaster recovery and business continuity planning.” 

More information about the partners and events for National Preparedness Month can be found at www.ready.gov

###

ABOUT AGILITY RECOVERY SOLUTIONS
Agility Recovery Solutions is a North American leader in on-site disaster recovery and business continuity solutions. Within 48 hours of an interruption, Agility provides businesses with a self-sustainable mobile office environment complete with desks and chairs, computers, servers, power generator, satellite communications and more. The company is based in Charlotte, N.C., and has offices in Toronto, Atlanta and Phoenix. Learn more at www.AgilityRecovery.com.

CONTACT:
Lee Freedman
Agility Recovery Solutions
lee.freedman@agilityrecovery.com
(704) 927-7931

The following article was printed in The Buffalo News on Sept. 1, 2008. The original version of the story can be seen at: http://www.buffalonews.com/145/story/428095.html

By Jonathan D. Epstein NEWS BUSINESS REPORTER

HSBC Bank USA has struggled mightily to recover from the crash of a key computer system two weeks ago, but it could have been a lot worse if the banking giant hadn’t had a backup plan and system in place.

That’s why experts say it’s critically important for businesses of all sizes to develop contingency plans and back up their computer systems in case of a disaster or crisis of any kind. And the same applies for individuals with home computers.

Such preparation, including designation of a single coordinator, will ensure that a business can get back on its feet quickly and restore operations and service to customers with minimal or no interruption. It could even mean the difference between survival and failure.

“When you’re in a crisis situation or disaster situation, you need a crisis management plan in place,” said Paul Sullivan, vice president and general manager of Agility Recovery Solutions, a disaster recovery firm in Mississauga, Ont., that has clients in Western New York.

“If you’re not handling the crisis effectively, you will eventually get back up, but you will either have spent too much money, made errors in how you spent the money, and you will have taken a lot longer than what normally would have occurred.”

Similarly, he said, backing up a home computer can make the difference between an easy recovery of personal information, e-mail addresses and files, or enormous frustration and loss.

“You can almost equate it to losing your wallet,” Sullivan said. “Losing your desktop is the same kind of thing. If . . . it’s destroyed, lost or stolen, think about the effect it has on your life.”

Wholesale insurance brokerage H. R. Keller and Co. hadn’t updated its outdated contingency plan in more than 20 years, and it was focused on computer backups. So owner and president Eric P. Keller knew he had to upgrade his preparations.

The 44-year-old Tonawanda company and its 32 employees provide about 1,200 retail insurance agencies in New York and Pennsylvania with hard-to-place property and casualty insurance coverage, mostly for their business clients.

“If there is some major disaster, somebody in the insurance business needs to be there to respond,” Keller said. “We’ve got customers records here. We’ve got to be here.”

And while a lot of businesses have “business interruption” insurance coverage, Keller said that doesn’t replace planning. “Without any plan, your business interruption plan would take care of the costs, but it doesn’t figure out for you how to do it,” he said.

The issue of contingency plans gained attention here after HSBC’s core banking computer system went

down Aug. 15 because of a faulty disk in its data storage system. The bank spent the next 10 days repairing the problem, restoring data, and catching up on transactions so that customer accounts could be properly updated. Customers are still reporting sporadic problems, but most issues have since been resolved.

The bank’s problems were minimized compared to what could have happened. The computer crash affected only the posting of transactions that had just occurred or that were being processed at that time and over the coming days.

That’s because the bank had backup electronic records of all the accounts and prior transactions, enabling it to quickly restart using the most recent backup and begin the catch-up work from there. And the bank has a “robust contingency plan and invoked it when this issue arose,” enabling it to tackle the problem right away, said spokeswoman Linda Recupero.

“Contingency plans for all areas of our bank are vital not only to doing business, but to safe and expeditious recovery when an issue like this occurs,” she said.

In HSBC’s case, banks are required by their regulators to have such emergency plans and systems in place, so there was no choice about doing so for the British banking giant. And many other large businesses are sophisticated enough to make similar preparations.

But a lot of smaller businesses don’t, or they don’t fully consider and prepare for all the possible scenarios, leaving them vulnerable when a crisis hits. In particular, while many businesses today back up their computer files and data, many don’t store the backups safely.

“They’ll back up the data and put the tape on top of the server,” Sullivan said. “What they didn’t do is take the tape and store it somewhere away from that server, even outside that city.”

That became a particular issue for businesses in New Orleans that had backed up their data and stored it down the street or several blocks away. When Hurricane Katrina flooded the entire city, “they lost everything,” Sullivan said.

The same is true for individuals. Individuals today use their home computers or laptops for electronic banking, online shopping, storing personal information and documents.

But storing a backup of your home computer in a desk drawer won’t help if your home is destroyed. Instead, Sullivan says, ship it to a friend or relative, or use a free or low-cost service.

Emergency planning also means considering factors outside your control. For example, Agility has customers in Iowa whose buildings and property were undamaged by recent flooding. But their telecommunications and power providers were underwater or otherwise impaired, leaving the businesses unable to fully function.

“They had a backup plan, but they were reliant on the outside supply chain for their network and power,” Sullivan said.

And flooding can also occur from something more mundane, like a pipe bursting in a shared office building.

But such natural disasters and physical damage represents only about 20 percent of the problems businesses can experience, Sullivan said. The rest, especially telecommunications outages, are more routine or day-to-day in nature.

That’s why he urges businesses to talk to their service providers, such as the phone or utility company, and make sure they have their own emergency plans and test them.

And even if companies have a disaster recovery plan dealing with their data, Sullivan said less than half of businesses have a business continuity plan dealing with protecting their business operations and employees.

Companies like Agility help clients develop emergency backup plans, and also provide assistance during a crisis. Such arrangements can also be made without outside help.

That could include going to a backup “hot site” to operate from temporarily or bringing in a mobile trailer so employees don’t have to travel a long distance. It also includes being ready to bring in emergency generators, extra computer equipment and phones, as well as arranging for satellite or other communications setups if the regular office is not available.

Keller used Agility’s organizational package to map out how it would respond to a disaster, creating checklists and lists of equipment and licensing information so employees would know “exactly what needs to be done, every step of the way, in the event something happens.” Agility has one copy, and Keller stored two copies off-site in different places.

Keller also took Agility’s advice and contacted the town building department to get advance permission to bring in trailers in case “our building burned down one night.” Agility stores such temporary office trailers in Mississauga and Syracuse.

Those preparations paid off sooner than Keller would have expected. When the October Surprise storm struck in 2006, the agency lost power for more than three days and needed a generator. Agility drove in a diesel- powered trailer, and an electrician switched the main electrical panel from the public power system to the generator.

“We fired it up and there was enough power [to] run everything,” Keller said.

Even so, not everything worked as planned. Keller had prearranged with Noco to get diesel fuel for the generator. But Noco’s power was also out. Keller couldn’t even call them.

“I drove over to their depot because their phone system wasn’t working,” he said.

The following article was printed in the Dexter Daily Statesman on February 1, 2009. The original version of the story can be seen at: http://www.dailystatesman.com/story/1497919.html

For every person without power following this week's ice storm, there is a story. For every face in every shelter, there is a story. And, for every volunteer who made a difference in a storm victim's life this week, there is a story.
Ironicallly, some of those stories unfolded within the walls of a local insurance agency located in downtown Dexter.

Alan Hedrick, owner of County Wide Insurance, explains what brought about 40 cold and displaced residents from the worst ice storm in the Bootheel's history into the confines of his hometown insurance office.

Hedrick explains, "When Katrina hit and we went down to help with that effort, it started me thinking about catastrophic circumstances and how we'd be equipped to handle a situation of such gravity in our area. Businesswise, we entered into an agreement with a company called Agility Recovery and for a monthly premium, we are granted the option to call upon them in the event of an emergency for such things as power, internet service, or office space. It's kind of like having insurance for insurance."

Hedrick confirms, "Any company can do this. It's just about helping your own. We just felt that it was an important step to take in light of recent disasters, but of course we never thought we'd need to apply it so soon, but here we are."

When the ice storm ravaged the Bootheel this week, leaving every home and business in Dexter powerless, Hedrick, along with business associate Jason Comfort, reached City Administrator Mark Stidham and without any kind of floorplan, quickly established a warming shelter at Hedrick's downtown office facility at the corner of Walnut and Vine Streets.

A 125 watt generator was put into place in a matter of hours, brining warmth and lighting back into the frigid walls of the brick building. Then, as the city began to receive residents to be housed at the already-established Park Lane Shelter at the old high school gym, word was spread that the offices of County Wide would also be available. The emphasis was placed upon taking in those with special health concerns, since the facility was smaller and granted readily available refrigeration for medications and special dietary items.

"We filled up pretty quickly," Hedrick says, "and we've met some very gracious and special folks that we would probably have never had the opportunity to meet."

One of those special folks is 90-year old Warren Fisher, who resides alone in a house southwest of the city. His neighbor across the road happens to be Stoddard County Deputy Tom Horton, who delivered his good neighbor to the safe haven of County Wide until the area's power was brought back up.

In his 90 years, Fisher hasn't witnessed any storm that compares to this week's.

"I've never seen anything quite like it," Fisher says of the destruction all over town, "and I have to tell you I didn't mind it too much, but I really don't want to see it again!"

Warren Fisher has made a few new friends during his stay at County Wide.

"He's been one of our favorites," Hedrick admits. "He's just been a joy and we've enjoyed this time that we've been afforded to get to know him. He is a gentleman and he's brought a smile to all our faces."

As the temporary guests of County Wide meander through the lobby and hallways of the office, business amazingly is proceeding as normal. As the misplaced parties are reading to their children or retrieving their medications from the company refrigerator and as small children are playing tag between the cots and woolen blankets, a dedicated staff is busy taking client's calls and responding to the needs of their insureds as if it's just another day on the job.

Hedrick is quick to say that it's all about teamwork.

"I didn't make this possible," he says. "It's all about teamwork and I can't say enough about the team here who made it possible to make life a little more bearable during these extreme conditions. This is not about any one individual. It's about a team of people who came together to lighten the burden of some of our close neighbors in need and it warmed our hearts as much as their hands to be a part of it."

"We've witnessed an incredible coming together of hearts and hands during this crisis and we owe the city of Dexter's government officials for working together and seeing to the needs of our own. I can only say that I'm proud to have been a small part of that operation," Hedrick attests.

Keith Oufnac, MBA, CISSP, describes himself as “the epitome of the anal-retentive network administrator.” A certified information systems security professional, Oufnac has been with Eustis Insurance & Benefits for about eight years in the role of information technology director.

He believes strongly that the agency’s data is the lifeblood of the enterprise. That belief, and his attention to detail, have served the Eustis organization well. Responsible for the technology needs of some 120 employees and locations in New Orleans, Baton Rouge and Mandeville, Louisiana, and Houston, Texas, Oufnac quips that he takes care of “anybody who gets electricity” in the Eustis operation. He’s been a busy guy—very busy in fact, since the agency staff has quadrupled since he came on board. Mix in a few disasters with the growth and you understand just how busy he’s been.

Hurricane Katrina devastated the Eustis New Orleans location in late August 2005. Hurricane Gustav blew across Louisiana in early September 2008, giving the agency an opportunity to test some revisions that had been made to its disaster plan following Katrina. Less than two weeks later, Hurricane Ike, said to be the third most destructive hurricane to make landfall in the United States, hammered the Houston office.

With that breadth of experience, Oufnac shared some “lessons learned” during a standing room-only session at the 2008 Applied Systems Client Network TENCon.

The primary lesson learned was the importance of having formal agreements with the right resources. At the top of the list of resources for Eustis was Agility Recovery Solutions™. (For more information about Agility, see “Survive and Thrive,” in the June 2006 issue of Rough Notes.) With the tag line, “Business as usual. No matter what,” Agility delivers power, technical, and connectivity resources as well as temporary mobile locations to organizations whose operations have been disrupted.

Agility’s understanding of how urgent it is for insurance agencies to get back on their feet following a business disruption is reflected by its pledge: “We protect your promise.”

Eustis’ contract with Agility had been in effect for just two months when Katrina hit, Oufnac recalls. According to the plan, which he and Agility had laid out, a doublewide trailer equipped with 48 workstations was set up behind the agency’s Baton Rouge location. “We were in that trailer like a bunch of sardines, but we had a place to work,” he remembers.

Following Katrina, Oufnac says the agency set up a contract with an oil and gas distributor that happens to be a client. That assures Eustis availability of fuel for the generators that Agility provides.

Another post-Katrina decision was to formalize a plan with the local radio station—the only station still operational after the storm. The agency had been running regular radio spots that focused on the “Eustis Advantage,” Oufnac explains.

However, after Katrina, he says the agency realized it needed to get its name out in a different way before, during and after a disaster. There is now a series of four spots that are played as circumstances change, Oufnac points out. If there is a hurricane watch, the “time to get prepared” message runs. If conditions worsen, the content of the message expresses more urgency as well. And if there is another storm like Katrina, Eustis will run ads at the top and bottom of the hour, informing clients of agency contact information, claim handling procedures and safety tips.

Having an agreement with a dependable outside consultant should be part of any agency’s disaster plan, Oufnac notes. “That person needs to be your best friend,” he says with a smile. “Even if an agency does its own IT, it is a lot of work after a disaster to get everything back up and running. And if your IT person is incapacitated, there has to be somebody else who can step in. If your in-house person is not available, who’s next in line? That needs to be part of a disaster recovery plan as well,” he states.

Of course, there are a lot of agencies where the person in charge of the technology is a principal, a bookkeeper or a CSR as well. “That person probably isn’t going to be able to pull everything together as quickly as necessary following a major disaster, given their other responsibilities,” Oufnac offers. “You need to have an ‘on-call’ relationship with an outside consultant for those instances.”

“Crash bags” and “black boxes” are also integral following any kind of disaster. Oufnac explains that he keeps a backpack in his office to grab whether there’s a fire or a hurricane. He says this “crash bag” includes CDs of the agency’s Windows operating system; the latest version of TAM, the agency’s management system; a backup that is no more than a week old; copies of the licenses for Microsoft Office; a network switch and some network cables—“just in case we get somewhere where there are computers, but no way to group them together,” he says.

He recommends a personal crash bag as well—in case an individual has to quickly evacuate their home. It should contain birth certificates, insurance policies, prescription information, for instance.

Eustis provides “black boxes” to the members of the agency catastrophe committee as well as the producers. Oufnac says the “basic” producer black box contains a hard copy and a CD of their customer list. It also includes a copy of the catastrophe plan, a “catastrophe phone,” pens and paper. From there he recommends that producers stock their black box with whatever they will need to service their clients for about a week.

The catastrophe phone is a cell phone that has an Atlanta, Georgia, area code—well away from any of the Eustis locations. Oufnac acknowledges that there is an expense associated with maintaining these phones but, “when there’s no cell signal in your area, it gets a lot more expensive to not be able to talk to the people you need to talk to.”

The black boxes available to members of the catastrophe committee are a bit different in that they include a complete customer list, ACORD loss forms, a car charger and a home charger, in addition to the “basics” that are part of the producer black box.

Eustis also maintains a toll-free conference line. In the event of a catastrophe, the management team dials in at a pre-determined time.

The entire staff receives a laminated wallet-size card each year that provides all the Eustis contact information, as well as the 24-hour answering service, the numbers for all the remote offices and a Yahoo! e-mail address. It instructs people to work their way down the list until they are able to make contact. “This is especially important if someone needs to relocate outside our area,” Oufnac says.

“For any agency, disaster prepara-tion is essential and communication is key,” he emphasizes.

First back in business

“It’s all about ‘being there’ when your client needs you the most,” declares Roy Riley, CPCU, AAI, president of Peel & Holland Financial Group, based in Benton, Kentucky. “That’s why we focus the time, attention and dollars on disaster recovery so that when and if ‘it’ ever happens, we’re able to help clients.”

“It” did happen in late January 2009 when an ice storm knocked out power from Oklahoma to West Virginia. All four of Peel & Holland’s locations were without power. For that matter, Riley reports, 95% of western Kentucky was without power. Cell phone signals and landline accessibility were spotty.

About three years ago, Riley attended a meeting of Sitkins International where he learned about Agility Recovery Solutions. “We came home from that meeting and immediately signed up,” he recalls. That turned out to be a wise decision.

As the ice storm headed toward Kentucky, Riley alerted Agility and switched the phones for all the agency’s locations over to CSR24. After the storm had passed he assessed the agency’s needs. All that was needed was a generator so he contacted Agility again and they delivered a 100-kilowatt generator in about nine hours. “That provided us lights, heat and enough electrical power to run the entire building,” Riley says.

Because the agency didn’t lose its Internet connectivity, Peel & Holland was able to open up four IP lines, restoring phone service. The agency obtained smaller generators on its own for its other locations. “We were probably the only organization in western Kentucky that had power, phones and Internet connectivity,” he adds.

The local television station for Benton was running an extensive list of closings. Only two businesses announced that they were open the day after the ice storm. Peel & Holland was one of them.

Seeing that the agency was open was reassuring for clients, Riley notes, particularly since people were unable to buy gas or groceries in the days right after the storm. Individuals and business owners insured through other agencies were coming to Peel & Holland for policy analysis and to file claims. “I predict they will be our clients in the future,” he smiles.

Five days after the storm, power was restored to most of the region and businesses started reopening. “By then, Peel & Holland had already reported over 250 claims on behalf of our clients,” Riley says proudly. “Additionally, we had made over 700 proactive outbound calls to our clients. Two of our carriers already had their storm teams in place and were meeting with clients. On the day that most of our competitors were just opening for business, we had been fully functional for four-and-a-half days and had things well underway.”

Disaster planning and recovery is a regular discussion point with clients, Riley points out. “In discussing disaster recovery with our clients, we explain that there are certain risks that just aren’t insurable. Disaster recovery is one of those areas where part of it is insurable and part of it isn’t.

“When we have the disaster recovery conversation with our clients, we determine whether Agility would be helpful to them,” he continues. “If so, we put them in touch with Agility and let them run with it from there. Agility can provide some great statistics about the failure rate of businesses that aren’t able to get back in business quickly.”

The Kentucky League of Cities (KLC) is one client that Peel & Holland put in touch with Agility. The KLC is an association of 400 Kentucky cities and munici-palities. Riley explains that the KLC has a self-insured program through which it provides property, liability and workers comp to most cities in Kentucky.

“We saw that Agility was a key opportunity for the Kentucky League of Cities,” he continues. “So we recommended to the KLC that they include Agility in their insurance program. Having Agility was a key tool which enabled the cities to recover quickly from this disaster.”

Twenty-one cities and municipalities in western Kentucky declared emergencies with Agility following this year’s ice storm. Thanks to onsite generators, these communities were able to power city halls, civic centers, 911 command centers, community shelters, and water plants.

Community spirit

After Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast in 2005, Alan Hedrick, CIC, owner of County Wide Insurance Agency, based in Dexter, Missouri, traveled to Bay Saint Louis, Mississippi, to assist a fellow agent he knew from his activities on the Agents Council for Technology. “When I saw the devastation, I realized I needed a better disaster recovery plan,” he recalls. Coincidentally, Dexter and Bay Saint Louis both have about the same population: 8,000.

By June 2008, Hedrick was putting the finishing touches on the disaster plan for his agency that has 22 employees and four locations in southeast Missouri—a region of the state known as the Bootheel. The agency’s servers were housed in a data center located in Atlanta, Georgia. Additionally, the agency was using CSR24 and Hedrick had signed on with Agility Recovery Solutions after hearing about it at a Sitkins International meeting.

When the January 2009 ice storm turned the Bootheel into a disaster area, County Wide was one of the only businesses in Dexter to have power—aside from emergency shelters and water pumping stations—thanks to Agility delivering a 125-kilowatt generator in a matter of hours.

But when you’re part of a tight-knit community, you share your resources with your neighbors, Hedrick notes. So when Mark Stidham, the city administrator for Dexter, contacted County Wide to see if they could house about 40 individuals with special health considerations, Hedrick and his business associate, Jason Comfort, put the wheels in motion. Unlike the old high school gym that was being used as a shelter, County Wide had refrigeration readily available for insulin, other medications and special dietary needs.

“Our Dexter location is a converted bank building,” Hedrick explains, “so we have plenty of lobby space. We set up cots in the lobby and hallways. Elderly folks as well as young families were here.”

Hedrick also invited his carriers to the office if they needed to connect to the Internet. “We wanted to help those carriers help our clients,” he offers. “So we opened our board room and invited them to stop by to process their claims. Some did come in to submit their claims.”

County Wide processed about 120 claims related to the ice storm. Ninety of those claims were processed on the two days immediately after the storm, something that Hedrick is proud of.

As for the disaster plan, Hedrick acknowledges, “There are things that you take for granted when you put a disaster plan in place, so we have learned some things that we should improve upon. We need to consider the ‘what-ifs’ in more detail. We need to have a printout of essential phone numbers. We need to assign tasks to specific individuals. We need to create a disaster recovery manual and give it to everybody on staff to keep at their home.

“We have a business relationship with Stafford & Stafford Insurance, an agency located just south of Kansas City, Missouri—about six hours away,” he continues. “We’re going to provide them a copy of our disaster recovery plan as well. If they hear of a weather problem in our area and they are unsuccessful in contacting us, they will implement our disaster plan.

“Some things we didn’t have planned out,” Hedrick concludes. “But we had an aggressive spirit to go get it done. We’re formalizing those things now. You have to consider the ‘what-ifs.’”

Agility specializes in restoring power, computer systems, Internet service and phone lines after disasters. In recent weeks, the company has worked with small cities in Kentucky and some businesses, bringing in generators, laptops and other necessities.

One client, an insurance agency in Dexter, Mo., used its restored power to resume business — and devise a rudimentary soup kitchen for residents.

“People here really feel like they are on a mission,” says Bill Boyd, Agility chairman.

The company, started by General Electric Co., is now privately held and relocated here five years ago from Canada.

Knowing he had only hours to find a solution, Byrn turned to member-owned insurance pool Kentucky League of Cities Insurance Services (KLCIS) and its new disaster recovery partner, Agility Recovery Solutions. Agility delivered generators to Mayfield within hours and the city was able to provide residents with warm shelters and clean water.

“Agility Recovery was literally a lifesaver,” said Byrn. “People had a warm place to sleep and clean water to drink. Our ability to recover made all the difference in the world.”

In total, 21 cities and municipalities in western Kentucky had emergency generators onsite following the ice storm thanks to the state-wide initiative, which benefits nearly 400 municipalities. The generators supported storm rescue and recovery efforts and powered city halls, civic centers, 911 command centers, community shelters and water plants. With critical resources up and running, city officials were able to concentrate on the health and safety of their constituents.

“Municipalities throughout the country should look at these Kentucky cities and commend them for their proactive disaster planning,” said Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear. “January’s ice storm was the worst disaster to ever hit Kentucky. These cities’ ability to restore critical services within hours of the storm saved lives and enabled State and National resources to attend to areas with critical needs.”

Finalized in late 2008 by the KLCIS and Agility Recovery, the disaster planning initiative ensures that each city has an actionable and accountable disaster recovery program. In essence, the program provides vital ancillary services, such as communication and electricity resources, during a disaster or interruption. The program is the first partnership of its kind between a municipal league representing cities and a disaster recovery provider. Without this initiative, cities would be more reliant on State and Federal resources and, most likely, would not be able to recover and serve constituents in a timely and necessary manner.

Beyond Electricity Generators
Kentucky cities utilize Agility Recovery for both proactive continuity planning and, if needed, disaster recovery. Agility continually works with the cities to plan for interruptions caused by natural and man-made disasters. Planning initiatives address critical areas like emergency communication plans, alternative office and administrative space, technology replacement, employee continuity and more.

If a city experiences any interruption, Agility can deliver, within 48 hours, practically any resource to resume operations. Recovery assets include mobile office space, computer and server technology, satellite for phone and Internet connectivity, and power generators. These resources can be delivered to cities á la carte or together to form self-sustaining mobile operating environments that can be setup virtually anywhere.

“We were drawn to the flexibility of the program,” said Sylvia Lovely, executive director and CEO of Kentucky League of Cities. “In the case of January’s ice storm, our cities really needed generators, and they got them. But in the event of a tornado, fire, or even a server failure, our cities will need other tools. And they have complete access to the resources they need because of this disaster recovery program.”

On top of the physical resource availability, cities have access to a Web-based alert notification system to communicate with employees, emergency responders and other constituents when traditional communication methods, like phone and e-mail, are unavailable.

“We utilized the alert notification system to communicate with Agility Recovery and other first responders after the storm,” said Cindy Medford, City of Paducah’s risk manager. “Like our access to Agility’s resources, the alert notification system proved to be a valuable part of our continuity and recovery programs.”

Meeting FEMA-Issued Disaster Recommendations
In addition to ensuring their ability to recover in the future, the Kentucky cities meet FEMA recommendations outlined in the entity’s 2003 to 2008 strategic plan and Continuity Guidance Circular 1, which was released in January 2009.

“Our guidance helps ensure that governments at the local, state, and federal levels are operational and capable of performing their essential functions, under all conditions,” said Rex Wamsley, director, Continuity of Operations, FEMA National Continuity Program.

Among its recommendations, FEMA steers all entities, from local municipalities to private businesses, to develop disaster recovery and business continuity plans in order to protect themselves and support the Federal Government and the essential services it provides to citizens.

Vast Recovery Network on Standby
Agility Recovery maintains millions of dollars of equipment at its recovery distribution centers outside of Atlanta, Ga., Phoenix, Ariz., and Toronto, Ont. In addition, the company has hundreds of mobile office and generator distribution centers across North America, providing a 48-hour recovery window for its clients.

“Our resources are only utilized in the event of a disaster,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery. “And we continue to grow our assets each day because we cannot fail. Businesses, people, communities, they all rely on us to get them up and running, to restore ‘business as usual’ as fast as possible. It’s tremendous pressure and responsibility, and we view our work as a mission.”

Agility works with nearly 4,000 entities throughout North America on their disaster planning and recovery efforts.

“We didn’t expect our first experience with Agility to be a state-wide natural disaster,” said Bill Hamilton, executive pool administrator/chief insurance services officer with the Kentucky League of Cities. “We learned a number of good lessons for going forward, but what we do know is that this is a solution that helped people and allowed our cities to restore government more quickly.”

Disaster Recovery Tied to Insurance
Agility Recovery and KLC were introduced by Peel & Holland Financial Services, a Kentucky insurance provider that works with Kentucky League of Cities Insurance Services and its municipal insurance program. Peel & Holland is integral to cities facing disasters because the company pays out insurance claims related to the recoveries.

“Public entities require the same basic coverage as many businesses and organizations,” said Roy Riley, president of Peel & Holland Financial Group. “However, because of broad operations, oftentimes there are increased exposures that need to be covered as well. The KLC disaster recovery program not only ensures continuity of operations for municipalities, it lessens their insurance claims resulting from disasters.”

About Kentucky League of Cities
The Kentucky League of Cities (KLC) is an association of 380 Kentucky cities. KLC offers cities, leaders and employees a number of services including insurance, loss control and employee benefits; legislative advocacy and policy development; research, finance and legal counsel; and training and education services. KLC’s corporate office is based in Lexington and it has a secondary office in Frankfort. Visit www.KLCIS.org or www.KLC.org for more information.

About Agility Recovery Solutions
Agility Recovery Solutions provides disaster planning, testing and on-site recovery services to thousands of businesses throughout North America. Within hours of an interruption, the company delivers the power, technical, space and connectivity resources organizations need to resume operations.

Organizations ranging from small businesses to government entities to Fortune 100 companies turn to Agility for their planning, testing and recovery needs. More information is available at www.AgilityRecovery.com.

About Peel and Holland Financial Services
Peel and Holland Financial Group has provided clients superior insurance and financial services since 1924. As an independent insurance agent, the company works with select and proven insurance companies to develop innovative insurance solutions. Peel and Holland’s proactive approach to client risk assessment involves collaborative and proprietary methods of identification. Visit www.PeelHolland.com for more information.

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The MSPAlliance-Agility relationship combines the technical and data recovery aspects of disaster recovery planning with one of the most commonly overlooked pieces of business continuity – people recovery.

MSPAlliance is the world’s largest professional association and accrediting body for the IT managed services industry. MSPAlliance members build and maintain technical infrastructures for organizations from small and mid-sized businesses to companies in the Fortune 500.

Agility Recovery is one of North America’s leading disaster recovery organizations, with a particular expertise with small and medium-sized businesses.

“The term ‘data recovery’ is too often used in place of ‘disaster recovery,’ and vice versa,” said Charles Weaver, co-founder and president of the MSPAlliance. “Both are vital for the future of organizations, no matter their geographical location.

“The members of the MSPAlliance are experts in building and maintaining an organization’s IT infrastructure and streamlining technical functions. Utilizing Agility’s knowledge and experience in disaster preparedness and recovery, we will offer better educational opportunities for our members and teach them to help their clients prepare potential interruptions.”

“Ninety percent of organizations have very good data backup plans, but only 25 percent are prepared to recover their people following a disaster,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery. “We view people recovery as a function as critical as data recovery, especially after an interruption.

“Where will your company operate when the office isn’t accessible? What will your people do when it’s impossible to travel to another location, such as after Sept. 11, 2001? How will you get technology up-and-running at a temporary location? These are questions we ask companies every day. Having actionable and comprehensive data recovery, disaster recovery and business continuity plans will mitigate the risk of not being operational after an interruption.”

MSPAlliance and Agility will work together to educate MSPAlliance members on the disaster recovery planning process and how to implement effective programs with virtually every type of business. In addition, MSPAlliance will add significant disaster recovery and business continuity content as part of an enhanced accreditation process.

The MSPAlliance Managed Services Accreditation Program (MSAP) is the only best practices and standards-based program specifically created for the managed services industry. Members who earn accreditation adhere to a strict code of ethics and consumer bill of rights, which significantly benefits their clients and end users.

The MSAP is the managed services industry’s only benchmark-based program, measuring specific criteria, such as financial status, business practices, client references, service delivery processes and more.

Greg Donovan, CEO of Alpheon Corporation, a managed service provider, serves as chair of the MSPAlliance board of advisors.

“Disaster preparedness is critical,” said Donovan. “Cities, schools, business of all shapes and sizes, and more have disaster recovery programs in place. And data is a large piece of these programs. In order to grow our profession, we need to be better prepared and educated to offer full-circle advice on continuity program planning. The MSPAlliance’s relationship with Agility is the first step in this critical area.”

About MSP Alliance
The MSPAlliance is the world’s largest professional association and accrediting body for the managed services industry. As such, the organization ensures that each of its members adhere to a strict code of ethics, which means a great deal to the IT Business Consumer.

The MSPAlliance is made up of over 8,000 providers’ world-wide, working together in a vendor-neutral manner to define and promote the managed services industry.

For nearly 10 years, the MSPAlliance has been the only unified voice for the managed services industry, and the only organization that promotes the highest level of professionalism, reliability and integrity.

About Agility Recovery Solutions
Agility Recovery Solutions is a former division of GE with 20 years of disaster recovery and business continuity experience. Agility helps businesses restore their operations and recover their people after a business interruption. The company’s turn-key, packaged recovery solutions are available to businesses across North America. Visit www.AgilityRecovery.com for more information.

The 2009 Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity Survey was conducted by Agility Recovery Solutions and Hughes Marketing Group. More than 700 business owners and executives throughout North America participated. Among the highlights:

Data backup brings a false sense of security.

• 94% of companies have formal data backup plans.
• While 75% of companies say they can have their employees back to work within days of a disaster, only:
     - 28% have access to alternative office space.
     - 41% have access to mobile office space.
     - 54% could acquire temporary office equipment.
     - 57% have access to power generators.

Small and medium-sized businesses are woefully unprepared for disasters.

• 90% of smaller companies (<100 employees) surveyed spend less than one day per month maintaining their continuity plans.
• One in five (22%) spend no time maintaining their plans.
• Comparatively, 20% of larger companies (>100 employees) spend more than 10 days per month on their continuity plans.

Responses indicate a difference between saying the “right thing” and taking action.

• Gaining C-level buy-in is a challenge. Regardless of business size, survey results show many companies have difficulties getting C-level executives to embrace the importance of continuity planning.
• Although 67% of respondents feel an effective business continuity plan is paramount to company success, only 53% think their company’s management team feels the same way.

“A data backup plan is not the same as a disaster recovery plan,” said Bob Boyd, chief executive of Agility Recovery. “The best data in the world is useless if you can’t make use of it. Businesses must take measures to ensure employees can return to work immediately after a disaster. Without alternate plans, you’re business will pay the ultimate price.”

According to the survey, in the last two years, 52 percent of businesses experienced interruptions that halted productivity.

Complete survey results are available at www.AgilityRecovery.com.

About Agility Recovery Solutions
Agility Recovery offers on-site disaster recovery and business continuity services for small and mid-sized businesses throughout North America. If you have a disaster, Agility will deliver the power, technology, space and/or connectivity elements needed to recover. Visit www.AgilityRecovery.com for more information.

September 2009 marks the sixth annual NPM, an initiative sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security’s Ready Campaign and Citizen Corps. This year will focus on changing the perceptions about emergency preparedness. Coalition members, such as Agility Recovery Solutions, share preparedness information with their members, customers, employees, and communities.  

“Small and mid-size businesses are the backbone of the country’s economy. Local communities rely upon these businesses to provide goods, services, and income to their residents,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions. “However, without access to the proper planning tools, these businesses are helpless against unforeseen events and circumstances. Agility provides these business owners with the tools necessary to develop effective business continuity plans – not just during the month of September, but throughout the year.” 

During the month, Agility Recovery is hosting free Webinars on Wednesday’s at 2 pm EDT to educate businesses about the importance of business continuity planning. These online, interactive courses include: 

• September 2, 2009 – “Business Preparedness – Simple Steps To Ensure Continuity”: Guest Speaker: Ms. Rebecca Marquis, Acting Director of Ready Campaign, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)

• September 16, 2009 – “Pandemic Planning – How to Prepare Your Business for the Upcoming Flu Season”: Guest Speaker: Colonel William Lang (Ret.), M.D. Former Associate Chief Medical Officer, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS)

• September 23, 2009 – “Social Media – What Role Does It Play in Business Preparedness?”: Guest Speaker: Mr. John P. Shea, Public Information Officer, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)

• September 30, 2009 – Creating a “Culture of Preparedness”: Guest Speaker: Mr. R. David Paulison, Former Administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)

According to a recent study commissioned by Agility Recovery Solutions, an overwhelming 90 percent of small to mid-size businesses are woefully unprepared for a business interruption or disaster. More often than not these ‘disasters’ are everyday events that can have crippling effects on a business: a broken water pipe, a building fire, a power surge, or power outage – not necessarily the natural disasters and regional events dominating the headlines.  

For more information on National Preparedness Month and Agility-sponsored events, please visit www.agilityrecovery.com.   

About Agility Recovery Solutions

Agility Recovery Solutions, a former division of GE, has over 20 years of disaster recovery and business continuity experience. Since 1989, Agility has provided comprehensive, packaged recovery solutions, consulting services and testing options to businesses across North America. Agility revolutionized the disaster recovery and business continuity industries by developing a simple, cost-effective and easy-to-use recovery solution called ReadySuite.

Agility Recovery Solutions has teamed with a Pennsylvania company to offer ReadySuite Financial, a mobile recovery service for community banks and credit unions.

Under the agreement, Charlotte-based Agility Recovery will provide financial institutions access to mobile office space, desks, teller counters, computers, phones and Internet access in the event a business disruption.

Strohl Systems, based in King of Prussia, Pa., will market the service to range of credit unions and community banks.

Financial terms of the agreement weren't disclosed.

"This new offering was designed to provide a cost-effective means for banks and credit unions to continue serving customer and member needs after a disaster has occurred," says Eric Strohl, vice president of Strohl Systems.

Strohl Systems is a marketer of business-continuity software and services.

Agility Recovery, which has distribution centers in Atlanta and Ontario, Canada, maintains $35 million of equipment in stock. Within 48 hours of disaster, Agility delivers the resources a business needs to continue operations.

This article originally appeared in the Charlotte Business Journal on Feb. 16, 2007. It was written by Will Boye.

Private-equity firm Plexus Capital hasn't ventured far from its Charlotte offices for the two investments it has made this year.

Bob Anders, a Plexus partner who heads the Charlotte office, says the firm likes investment opportunities within the state.

"It's easier to sit on the board of directors and add value when you can get there just by jumping in your car," Anders says.

For its most recent deal, the $80 million fund invested $3.5 million in subordinated debt and $370,000 in equity toward the purchase of Mid-State Machine Co., a Rowan County company that manufactures machine parts and metal products for the off-road equipment industry and others.

Plexus learned of the investment through Larry Schwore, an entrepreneur who was interested in purchasing the company from Gerald Williams and his family. Mount Ulla-based Mid-State, which was founded in 1965, has about 90 employees.

Schwore teamed with Plexus, Insight Capital, a private-equity firm based in Winston-Salem, and Better Built, a Florida-based metal company, to buy the business. Schwore is now the chief executive at Mid-State and has relocated to the Lake Norman area from the Northeast.

The Williams family is maintaining a minority stake in the business, and all the employees have kept their jobs. "I think all the constituents should be able to win in this situation," says Anders, who has joined Mid-State's board.

Earlier this year, the firm invested $3 million in subordinated debt toward the recapitalization of Agility Recovery Solutions Inc., a Charlotte-based disaster-recovery firm that will use the new capital to hire salespeople and for other growth initiatives.

Agility, which specializes in disaster- recovery services for community banks, is owned by Generation Partners, a private-equity firm based in Connecticut. Agility's chairman is Bill Boyd, former chief executive of Muzak, which is also owned by Generation Partners.

The Agility deal was referred by a local bank that invested in Plexus.

Plexus, which has offices in Charlotte and Raleigh, launched in 2005 when it raised nearly $30 million in private capital from banks and other investor. It then leveraged the fund up to $80 million with debt through the Small Business Administration's Small Business Investment Companies program.

Plexus typically makes subordinated- or mezzanine-debt investments ranging from $1 million to $5 million in lower-middle-market companies in the Carolinas and Virginia, although Anders says the firm is also working to close a couple of deals in Florida.

It's the kind of statistic that would make any agency owner cringe.

“About 60% of the businesses affected by a disaster will not survive because they do not have a recovery plan in place,” says Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions, an industry provider of mobile business continuity solutions.

However, with proactive planning and realistic business assessments, insurance agencies can be back in business shortly after a disaster occurs, ready to help their customers.

Planning for an alternate location

According to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), developing a “continuity of operations plan” includes plans on what a business will do if the “building, plant or store is not accessible.” DHS says that businesses need to consider if they can “run the business from an alternate location.”

For Steve Kessler, CEO of the Santa Monica, California-based Sander A. Kessler & Associates insurance agency, previous experience with the earthquakes and wildfires of Southern California meant building a separate “hot site” on his ranch in the Malibu area.

“We took two of the stalls in the horse barn and converted them into a fully enclosed site with air conditioning, server racks, with tables and chairs for eight employees,” Steve explains. “We also keep an adequate supply of water, food, soft drinks, and other necessities on hand in case of an emergency.”

As for connectivity to the Internet, Kessler has dedicated T1 lines out to the hot site as well as to a mobile home on the ranch property that will accommodate seven more employees. Then there’s the technology to run the agency, including SQL servers, firewall, telecommunications (VoIP) system, fax machine, and printer, as well as 15 laptops.

“I remember the quake of 1994,” says Steve. “When there’s an earthquake, it’s more than just not having access to your building; everything is shut down—the city is shut down.”

However, Steve knows that not all agencies can afford their own hot site. “There are a number of facilities where owners can rent space or servers,” he says, which echoes the DHS recommendation that a business develop relationships with other companies for facilities in the event their own is unusable.

One of those aforementioned “other companies” is Agility. Previously a division of GE Capital, Agility’s experience lies in providing business recovery and continuity services and consulting. “Most small businesses can’t afford their own dedicated hot site—they just can’t afford to pay that much,” says Bill Boyd, Agility’s chairman.

Paul Sullivan, vice president of strategic operations and general manager for Agility, explains that most vendors’ disaster recovery solutions are geared toward Fortune 1000 companies, “most small and medium-sized businesses think that these services are not affordable.”

However, Agility offers agencies a service called ReadySuite that provides “members-only” access to a complete business continuity solution for as little as $250 a month.

“One of our first vertical markets for ReadySuite was independent insurance agents,” Bill says. “When a disaster hits, agents need to be able to respond to their clients’ needs.”

With offices in Atlanta and Toronto, Agility has access to inventory across North America. “We’ve been unbelievably accepted by the marketplace,” says Bill, referring to their 100% success rate, “because when a disaster occurs, we’re able to get businesses back up and running within 48 hours.”

In addition to the low cost and the quick turnaround time, ReadySuite is also a mobile or on-site solution. “When we went with our teams to Baton Rouge after the hurricanes,” says Bob, “there were many of our clients who were able to recover in their parking lot.”

Through ReadySuite, Agility will deliver a mobile office with room for 35 to 40 employees if suitable office space cannot be found. The mobile workspace comes complete with computers, power generators, and satellite communications for telephones and Internet access. “We have over $35 million in computer and technology hardware ready to go in case of a disaster,” Paul says.

In the event of a business interruption and a disaster is declared, Agility sets the member agency’s recovery plan in motion, and the agency is responsible for Agility’s out-of-pocket costs only. An agency’s own insurance typically covers these expenses.

“When we respond to a disaster on behalf of our members, their cost is our cost—we don’t make a dime off of it,” Bill explains. “Basically on the day of a disaster, we come out and fix it—no matter what.”

Making internal and external assessments

As part of ReadySuite membership, Agility takes clients through a “Roadmap to Recovery”—typically a two-week period spent with a consultant who helps the agency assess business workflow processes—both internally and externally. “This is a foreign concept to most small to mid-sized businesses,” says Paul.

According to DHS, the first item on the list for planning to stay in business is to “carefully assess how your company functions … to determine which staff, materials, procedures, and equipment are absolutely necessary to keep the business running.”

Backing up the DHS recommendation, Paul adds that critical business functions also should include taking care of employee needs. Critical employee services such as payroll need to be part of the planning. “A business is really about its people, but it is still one of the areas that’s still most overlooked,” he notes.

For Kessler, this internal assessment has led to the agency’s development of a schematic of strategic and important positions in the event of a disaster. This includes three to four employees handling claims, three to four senior account managers (three from the benefits department, two for private client services), two managers and two IT personnel. “I also have it divided into two shifts based on employee skill sets and where each employee lives,” Steve adds.

“In Baton Rouge we saw the need for better business-to-employee communications,” Bob recalls. “Most people hadn’t talked with their teams; employees didn’t know whom to call or where to go—especially when they were displaced all over the Southeast.”

This is where an employee communication plan becomes important. Agility recommends that agencies develop a 24-hour “phone tree” for all employees and their spouses/closest relatives. After seeing the importance of and need for cellular phones in the aftermath of the hurricanes, Bob says that it is paramount that employees are trained on how and whom to call to get information or give information—even when standard communication lines fail.

Besides the internal assessments of the agency, knowing how to communicate externally is equally as important. Kessler’s contact list includes employees as well as contact information for customers, vendors, and suppliers.

Even though DHS recommends that businesses develop an emergency contact list of the companies and contacts they interact with, the folks at Agility say that less than half of U.S. businesses have continuity plans in place that take into account their supply chains. “Businesses need to be asking themselves,” Bob says, “‘What if one of my suppliers goes down? How will we function?’”

Kessler’s continuity planning includes step-by-step plans for before, during, and after a disaster. This way even if Kessler & Associates’ business is interrupted or shifted, their clients will still know that the agency is able to take care of them. “We want to make sure our clients know what is going on,” says Steve, referring to their disaster communications. “We send out e-mails to our clients; we shift our Web pages over to reflect the office closure and even post the direct numbers for the carriers we represent.”

Taking care of business

Commenting on Bob Boyd’s earlier statistic, Paul calls having a business continuity plan in place a “competitive advantage.” He notes, “When you help a business recover quickly, you find that you’re not just helping the business recover, but you’re helping their customers recover, too.”

“While we’re here to help put people’s lives and businesses back together, we also know that businesses that can get back up and running quickly typically flourish after a disaster,” observes Bill. “But we have to get people thinking about the processes and the planning, first.”

For more than 16 years, Agility has been helping businesses plan for and recover from disasters; but for Bob Boyd, it’s still the ones that don’t prepare and ultimately don’t survive that affect him most. “We’ve seen businesses with no [business continuity] plan in place that are powerless to resume operations,” he says. “There is no worse feeling and no worse fate.”

Agility Restores Business Lifelines in Crises

On October 26, the wall is covered with the names of victims of Hurricane Wilma, the third major hurricane to cause catastrophic damage in the U.S. this season.

They are the names of ordinary people, small business owners, with families and pets, and careers not too different from yours. A few days ago, they were not expecting to be among the names on this wall.

But this is no sad memorial etched in stone. This is an active, ever-changing database, and it is a tool of hope for those whose lives have been altered by the course of this latest catastrophe. The wall is the white board in Bob Boyd’s office at Agility Recovery Solutions, and it is the hub of a great deal of activity today.

Boyd has an exciting job: he gets to be a hero. No cape or special powers – unless you count the ability to work happily with his own father – but nonetheless his latest endeavor has resulted in a sort of salvation for dozens of businesses and their owners in recent months.

Simple Complexity

Since becoming president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions in February 2004, Boyd has changed an entire industry to deliver disaster recovery capabilities to small businesses – a service formerly available only to very large, very high-revenue companies.

Besides Agility, only a few major players dominate the industry of disaster recovery. All of them focus on Fortune 5000 companies – companies large enough to pay the tens if not hundreds of thousands dollars a month it costs to have a company like IBM on call to help pick up the pieces in the event of a disaster.

But when Generation Partners, the venture capital firm that owns Agility, brought this former Muzak executive on board, Boyd did a crazy thing. He started selling the service to small businesses starting at $200 a month. Yes, that’s only two zeros!

Small businesses like Gillis, Ellis & Baker, whose office was wiped out by Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans mere months after signing up with Agility, and whose office was back up and running – and processing claims for fellow victims – within four days of the disaster that rocked the nation.

How? Agility.

The core of Agility’s service is deceptively simple: They help businesses get back on their feet by providing recovery planning assistance in advance, and then mobile offices, satellite voice and internet capability, power generation, IT hardware, and consulting as necessary during a crisis.

The concept is simple, the logistics complicated. Agility maintains warehouses in Atlanta and Toronto filled floor to ceiling with IT equipment of all descriptions, makes, models, and capabilities. They have state-of-the-art mobile units in both single- and double-wide sizes stationed in locations throughout the U.S. Then there are the generators, the satellites, the bandwidth, the partnerships with shipping, construction, IT, and many other companies to assist with delivery and set-up.

And all orchestrated so beautifully that they have not once failed in their commitment to get a client back on its feet quickly. Not even when 19 companies simultaneously declared a disaster immediately after Katrina; not even when 21 declared following Wilma.

Salvation

Boyd seems pretty pleased with what his company has done so far. He describes his trip to New Orleans, two days after Katrina struck: “You look at these people, ordinary people whom you could be friends with – they had lost everything, and you think, how can they get up and keep going?” He shakes his head. “But then they can go into work and have some semblance of normalcy, and you realize you really have helped them.”

One client, he remembers, received a special permit to go back into their damaged office building to recover some equipment. While there, he selected one photo from the desk of each employee. When the employees showed up for work at the mobile unit the next day, that photo – in some cases the only family picture they had left after the flooding – was sitting on their new desk. Some broke down in tears.

But it’s not just the big disasters like Katrina that call for heroes. Software failure, electrical outages, wind storms, gas leaks, fire, chemical spills, data corruption – the list is long and scary, and includes many disasters that are localized to a single building or even a single small company’s data.

According to Boyd, industry statistics indicate that in the next five years at least 20 percent of small companies will suffer an event that causes an interruption to their business. Of those that do, fully 60 percent of them will not survive another two years.

“It’s not for the reasons you might think,” explains Boyd. “Think of Katrina – most of those businesses may be able to open their doors in a month, but meanwhile their customers will have gone some place else.” Additionally, he adds, they may not be able to collect outstanding receivables due to loss of data: “They won’t know who owes them money or how much.”

“That’s what kills them,” he says, shaking his head again. “They can never get back to where they were.”

And that’s what makes Boyd and Agility into heroes. After Katrina, two local insurance agencies affected by the storm were able to quickly open their doors to begin processing claims: they were both Agility customers. Needless to say, they’re not likely to be in the 60 percent of failures in two years.

Math Thing

Insurance companies are among Agility’s target clientele, in part because insurance companies also make great sales agents for Agility. First of all, they quickly grasp the concept of Agility’s monthly premium to ensure coverage in case of a catastrophic event, and so it’s a product that makes sense to them.

Secondly, it’s a product that actually saves them money by saving their clients money in the event of a loss. Business insurance usually covers actual losses from a covered event. Companies that purchase Agility suffer less loss and therefore make smaller insurance claims. So Agility is a strong complement to an insurance company’s existing offerings.

Finally, it makes them look like heroes too when something like Katrina hits.

Gillis, Ellis & Baker, for instance, signed up for Agility themselves and also sold it to several of their client weeks before Katrina struck. One of those clients was awarded a $5,000,000 contract the day after Agility returned their business to function – a contract that they would have lost if they had not been available to answer their phones.

Of course, it’s good business for Agility to have their clients selling their products to their clients. “It’s partly a math thing,” smiles Boyd ruefully. But the “math thing” means geometric growth for the company, which Boyd expects to become a half-a-billion dollar company in five to ten years.

The math thing works like this: Each of Boyd’s twenty salespeople expects to sell $1,000 a month this year. In the first month of the year, that’s $20,000 revenue for the company. Because clients pay a monthly premium, in the second month the company will receive that same $20,000 in revenue from the accounts that were sold in the previous month, plus they will receive another $20,000 from new accounts: so in the second month the revenue is $40,000. In the third month, they receive the same $40,000 plus another $20,000 from new accounts. And so on.

At the end of the year, they have grossed $1,560,000 from accounts sold that year. In the second year, they will bill $2,880,000 from the previous year’s sales, plus another $1,560,000 from the new year’s sales.

Then you add in that, for every $200 sale to an insurance company or CPA firm or attorney, that client likely becomes an additional “salesperson” for the company, directing another two, three, or twenty clients a month to the company.

And, unlike true insurance companies, a covered event on the part of a client does not represent an expense to Agility. Rather, Agility tallies the bill for the use of resources – shipping and set-up costs, rentals, etc. – adds 8 percent to cover their expenses in organizing and handling the recovery process, and hands the bill to the client. Extra clients represent almost pure extra profit.

“People think I’m crazy when I say this,” says Boyd. “But it’s almost inconceivable that in five to ten years Agility wouldn’t be worth half a billion dollars. I just don’t see how that could happen.”

Crazy

Of course, he’s been called crazy before. It seemed insanity, for instance, to pursue a market that could afford only $200 a month when Fortune 5000 companies were willing to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars a month. But, he points out, the trouble with the Fortune 5000 is that there are only 5000 of them. That can make the competition for their business pretty fierce.

Besides, it was exactly Boyd’s brand of insanity that the owners of Agility were looking for when they hired him. They had purchased the company from GE in 2001 – right after 9-11 not coincidentally – and had been disappointed with its sluggish growth.

Boyd had already proven himself quite handy at perking up sagging companies. He had gotten his start working with his father, Bill Boyd, at Bill’s Muzak franchise here in Charlotte. Using the skills he learned through his father’s very successful franchise, he went to work at the Muzak headquarters, revitalizing and helping update the company’s image – and sales. When he arrived at Muzak headquarters, it had 5,000 clients in its Marketing on Hold division called Voice. When he left it had 80,000 clients.

The principals at Generation Partners were impressed. When Generation asked him to come talk to them about Agility, Boyd said, “I didn’t know anything about the business. I didn’t know anything about disaster recovery plans. I didn’t even know they existed!” But he was so enthralled by the idea that he began work immediately, building out a team and, among other things, bringing his father on as chairman of the board.

“There aren’t very many times people get the chance or want to work with their father,” says Boyd. “But this is now the third time I’ve worked with him. He is by far the best visionary, communicator, motivator, and salesman that I’ve ever run across in my life. Those are all skills we need and I don’t have any of them.”

Boyd’s skill runs along the lines of taking crazy ideas and making them work.

Like this business of bringing disaster recovery resources to small companies. Unlike the Fortune 5000 companies whose sheer size means great complexity and ensures that they will experience disasters of various scales during the course of their business, and that at least some of those disasters will require significant resources to rectify, most small companies will not experience business interruptions and even those that do require far fewer resources in order to recover. Additionally, their recovery plan can be quite simple and easy to organize. So it occurred to Boyd that since they already had the equipment and infrastructure to service those companies, they could afford to offer them for a very small fee.

So far, it has worked out handsomely. The company is ahead of its sales and revenue goals for the year, and their small business clients are incredibly happy. And the timing couldn’t have been better for those affected by the busy storm season.

The names on Boyd’s white board on October 26 are the lucky ones. These are the company owners and managers whose businesses will be up and running again within hours, thanks to Agility. Their employees will have a place to come to work within the week. These are the companies that will probably still be businesses in two years.

Boyd makes a note above a name on the board, erases something next to another. The result of the frequent scribbling and erasing reminds one of the strategic notations of a general preparing for battle. But while Boyd’s unornamented office might look like a war room, to their clients Agility looks like a miracle.

Mobile units let companies quickly set up temporary operations close to home.

The need for disaster-recovery plans has intensified in the past few years, but for many companies, the conventional model of setting up a temporary work site in an urban recovery center hasn't been a great solution. Increasingly, businesses, including some hit by Hurricane Katrina last week, are relying on preconfigured mobile recovery units.

Agility Recovery Solutions, with more than 100,000 mobile recovery units located across the country, is the largest such recovery service in North America, VP of sales Mike Hoeltke says. It deployed units in at least 14 recovery efforts associated with Katrina and expected that number could go as high as 25 in Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

A double-wide mobile disaster-recovery unit can house up to 48 employees.

Companies contract with Agility to have units specifically configured to meet their needs. They specify the types of computing and telecommunications systems required so that they can use the units to create a working environment for displaced employees. A single-size mobile recovery unit accommodates about 16 people, and a double-wide unit about 48 people. Contracts start at $200 per month.

Patrick Industries Inc., a manufacturer of laminated products, had a conventional program with disaster-recovery specialist nFrame Inc. It required employees to relocate operations to nFrame's recovery center in Indianapolis, a 2-1/2 hour drive from Patrick Industries' Elkhart, Ind., headquarters, director of MIS Sue Penick says. But a partnership between Agility and nFrame offered a mobile recovery alternative.

The flexibility of working with nFrame and Agility was a strong selling point, Penick says. Some larger disaster-recovery companies required the use of equipment that wasn't identical to what Patrick Industries normally uses and would have moved workers hours from their homes, she says. "They've been able to provide us with everything we need and provide it in a way that really makes sense," she says.

The partnership with Agility lets nFrame be creative in developing recovery programs for customers, says Robert Alcorn, chief operating officer at nFrame. While some may want to keep all activity local, others may like a program in which much of the data-center requirements are at nFrame's Indianapolis headquarters and more labor-intensive efforts, such as call centers, can be moved into nearby mobile units.

Tens of thousands of displaced New Orleans residents sought help in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, but few government officials could respond. The city’s IT infrastructure was incapacitated.

Seared into the national consciousness are images of people packed into the Louisiana Superdome and the New Orleans Convention Center while awaiting food, water, medical treatment and other help. Their plight taught hard lessons.

To cope with an emergency, key government organizations, such as police, first responders and human services agencies, must be better able to communicate with each other, and they must have quick access to critical data. To meet these needs, many states are considering mobile disaster recovery equipment and solutions.

“Because of the hurricane season last year, everyone’s eyes got opened wide,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions Inc., a Charlotte, N.C., company that offers mobile recovery services as well as equipment shipping capabilities. “This stuff, if it happens, is really big and it’s really bad.”

Louisiana CIO Rizwan Ahmed agreed. “If they have not looked at it before, I’m sure they will look at it now,” he said. Nowhere is this more true than the hurricane-threatened South, he said.

Help rolls in
Mobile recovery means data on wheels. Several companies offer mobile recovery units that can drive into a disaster area within hours.

The units feature thousands of square feet of climate-controlled space that can house equipment and provide capabilities needed by government employees responding to disasters, including servers and laptops, voice and data communications, and terminals and printers.

Being able to get key operations up and running quickly is essential. A state agency responding to a disaster might need to buy new equipment and require access to its list of vendors to make the purchase. A health care agency may try to help patients, but without data would not know what condition any given person has. A police department might be trying to compile a list of missing persons. Each requires access to data.

That data often can be unavailable during and after an emergency. Even if a data center or its backup is not affected, the lines of communications connecting the data center to those who need the data often are broken.

Data is most needed after the emergency has passed, said Julius Neudorfer, director of Network Services Inc., a data center and networking company.

“It’s absolutely critical for when the fires are out and people are standing in the streets, and you have no place for them to file claims, ask for medical assistance or be directed, as was sadly seen in Katrina,” he said.

The model for data recovery in a disaster has been to pay for use of a private data center. Many large IT and telecommunications companies have such operations, and many private sector businesses use them.

Among the leaders in the field are CAPS Business Recovery Solutions, Leonia, N.J.; Hewlett-Packard Co.; IBM Corp.; and SunGard Data Systems Inc., Wayne, Pa., said Stephanie Balaouras, a senior analyst at Forrester Research Inc., Cambridge, Mass.

Other players include telecommunications companies such as AT&T Inc. and Qwest Communications International Inc. of Denver, she said.

At what cost?
State agencies looking to recover just 35 seats are paying $11,500 per month, plus fees ranging up to $10,000 to declare a disaster, plus additional usage fees after 30 days, all for the right to use a backup data center within 48 hours of an emergency. Those prices may be within range for major corporations, but not for state and local government agencies, Ahmed said.

The business model of mobile disaster recovery solution providers offers cheaper service, said Ahmed, who is working on a deal with several mobile disaster recovery companies for services to state agencies under one contract, he said.

By charging a small, monthly membership fee, plus billing for all costs associated with rolling out the solution when it is needed, companies such as Agility offer levels of service. Rentsys Recovery Services Inc., College Station, Texas, and SunGard also are considered major players in the field, Forrester’s Balaouras said.

Network Services, a division of North American Access Technologies Inc., Hawthorne, N.Y., uses a different model. Instead of supplying equipment and services, the company builds and sells mobile data centers to businesses and government agencies.

Network Services’ mobile data centers cost between $200,000 and $1 million, Neudorfer said. The vehicle is different from a command bus, which offers workstations and voice communications connectivity.

The truck, which has room only for a driver and one or two others, is stocked with servers and operational LANs and WANs to support a makeshift office, Neudorfer said.

He would not say how many mobile data centers Network Services has sold or to whom, but said the company is targeting government agencies and has seen an increase in interest and demand. But government buying cycles likely will push most purchases into 2007, he said.

Agility offers three levels of service, with monthly fees ranging from $250 per month for up to 48 deliverable work stations, to $2,500 per month for access to 200 seats, Agility’s Boyd said.

Within 48 hours of calling the company, mobile office trailers arrive, complete with computers, satellites, servers, printers and fax machines, he said. The full expense of rounding up and delivering the equipment is passed along to the customer.

During Katrina, Agility mobilized for nearly 40 commercial clients and billed an average of $50,000 for use of the trailers over several months, Boyd said.

One Agility customer is the auditor’s office for Hamilton County, Ohio, which is paying $750 a month to reserve up to 96 seats on two trailers, Boyd said. The county is using it to protect financial, payroll and real estate data that generate a significant portion of its income, said Terry Munz, IT director for the Hamilton County Auditor’s Office.

Although the threat of a major storm makes for lots of attention, power outages, fires and floods are the most common emergencies that affect a government agency’s operations, Boyd said.

Agility is just beginning to sell to government agencies. The business community already has embraced the need for disaster recovery, and state and local governments are following, Boyd said.

“It’s clearly an area that we expect to have a lot of growth in,” he said. “If you’re the city manager or county administrator in a local community, you know you’ve got to recover and be there for your taxpayers.”

For Gillis, Ellis & Baker 2005 began well. A 73 year old, third generation agency in downtown New Orleans. The 37 employees were settled into their newly expanded and renovated office on the 6th floor of a 26 story office building directly across Poydras Street from the Superdome. The office was fresh and stylish, the furniture and workstations brand new and everyone found the new surroundings to their liking. GEB was also coming off of their biggest production year ever - 2004 had taken them to new heights for new business revenue and the sales goal for 2005 had them exceeding the record. But something was missing.

In addition to sales records, 2004 had delivered four hurricanes to Florida, including powerful Ivan which passed too close to New Orleans for comfort. The management team at GEB - Anderson Baker (President), Parke Ellis (Executive Vice President) and Doug Mills (VP/C.O.O.) - realized they had a problem. Upon further review, the agency's disaster recovery plan was deemed to be inadequate to properly respond to a hurricane or other catastrophic event and that had to quickly change.

Story after story told of hardships and struggles by agencies in Florida following the four storms. The GEB management team faced the reality that if a storm (or other disaster) struck their office they were ill prepared to respond. Their families, the 37 employees and their families and their 3000+ customers were depending on the agency's ability to withstand a disaster, rebound quickly and be there for them. The agency had to be up and running after a disaster - no matter what.

Building The Plan

I was tasked with the role of disaster plan coordinator for the agency. I was to re-build the plan and assure that the agency could quickly and efficiently respond to any disaster that befell the agency. Hurricanes were our primary concern, but the plan should be able to respond in other emergency situations as well.

Some key questions that I had to answer (as does anyone preparing a disaster recovery plan for an insurance agency):

• Where will we go if we can’t occupy our office?
• What will we have to work with when we get there – understanding that we would have to replicate almost every function in our office?
• How will we communicate with staff, clients and companies?

In attempting to answer these questions it quickly became apparent that without the "assets" required to put a plan into action the plan itself was useless. By assets I mean actual office space, computers (servers and workstations), telephones, internet access and all of the other things required to run a 21st century insurance agency. Add to this the necessity that all of the assets had to be available at a moment's notice and assembled in as short a time as possible (48-72 hours). With this realization, the effort switched from pure planning to acquisition of assets or the means to acquire assets when necessary.

The main ingredient to our plan was a backup office facility and the tools necessary to run the office including our entire IT infrastructure. Through the Big I of Louisiana we were put in touch with Agility Recovery Solutions, and from my very first conversation I knew they were the answer. Agility offers to provide the following items to you (or some combination of items as the situation dictates) all within 48 hours of declaring an emergency:

• An air conditioned mobile office unit with (in our case) 20 workstations with desktop computer, phone and desk/chair
• Servers to replicate the capabilities in your office
• Satellite phone service
• Satellite high speed internet service
• Technical support to begin and maintain operation of the mobile office

The cost is modest (about $250 a month for the service) with the understanding that Agility will bill you their actual costs for services/equipment provided.

An added and valuable feature to membership with Agility is the Disaster Planning Guide they have you complete. Part of the guide enables Agility to replicate your office IT infrastructure in the mobile unit. It also allows for quick replacement of IT hardware if that is your "disaster". The other part of the guide has you answer many of the questions you would/could be faced with if a disaster strikes. While not a true "how-to" in disaster recovery, the guide does force you to address many issues before the disaster, and develop answers or solutions. This would serve us well come August 29, 2005 and beyond.

In discussing disaster recovery with Florida agents, the same question kept coming up - How do you handle the high volume of calls that surely follow a hurricane or other large disaster? In addition - How do you handle these calls while setting up a new office or re-establishing your current office and all while giving your clients the peace of mind that the agency is there and ready to help?

Our solution was Artizan Internet Services, the providers of CSR 24 and Service 911. In our case, Service 911 was what we needed. The key elements of the service are as follows:

• A weekly back up of your client data management system (AMS in our case) so that Artizan has the same client data as your in-house CSRs
• Trained CSRs to answer calls and either handle the client's request or take a message and email a message to you for follow up
• Can be "turned on" for short periods of time or kept in service for a prolonged period to aid in recovery of the office
• Creates the appearance of "seamless service" to your clients. They are able to reach a CSR for help who has access to all of the client's policy information and the client has the piece of mind of knowing that their agent is there to help them
• Artizan has a set up charge of about $1,500 and a monthly fee of $167 which includes data backup. A per minute charge is applied for calls once an emergency is declared.

With most of the key questions answered by Agility and Artizan, GEB entered into contracts with both companies in the summer of 2005. We began work on the Agility Disaster Planning Guide and made arrangements for training for our IT manager, but before all of this could be completed, fate intervened and the planned for became our reality.

No Matter What

Despite the fact that we along the Gulf Coast watch hurricanes and their movements very closely - Katrina sort of snuck up on us. As late as Friday August 26th, the weather service had Katrina coming ashore east of Panama City, Fla. as a Category 2 storm. We were watching her movement, but not overly concerned. Here is a brief timeline of the events leading up to landfall on Monday August 29th and the days immediately following.

By late afternoon on the Friday August 26th, the path of the storm was moved westward (towards New Orleans) and Katrina was gaining strength.

• No one was overly alarmed. The Saints played a pre-season game in the Superdome that night, and my partner went off to a fishing camp south of New Orleans with a Colonel in the Louisiana National Guard.
• By Saturday (27th) the storm had gained strength and predictions talked of a Category 5 storm. The preparation pace quickened. My partner canceled his day of fishing when the Colonel was picked up by helicopter and flown back to the city. My wife and I put her 83 year old parents on a plane to Dallas to stay with my sister-in-law. As evacuation loomed, we knew they could not stand the stress of days on the road and the uncertainty it brings.
• On Saturday morning I went to the office to retrieve some documents and touch base with Agility and Artizan. Our partners were ready to respond if called upon. We in New Orleans had been through this many times before, and most of us thought this would be a 2-3 day inconvenience, but for some reason this storm was causing me concern.
• Gassed up the cars Saturday night and by daybreak on Sunday (28th) we (wife, three children and the dog) were on the road headed to Natchez, MS. This was the first time our family had ever evacuated. What would normally have been a 2.5 hour drive would take us 8 hours to complete.
• We rode out the storm in Natchez and watched what we thought was a "near miss" of New Orleans. By Tuesday the 30th it was clear what had happened with the levees and flooding in the city and we all knew we were not going back to New Orleans any time soon.
• An emergency was declared with both Agility and Artizan on Tuesday evening. By that time no calls were being routed out of New Orleans because all of BellSouth's circuits were flooded. Artizan took over our website and posted their 800 number on the site. This would prove invaluable in the coming days as our clients searched for us. Agility found us a location in Baton Rouge and told me to meet them there on Friday September 2nd. The trailer was on site on Friday and operational on Saturday September 3rd. All of this while faced with the evacuation of over 1.5 million people and the results of the largest disaster in the history of the United States.
• The stories of our 37 employees and their families could fill a book. No lives were lost, but 27 employees suffered complete destruction of or significant loss to their homes. Automobiles, pets and family possessions were gone. Lives were shattered and the uncertainty of what the future held was almost paralyzing.

In the midst of this loss, this pain, the total disruption of our lives and near total destruction of our city and surrounding areas, the employees of Gillis, Ellis & Baker began the road back.

Relief, Recover, Rebuild & Re-Birth

With our temporary office established in Baton Rouge, our first task was the assembling of our staff at the new location. By my guess, the 37 employee were scattered over 9 states from Texas to Virginia. Communications were a mess. Land lines in the New Orleans area were gone, cell phone calls into or out of the 504 area code were very iffy - and besides, there was nobody there to take the call. Everyone in the four parish (county) area of Greater New Orleans had been evacuated.

What did work? Text messaging! I doubt more than a handful of our staff even knew they had text messaging on their cell phone before the storm, but it became our standard means of communication. My then 14 year son, PJ, was horrified by my lack of dexterity in text messaging and he took over the duties. He followed me around for over a week acting as my walking "Dictaphone" by typing in text messages and firing back replies.

Email also worked, and part of our plan included non-work emails (AOL, Yahoo, MSN, etc) as a means of communication. I was able to email some of our staff with instructions on the new operations in Baton Rouge. Through these sources and word of mouth I was able to track everyone down within a week. Several of our employees had not evacuated immediately and were trapped in the affected area - two of whom were rescued by helicopter.

It was a harrowing experience for all of us as we left our homes and watched the events unfold on television. It was actually a relief to go back to work. From three employees on Saturday September 3rd, we began adding people each day as they found their way to Baton Rouge. We threw ourselves into the task at hand. Service 911 forwarded us messages from the calls by email, and we "triaged" the calls and set them up for return calls. As word spread of our new phone number and location, clients began calling direct and coming to the trailer. 14 hour days were the norm, but at least at work we all felt useful and productive. We did not have to think about the chaos and destruction going on at home.

Getting the agency up and running was a huge task, but that alone would have proven easy. Adding to everyone's stress was the need to find housing, take care of family members with special needs, get the children enrolled in school, and fight the gridlock of traffic in Baton Rouge which grew from a city of about 400,000 to almost a million overnight. Work, while stressful, was a refuge from the chaos all around us.

We handled over 3,000 claims in total, and handled over 10,000 calls. All of this was possible thanks to Service 911. We could not have handled the volume of calls without the first response capability of Service 911. Through their CSRs, many calls were resolved quickly and the claims process begun. When follow up was needed, we were able to assign the call backs based on our current personnel and work load.

The recovery trailer was our island of hope and sanity during those first few weeks. By the third week in September we were close to fully staffed and began looking for semi-permanent office space. It was estimated that our office building in New Orleans would not be ready for occupancy until mid-November at best, and we need more space, land lines for our phones and hard line internet service.

We were able to find two adjoining Class B office suites in Baton Rouge, and we moved there the third weekend in September. With Agility's blessing and help, we simply took all of the computers, the servers, the furniture and supplies out of the trailer and set up operation in the office space. The new offices gave us all of the upgrades we needed, and some simple creature comforts like separate bathrooms for the men and women.

What we didn't change was the esprit de corps that had developed among the entire staff. You could almost feel it, the bond that had formed as we worked to bring our agency back to life, help our clients and assist each other through the most trying times we will hopefully ever know. We nicknamed it The Spirit of the Trailer.

This time last year, if Gila Corp.'s office on Airport Boulevard would have been wiped out by fire, flood or another disaster, it would have taken executives there two or three months to get the company back on its feet -- and that's only if their employees and clients stuck around for the rebuilding.

Today, however, if disaster strikes the Austin collections and payment-processing company, executives and their employees will be back in the corporate saddle within 48 hours.

Gila's new bounce-back ability is the fruit of about a year's worth of work by its chief information officer, Domenick Riccio, who was hired by Gila about a year ago with the top priority of keeping the business running at all costs.

It was a lofty goal, but a necessary one for a company that collects payments and fields telephone calls for more than 400 clients across the country, mostly government agencies and financial institutions.

"If we're out for 60 days, that's 60 days our clients go without the revenue we provide," Riccio says. "They expect us to be here for them, no matter the severity of the situation."

In light of recent devastating natural disasters nationwide, Gila not long ago polled its clients to identify and prioritize their key issues. Among their top concerns: total suspension of services due to natural disasters.

Riccio says many of Gila's clients don't require that the company has a business recovery strategy, but it helps -- especially when courting prospective clients.

"In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, many businesses realized how vulnerable they were by only having a data backup plan," says Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions in Charlotte, N.C. "The day after the storm, your data may be ready to use. But what will you do if your building is flooded? 'People recovery' should be a mandatory piece of any disaster recovery plan, and Gila officials truly understand this need."

In regard to people recovery, only 25 percent of businesses feel they are "very prepared," according to a recent study by Forrester Consulting.

Riccio says many businesses, including Gila, are well-versed when it comes to data recovery. Backing up information -- even to safer, remote locations -- is commonplace in today's business world. But ensuring that your staff, hardware and everything else that's tangible can be recovered quickly is another story.

Riccio says he shopped around for such recovery options. Some, he says, involved local companies that offered backup office space and equipment in the area when needed.

But Riccio and his staff thought, if a major flood or other disaster took out their office, who's to say it wouldn't cripple their backup office space and equipment on the other side of town?

So Riccio kept shopping, and ended up striking a deal with Agility. He declined to say how much the company is investing in the new safeguard, but here's how it works: If Gila is ever temporarily displaced because of a disaster, company officials will simply pick an unaffected place to set up shop. It could be at a home, another office building or under a tent on the side of the interstate. In any case, Agility would work with Gila to provide the computers, servers, generators, desks, fax machines and whatever else Gila needs to operate. The equipment would be shipped to Gila's temporary location overnight.

Gila is responsible for backing up its own data, so any off-site mobile office would be tantamount to a picnic where Gila brings the food and Agility brings the blanket, basket and silverware.

Riccio says such a plan is essential for Gila, which has only one office.

"I came from Verizon, and when you have a big company and network like that, if you have one hiccup somewhere it won't affect the entire business," he says. "But if we have a hiccup here, we essentially fall off the face of the earth, as far as our clients are concerned, because we only have one location."

Lessons learned
Backing up data will not ensure uninterrupted service.
Service providers are especially vulnerable to disasters.
Disaster recovery plans must remain flexible.

"I don't want to be standing in front of my building, scratching my head, wondering what to do next," he said.

To ensure that the $88 million-asset bank could get back on its feet quickly after a similar catastrophe, Mr. Hom turned to Agility Recovery Solutions.

Should Lincoln Park's one branch be damaged in a disaster, a team from the Charlotte disaster-recovery company would be on the ground within 48 hours to set up a mobile branch complete with satellite communications, computers, software - "whatever is necessary to put us back into operation and to serve our customers," Mr. Hom said.

Community banks have relied on outside companies for years to provide a host of essential services, such as data security, internet banking, and even mortgage lending. Now a growing number of them have begun to outsource disaster recovery.

"It's a sign of the times," said Doug Johnson, a senior policy analyst at the American Bankers Association. "These types of services are becoming more attractive to community banks."

A host of other companies, including SunGard Data Systems Inc., International Business Machines Corp., and Hewlett-Packard Co., provide disaster-recovery services to large businesses. Agility's are tailored for community banks.

SunGard, of Wayne,PA, also bid for the Lincoln Park contract, but Agility "met our needs in a more cost-effective manner," Mr. Hom said.

Agility says it had about 115 community-bank customers, five of which signed on after Katrina made landfall on Aug. 29.

Mr. Johnson said he knows of no other company providing similar services to community banks. Nevertheless, he said, potential customers should make sure that the service is cost-effective for them and that Agility has the bandwidth to serve all of its customers in the event of a large-scale disaster.

Scarborough, a Chicago division of Aon Corp. that provides insurance for financial institutions, launched a partnership with Agility in January. "Larger institutions generally have the resources to pull together a disaster-recovery plan that can be implemented quickly," said Kim Waller, Scarborough's managing director. "It's the smaller institutions that have to find more creative ways to deal with disaster-recovery needs."

Mike Hoeltke, a vice president of sales at Agility, said its mobile branches enable community banks to get up and running quickly after a natural disaster without having to move. The units are powered by generators, equipped with satellite communications technology, and have all the trappings of a standard branch, including a teller counter, a manager's office, a check-signing station, and a reception area," he said. "We provide everything, right down to the tables and chairs," Mr. Hoeltke said.

Mr. Johnson said that the recent hurricanes in the Gulf Coast have increased demand for such services. "Financial institutions are mindful that natural disasters of various types can occur throughout the country," he said.

None of the community banks under contract with Agility have been through a disaster, but they say the contracts give them peace of mind.

"I did not have the time nor the inclination to do everything that's needed to be done as far as disaster recover goes," said Ellen Eigel, the vice president of operations at Midtown Bank and Trust Co. in Atlanta. "They offered me the solution I needed."

The $83 million-asset bank pays Agility a monthly fee of $345. If disaster struck it would also have to cover all the costs of bringing the Agility team on-site, but Mr. Hoeltke said banks' insurannce policies generally cover these costs.

Ms. Eigel said that she considers the cost small for the security Agility provides. "It's something that helps me sleep a little better," she said.

The $121 million-asset Community Capital Bank of Jonesboro, GA, signed with Agility in 2004. Until then it had no solid disaster-recovery plan, said chief financial officer Adam Stovall, a vice president.

"There were not any other companies that would come out and provide the services that they provide," Mr. Stovall said. "I think they've really hit a niche," he said. A disaster-recovery plan "is something we all have to have."

The $346 million-asset Buckhead Community Bank in Atlanta became an Agility customer last August. "We're all busy bankers, and we can't be experts on everything," said Chuck Shaw, a senior vice president. "It's good to know that we can go out and get someone who is an expert on disaster recovery."

Agility, which was GE Capital IT Solutions Disaster Recovery Services until 2002, has been providing a range of disaster-recovery services to business for 16 years. It began marketing to community banks a year ago - after realizing, Mr. Hoeltke said, that they had "no economically viable alternative." It has 25 sales representatives across the country and plans to have 33 by yearend.

Bob Boyd slunk into his seat on the plane, exhausted from his trip to New Orleans. As the aircraft took off from Baton Rouge, further distancing him from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina, he dissolved into tears.

This was after only five days spent in and around the wreckage, where Boyd and other workers from Agility Recovery Solutions helped businesses --- their buildings flooded, their windows busted, their documents destroyed --- stanch the flow of lost revenue and get back up and running.

"It's like I had survivor's guilt," said Boyd, president and chief executive officer of Agility. "But putting people back to work is a nice business. It's a nice thing to feel good about."

Economists have estimated the losses in New Orleans and communities along the Gulf Coast will top $170 billion, with more than $100 billion in damage done to businesses, homes and public infrastructure. Business interruptions are expected to cost $25 billion.

Preventing business interruptions is Agility's job. The company, part of the $1.7 billion disaster-recovery services industry, is based in Charlotte and Canada. But command central for Hurricane Katrina is in Forest Park, Ga.
It's there, in a cavernous warehouse, that the 16-year-old company keeps a massive cache of office equipment and supplies. On shelves that climb toward the ceiling are all the things a business needs to replicate operations and get back to work in a hurry. There are rows of computers, clusters of desk chairs, spools of cable, cases of satellite equipment and stacks of fax machines. At times there are even bushels of rubber bands, mountains of paper clips and piles of pens.

For a monthly premium of between $200 and $700, Agility offers clients disaster-preparedness services such as data-backup help and contingency planning, and promises support and access to its collection of equipment if disaster strikes.

Useful connections
Through its longtime relationships with agencies like the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Agility is able to gain access to disaster zones and areas typically off-limits to most companies.

Agility had about eight clients in Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi on its roster before the hurricane. Once Katrina hit, Agility set in motion the "road maps" created for each customer.

For Eustis Insurance and Benefits, one of New Orleans' largest agencies, that meant Agility needed to pack trucks with 45 computers, three servers, desks, tables, chairs, phones and a power generator, then drive them from Atlanta to Louisiana.

Before the storm, Eustis had headquarters in 18,000 square feet on the 19th floor of a New Orleans office building. That structure is now believed to be in shambles, given the damage that's known to have been sustained by the nearby Superdome and Hyatt Regency hotel.

The 60-year-old insurance company already had an office in Baton Rouge, but it isn't large enough to house all of Eustis' 125 employees. To miss even a few days of work could crush the insurance company at a time when customers were desperately trying to file claims. So Agility sent a mobile office unit.

It's a jazzed-up trailer that on the inside feels exactly like any other close-quartered office.

There are fluorescent ceiling lights, windows shaded by Venetian blinds, a dark-wood conference table, two bathrooms, a water fountain, a water cooler, air conditioning, a television and 40 workstations with computers and telephones operated by satellite. The trailer is powered by a diesel generator.

The mobile office allowed Eustis to be fully operational within 72 hours. It's now parked behind the company's Baton Rouge office. The trailer will stay there for three to six months, until the company can find more permanent real estate in the New Orleans area. That's where the vast majority of Eustis' clients are, or were, located.

"A business interruption never took place," said Tommy McMahon, vice president of Eustis, which has 7,000 clients and $140 million in premiums. "It could have put us out of business. Only a handful of agencies in New Orleans are even in any semblance of up-and-running. Many of them haven't established a phone line yet. It's devastating."

No time limit
Eustis' monthly payments will cover some of the bill, but the company will be responsible for out-of-pocket costs, which can run close to $30,000. Agility has set no time limit for use of the trailer; the recovery company has access to about 100,000 mobile units, as well as 10,000 generators.

Agility also has about $35 million worth of computer equipment, housed in the Forest Park warehouse. Some of the pieces were lined up on the floor Thursday, along with desk chairs and a fax machine and telephones, ready to be shipped to yet another beleaguered business on the Gulf Coast.

Agility's workers will again stay there for several days to offer help and technical support.

"I have experienced the highest highs and the lowest lows of my career, and they're often separated by one second," Boyd said. "When you sit down and talk to these people and realize that everything they have is gone, it's awful. But the next thing they say is: 'I've got a business that's still gonna exist. My 50 employees have a job tomorrow.' "
"That makes me so proud."

The Associated Press contributed to this article.

CUNA put on display last week one of the new mobile facilities it is making available to credit unions seeking to be prepared in the event of a disaster of any type. Offered through a new partnership with Agility Recovery Systems, and part of a larger business continuity effort CUNA began putting in place in the wake of the 2005 hurricanes, the unit was on display during CUNA's Future Forum here last week, coincidentally at the same time a tropical storm was lashing Orlando.
The new mobile facilities are essentially fully self-contained branch offices that Agility promises to have on-site within 24 to 48 hours of a credit union's request.
The company said it has access to more than 100,000 of the 12-by-20 modular facilities, which include two teller stations, desks, and complete computer connectivity using satellite-based technology.
The facilities include a generator and enough fuel to run for 24 to 36 hours, meaning if a credit union operates for eight hours or less per day it can be open for several days before needing to replenish fuel supplies.
Agility CEO Paul Sullivan, who conducted a tour of the facility, emphasized that it requires no external services at all to operate other than a flat piece of land. It requires approximately four hours to set up once it arrives on site. Credit unions have the option of testing their ability to recreate operations as part of their business continuity plans. There is also a small kitchen and washroom, and it is ADA compliant, along with being air conditioned or heated, depending on the situation.
CUNA CEO Dan Mica said the new mobile facilities and the broader effort to assemble a suite of business continuity services for credit unions came out of a task force, underwritten by CUNA, CUNA Mutual and the state leagues, that was created in the wake of hurricanes Katrina and Wilma, which devastated many credit union operations along the Gulf Coast and in New Orleans.
That suite of products, which is being offered through CUNA Strategic Services, and includes products from other providers, including Accell (financial counseling), Canon (digital imaging), Diebold (ATMs and other cash dispensing terminals), Perimeter Internetworking (IT), Strohl Systems (business continuity tools), and VoiceGard.
One issue that arose after the hurricanes was access to cash deliveries, which Sullivan told The Credit Union Journal credit unions will need to prepare for, as well.
Credit unions interested in the facility back-up pay a monthly retainer and have no out-of-pocket expenses for 60 days after the facility arrives, according to Sullivan.
After that a daily usage fee kicks in, which he said is aimed at getting credit unions to move ahead with securing permanent facilities.

For Walter Overby, hurricanes and other severe-weather events are a part of daily life on the Gulf Coast. Having endured Hurricane Ivan last year, Overby, vice president of systems delivery services for Alfa Insurance, in Montgomery, Ala., knew what kind of misery and devastation such storms could bring, and he had no intention of being caught unprepared.

So a month before Hurricane Katrina roared through the Gulf Coast, demolishing New Orleans and causing unprecedented levels of damage to portions of Mississippi and Alabama, a special task force at Alfa chose to invest in a mobile recovery unit from Agility Recovery Solutions, of Charlotte, N.C. The idea was to use the mobile unit to better serve policyholders in Alabama, Mississippi and other areas by providing a safe, self-contained work area with power and voice and data communications that would allow adjusters and other staff to conduct massive amounts of new business.

"A lot of times under these types of disasters, you see adjusters working out of cars or out of hotels with calling centers, or leased office space where they can find it," Overby said. "Usually [in] an area that's been devastated, [it] has been hard to find adequate [working] conditions. ... We just wanted to put our company in a position [that] if people tried to get in touch with us, they could, and get claims calls we could deal with in a timely fashion."

Once Alfa declared a company emergency during the hurricane, Agility sent a 24-by-68-foot, double-size mobile unit to a location in Mobile, Ala. However, several factors delayed the unit's arrival, including Federal Emergency Management Agency restrictions on road and highway access to areas slammed by Katrina.

"The magnitude of Katrina posed difficulties nobody could overcome. We got a mobile unit to the border and couldn't get into the state. We had to identify who we were to FEMA," said Bill Boyd, president and CEO of Agility. "This was a catastrophic event. The United States has never seen something like this, that big a region. An entire city was devastated."

Alfa was hardly alone in facing challenges. For businesses, universities and organizations throughout the Gulf Coast, even those with well-designed and practical disaster recovery plans, the task of bringing their organizations back online has proved more daunting than they feared. In many cases, technology has turned out to be an invaluable asset in the recovery process, but other companies have learned the hard way that even in an age of unceasing technical innovation, there's only so much that technology can do.

"I think the majority of people [in affected areas] are recognizing the scope of this, and it's not something [where] they're going to be back up and running next week," said Belinda Wilson, executive director of business continuity and availability services for Hewlett-Packard Co., in Palo Alto, Calif. "Most people have almost accepted the level of devastation and realize this will not be a short-term recovery. Many of these places just need to be completely demolished. They're not waiting for any more on the damage assessments. I think it's pretty clear."

In Houston to escape Katrina's destruction, Mike Roppolo, director of health services for the Newman School, in New Orleans, said the task of restoring the popular city is daunting. "It's going to take more than several months to rebuild that city and get it back to some form of what we knew to be New Orleans," Roppolo said. "Some families will return; some families may not return ever. Things might never be the same way for many of us there ever again."

Roppolo said Newman officials have decided that his school will not likely reopen until January at the earliest. In fact, an entire calendar year may be lost at the school due to myriad environmental and technical problems still plaguing New Orleans.

Yet, what seemed a relatively minor decision last spring to move all students' health and immunization records from paper to an online electronic format stored off-site is now paying huge dividends to hundreds of families scrambling to enroll their children at replacement schools across the country. The Newman School is using Digitech Systems Inc.'s ImageSilo service to store students' health records. Through the service, Roppolo can grant requesting schools and parents secure access to the archived records.

"Our IT department thought it would be more cost-effective and give us more options to store things off-site. Of course, we could have never imagined we could be in the position we are now or using it for this purpose so soon," said Roppolo. "We have a lot of families that relocated to Houston, Dallas, Baton Rouge ... some are in Colorado, some in Florida, some in Wisconsin. By having all these documents scanned, we can make those immunization and medical records available by getting them off the server and get them in e-mail and PDF format to schools or parents requesting them."

Although the school itself wasn't damaged and is dry for the most part, Roppolo said, the manpower needed to move records for 1,200 students to Houston in order to fax or mail them would have been impossible to find during the hurricane and its aftermath.

For some IT users caught in the direct path of Hurricane Katrina, lack of time and lack of power were two big roadblocks on the path to recovery.

"The hurricane crept up on us so quickly," said Venkata Mahadevan, systems manager for the computer science department at the University of New Orleans. "It's not possible to move giant racks of servers, etc., to other locations without major resources, which we don't have. Even if the servers could be moved, where could they be set up again? This boils down to a lack of resources."

Like Mahadevan, most system administrators are not trained to effectively deal with such a crisis. He said the best course of action is usually to shut systems down before the storm and set up temporary sites and Web portals.

Although he has all his department's data on backup tapes, with which he evacuated, Mahadevan finds himself lacking servers, a tape drive, and a data center or remote site to begin the rebuilding process. Still, he must formulate a plan to recover when the opportunity eventually comes around.

"I expect that the first thing we will do when we get back to campus, which is not accessible right now but remained mostly dry, would be to come up with a more effective hurricane/ emergency response plan for our department," Mahadevan said in an e-mail message.
"Hindsight is always 20/ 20, but this may include purchasing a generator and installing it on the rooftop of the building and establishing a replicated computing infrastructure at a site outside of New Orleans that mirrors the original data center."

For many people charged with running IT systems, Katrina proved the ultimate testing ground for disaster recovery and business continuity plans. Tim Babco, senior director of IT for SCP Pool Corp., in Covington, La., said his company designed a core set of disaster recovery documentation several years ago to mitigate hurricane risk. Babco said Katrina will force future revisions.

Three years ago, SCP Pool, a large pool-supplies wholesaler, selected what is now a Vericenter Inc. facility in Dallas as its primary data center for hosting the company's mission-critical, AIX-based ERP (enterprise resource planning) systems. SCP Pool's second-tier applications, such as its human resources, benefits and payroll software, typically reside in Covington.

To safeguard its IT systems from Katrina, SCP Pool relocated the staff necessary for shifting its call center, support operations and phone numbers from Covington to Dallas. "My biggest challenge was two things: get my staff and support capabilities to Dallas, and, two, move [secondary] and tertiary systems to Dallas," said Babco. "Any [disaster recovery] plan has to identify priority. Along with priority, how long can something stay out and unavailable and not impact the business?"

Babco employed what he called a makeshift "Noah's Ark" strategy in redeploying IT staff to Dallas, choosing a handful of experienced staffers—including an AIX administrator, a network administrator, a Microsoft Windows administrator, a help desk agent and a software specialist—to be sent out in a first phase, followed by more staff in later phases.

"By Monday morning, when the hurricane was hitting, I had a core IT staff already positioned in Dallas, with all of our IT help desk calls already forwarding to us. Therefore, all 200 [global SCP Pool] locations needing IT services were uninterrupted," Babco said.

Although many areas near Covington are still without power and there is limited connectivity at SCP Pool's headquarters, Babco said his team will leave the Vericenter facility this week.

Many businesses without the luxury of leaving areas damaged by Katrina must rely on more localized technology offerings for their needs. For instance, HP has shipped two of its mobile trailers equipped with the amenities of the company's data recovery centers.

According to HP's Wilson, a New Orleans bank is using one trailer as a temporary operations location, featuring 100 seats, tellers and even a drive-through window open for business. She said the mobile units most in demand are those with satellite communications capabilities. "Given what's happened in New Orleans and [that] all phone lines are down, it would behoove us to make the investment there and add satellite [phones] to all of them," Wilson said.

The hurricane's unexpected fury and aftermath have left many IT users—some of whom had left in advance with only a few days' worth of clothing or personal items—forced to balance moving ahead with their personal lives with keeping their companies' technology and business needs uninterrupted.

"People in New Orleans and affected areas, they're worried about where they're going to get their eyeglasses prescription or where their kids are going to go to school. The last thing they want to worry about is [IT]," said Agility's Boyd.

Before Hurricane Katrina, Gillis, Ellis and Baker Insurance, a leading New Orleans writer of casualty, liability benefits, health, employment, risk management and seismic vessel coverage had offices across the street from the Superdome; today half of GEB's employees are scattered between Texas, Georgia and points-in-between, while the other half are busy taking claims in a 24-foot by 60-foot single-wide emergency recovery mobile unit parked in Baton Rouge, La.

Anderson Baker, president, told Insurance Journal GEB began taking claims by turning data over to an outside entity while Agility Recovery Solutions of Charlotte, N.C. set up his operations in the mobile unit in Baton Rouge.

Baker said that after all the 2004 hurricanes, GEB officers rethought their disaster recovery plan and chose Agility Solutions to get them back in business.
Baker concerned about other agents

"A few of my very good peers at other agencies did the same thing," Baker explained. He said a vast, huge, overwhelming majority of agents affected by Hurricane Katrina did not subscribe to Agility, or as far as he knew, any other service.

"Because I know them well and they are good, professional associates of mine, I hope they made other arrangements - but I am fearful that is not the case," Baker said.

"During the interim we had a service take our claims and forward them to our carriers," Doug Mills, GEB chief operating officer explained. "We were happy to come to this trailer this morning and find a note attached saying, 'We are glad you are here, it gives us hope.'"

In 2004, GEB Insurance wrote $45 million in premiums at its downtown New Orleans office. Eighty five percent of its business is commercial and 15 percent personal. Baker said about 85 percent of his business involves commercial employee health plans.

Business lifelines, provided by Agility Recovery Solutions through all types of disruptions, enabled GEB to access equipment and share its critical disaster experience. Agility maintains distribution centers with more than $35 million in computer equipment in stock and maintains access to more than 100,000 constantly available mobile units.

Agility works with its members to tailor their disaster recovery plans individually through a consultative approach and client preparedness plan. GEB signed up for its services in advance and therefore Agility was ready and able to respond on an instant's notice.

Back in business in Baton Rouge
GEB began taking claims from its 4,000 customers Sun. Sept. 4, with a dozen to 18 employees manning the banks of phones in the air-conditioned mobile recovery unit. Baker said GEB will take claims and forward them to carriers seven-days-a-week, at least 15-hours-each-day.
GEB has been in business since 1933, and has developed a close relationship with his clients for more than 25 years.

"Without Agility I would be sitting around staring at television all day, knowing that there is nothing I could do," Baker said. "Being set up in an emergency trailer gives me a purpose in what I am doing right now and what I am doing with my life by being able to do what I promised my customers I would do.

"This is the only time we have to deliver our product," Baker explained. "Of course we can issue Certificates of Insurance all day long, and our customers often think that is good service, but that's not service compared to what we are encountering now—and without Agility I would be unable to fulfill that promise, we would be absolutely dead and our clients would suffer."

70 percent without recovery plan
Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility, estimates that almost 70 percent of the businesses in the U.S. do not have a backup recovery plan.

"In the wake of a disaster like Hurricane Katrina, statistics indicate that about 68 percent of the businesses affected will not survive because they do not have a backup recovery plan in place," Boyd explained. "If an insurance company does not have a way to recover their business, if they do not have their data backed up, if they do not have a place to go, or a place for phones to ring and can not respond to claims—they are going to lose those customers.

"Hurricane Katrina had a monumental impact on the region. Right now we are recovering 10 companies on the Gulf Coast, insurance companies, construction companies and associations," Boyd said. "We have had representatives in the affected area since Sept. 1 when we started receiving calls for help and have been recovering people since then."

Agility has been assembling its single-wide 24-foot x 60-foot, and double-wide, 48-foot x 60 foot, mobile units with generators, air-conditioning, high-tech equipment, satellite systems and teams to assist the large number of people displaced in Louisiana, Mississippi and other Gulf Coast states.

Agility's first goal was to establish campuses to house its clients in Baton Rouge, Mobile and other parts of Louisiana. Boyd said some clients have moved to secondary sites they had set up in other areas, such as Chicago. Next week he expects to deploy three more mobile units.

To put the magnitude of the disaster caused by Katrina into perspective, Boyd said that when 9/11 occurred, Agility had a total of 17 declarations, all of which only involved shipping equipment to clients that were able to recover at their own facilities.

"With Hurricane Katrina, there isn't any infrastructure, we are going to end up deploying 10, 15, 20 or more mobile units," Boyd estimated. "When it is all over we will probably end up recovering 30 companies. It will dwarf any recovery effort that has ever happened to the industry, and on a completely different scale."

As an agent, and if I can round up my employees, I am confident we will get through this, survive this and deliver what we promised to our clients," Baker said. "I hope I have a city to insure a year from now and there are lots of people like me who are going to get back and make it happen.”

As this is being written, a major storm is bearing down on the Texas coast. Nearly a month ago, a similar storm destroyed much of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Tens of thousands of people were displaced, and as many as a million are seeking shelter again.

With those people are going the hopes of thousands of small and mid-sized businesses. Many of those businesses will lose everything, and will never be heard from again. Others will spend months or years recovering the information they need to make their business function, to pay their employees, and serve their customers. Yet a few are already up and running, because they planned ahead for disaster.

No doubt you’re aware of the ability of big companies to weather even terrible disasters. They depend on companies such as IBM and Sungard to safeguard their data, help them recover from a disaster, and even set up temporary offices and communications where necessary. But smaller companies may not be able to avail themselves of the services of these disaster recovery giants. However, that doesn’t mean they can’t plan ahead.

Fortunately, disasters on the scale of a category 5 hurricane are rare events. But that doesn’t mean you won’t have a disaster. “Your neighbor could have a burst pipe that floods your server room,” suggests Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions, in Charlotte, North Carolina. “There are simple things any business can do,” Boyd adds, “they can start backing up their data.”

Boyd notes that simply having a copy of critical business records, such as accounting data, critical documents, and copies of e-mails can make a huge difference between keeping a business running and having it slip quietly into history. “If you don’t have your data it’s difficult to overcome a catastrophic event,” Boyd explains. “You don’t know who your customers are, how much they owe, or how to bill them. You don’t even know your inventory.”
 
Yet it's not enough to just have a backup copy of data. That backup copy has to be kept somewhere safe, for example. Usually, just having a company executive take the copy home at night, or having it placed in a safe deposit box will protect against small disasters. But Boyd notes that a regional disaster might require storage in a different location entirely.
 
In addition, Boyd says it’s important to make sure that you have somewhere to use the data so that you can recover it, and then use it to keep your business alive. In some cases, just knowing you can get to a computer with your word processing software and an e-mail application is enough. But if you have specialized software, including an accounting application, you need to be able to find that as well. In that case, parking a spare computer with the right applications at a location outside of your immediate area may be enough. Your mother-in-law’s back room or the office of a trusted colleague could do nicely.
 
Boyd, who has spent most of his time since Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana recovering his customers, says it’s also critical to have a plan. The plan must include getting detailed contact information from your employees, and must include practice drills. That way you'll know that the plan is still viable and works when it's needed.

A disaster plan, for even a small business, should be put in writing and shared with employees. The plan should include checklists for each employee's role in planning the response to an impending disaster or recovering from one. Items on the checklist should include where to send backups, where to meet after the disaster is over, responsibilities for alerting employees, and where the alternate site for the company operations will be.
 
“They {IT and executives} need to talk to employees about what happens if they have a disaster,” Boyd explains. “They ought to practice it, call everyone on the phone tree, and travel to the alternate location.” He also says it’s important to actually restore your backups and make sure that they’re usable.

Boyd notes that the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina convinced him that a carefully prepared plan is critical. He saw a lot of business people missing basic things. Sometimes, the results of very bad decision-making was due to the stress of the disaste, he adds.

Fortunately, if an enterprise plans well, and practices on a regular basis, its chances of making it through the next disaster – regardless of size – are improved.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t end the planning effort. Not only do you have to keep your business running, you also have to secure the information you’re leaving behind. For example, suppose your computers survive the disaster, but you just can’t get to them, as happened in the Gulf region after the hurricane?

“We’ve heard reports of a lot of looting happening with computers and equipment, including phones and PDAs,” says Eric Sommerton, marketing VP at Control Break International.

Clearly, even if you’re up and running elsewhere, you don’t want someone looking at your business records. Worse, if those records include information protected by Sarbanes-Oxley, Graham – Leach – Bliley or HIPAA, you could find yourself with a significant liability issue. Of course, not everyone who might be trying to use your office after an emergency is a looter.

“People are trying to find ways to communicate, so they’re in these offices to reach out to family and friends,” Sommerton says. But that doesn’t really matter much if protected information is exposed.

This could mean putting some sort of security system in place thatwill protect the computers left behind if they remain operable. Obviously, secure user names and passwords are a must, but for sensitive information, some form of data encryption is a must.

Whether the disaster that hits your business is a regional one such as a hurricane, something local such as a gas leak or a fire, or something as small as a leaky pipe in the office upstairs, there’s no substitute for a plan.

You have to back up your data, of course, but you also have to know where to send it, how to restore it, and what to do with your employees while your offices are inaccessible.

And once you plan for that, you need to practice it so that everyone in the company knows what to do, and so that you know that it actually works.

Though Hilton Head Island has been fortunate, as with Ernesto last week, several local banks and insurers say they are leaving nothing to chance. Many of them have learned the lessons from emergencies in other areas and have instituted precautions should power go out and their buildings become uninhabitable.

Carswell Insurance Services, with offices in Bluffton and on Hilton Head, has contracts with third-party companies to handle data storage, phone forwarding and establishing a temporary office if their main offices are damaged or unreachable, said Bill Thomas, company president.

If a hurricane causes an evacuation, all of Carswell's data is backed up on disks and with a company in Atlanta. Phones can be switched instantly to a call center in Phoenix, Ariz. And Agility Recovery Solutions of Charlotte will set up portable offices as close to the island as possible within 48 hours, Thomas said.

"It's very, very expensive," he said. "But we have an obligation to our clients to be here."

Coastal Plains Insurance, which has Bluffton and island offices, also has a contract with Agility Recovery Solutions for a generator and office equipment, said Mike Pritchett, the company's claim manager.

All staff have cell phones for clients to contact them. Computer servers at Coastal Plains are portable, and that data is backed up by a firm in Texas, Pritchett said.

Still, if a strong storm hit, the exact response by Coastal Plains Insurance would depend on factors far beyond the company's control.

"When we come back and who comes back is very fluid," Pritchett said.

Harbourside Community Bank on the island will use its affiliation with The Savannah Bank and Bryan Bank & Trust in Richmond Hill, Ga., to serve customers through a storm, said Kenny Maguire, executive vice president of commercial lending.

Through the Savannah Bancorp, the holding company for the three banks, Harbourside has off-site data systems and phone-forwarding capabilities, Maguire said.

Maguire worked in Charleston after Hurricane Hugo in 1989 and was surprised the bank wasn't one of the first places people went after the storm.

"They were just trying to survive," Maguire said. "They were standing in line at the grocery store and to get ice and water."

It was about a week before lines started forming at the bank, he said. With today's technology, that week-long window will give Harbourside plenty of time to be ready to serve customers without lines, Maguire said.

CoastalStates Bank, which has three locations on the island, also has an extensive emergency plan, said Dan Holland, bank president. CoastalStates has contracted out its processing and information-technology services to Fiserv, which has centers throughout the country. The bank has an alternate office in Atlanta and access to processing facilities in Newberry and Jacksonville, Fla. And CoastalStates' toll-free number immediately will rerouted to the bank's alternate location in an emergency, CoastalStates' plan states.

One of the most pressing issues after a storm is reconnecting with vital bank staff. Managers and other key employees have satellite phones so they can find each other after an evacuation, Holland said.

Like the two insurance firms, CoastalStates also has an agreement with Agility Recovery Solutions to bring in two mobile offices within 48 hours of a disaster.

Ernesto was the closest that two-year-old CoastalStates has been to using its disaster plan, Holland said.

"This was a good dry run," Holland said.

“There’s a lot to think about during a disaster,” says Taylor Busby, vice president of marketing for Agility Recovery Services, which provides business-continuity services. “Replacing all of those little things you take for granted – and doing it quickly – can be a huge obstacle.”

Safeco knows how important business continuity is in our industry. That’s why we have partnered with Agility to offer agents a discount on the company’s service. We’re the first carrier to partner with Agility to this degree.

How it works
For a monthly subscription fee, Agility provides its members – which number more than 1,000 agents – access to a pool of resources for use in case of emergency. Agility maintains this equipment in distribution centers around the country. If your company needs generators, servers or even a mobile office setup, Agility ships it to your location – and will deliver everything you need to get up and running within 48 hours.

Aside from the monthly fee, members pay only Agility’s net out-of-pocket recovery cost in an emergency. These could include shipping, bandwidth fees (for phone and Internet service via satellite, for example), etc. “We are not in the business of profiting from disaster situations,” Busby says. "We bill members only for our out-of-pocket costs."

Not just for agencies
Of course, an Agility membership is useful for more than just insurance agencies. Your commercial clients can benefit as well – Agility’s service is ideal for small- and medium-sized business with 10-500 employees. And Agility has a partnership program for agents who generate business for the company, Busby says.

Monthly membership rates for Safeco agents start at $230, a savings of $20. Once signed up, agents enter their business and equipment needs on the MyAgility Web site, ensuring that in an emergency, they don’t have to remember how many servers or phones they need – Agility will already know. It also allows members to store critical documents, such as insurance policies, product warranties, and data back-up procedures.

“The site is an eye-opener,” Busby says. “Often, until becoming Agility members, our customers hadn’t really sat down and looked at everything they would need to get back up and running again.”

Agility Recovery Solutions
Agility provides members (who pay a monthly fee) access to a pool of resources for use in case of emergency.

• Cost: Membership starts at $230 per month for Safeco agents. In the event of an emergency, Agility promises to get the equipment necessary to get a business operational delivered within 48 hours. The company then bills members for its net out-of-pocket recovery costs.
  
• Contact: For more information, or to contact Agility, go to the company’s Web site at www.agilityrecovery.com.

"While our existing bank branches were unaffected by the fires, our entire community was,” said Michael Hahn, president and COO of PCNB. “We’re working with the affected residents and the businesses community to facilitate the federal disaster loan application process and help with other construction loans so our community can rebuild.”

PCNB was originally introduced to Agility through Compushare, Inc., a financial technology management company that focuses on technology performance and compliance services for community financial institutions. Upon first learning of the wildfire situation in San Diego and the risks posed to employees of PCNB, Compushare immediately dispatched a team of Disaster Recovery Specialists to quickly establish a network presence in the ReadySuite Financial branch and get PCNB operational in the temporary location.

“Our Compliance and Risk Management efforts at Compushare go far beyond developing and documenting plans to meet examiner requirements.  We’re committed to the success and safety of each of our clients,” said Michael Barrack, Director of Risk and Compliance at Compushare.  “We first inaugurated the ReadySuite Financial solution at PCNB knowing a practical contingency solution was needed that could be easily and quickly deployed at times of disaster.  This and Agility’s proven commitment to our clients’ success has earned them the right as a trusted partner of Compushare.”   

The 672-square-foot bank branch is equipped with teller counters, customer service desks, computers, satellite for phone and Internet, restroom and more. PCNB has five employees onsite, including Teri Hudson, a 25-year veteran of the Small Business Administration, the organization responsible for federal disaster loans for individuals and businesses.

“A disaster isn’t necessarily something that only affects your building or technology,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility. “With Pacific Coast, this disaster affected its people, customers, employees and members of the Fallbrook community.”A local resident donated land for the recovery and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), which charters, regulates, and supervises all national banks, granted the bank a temporary charter for the ReadySuite Financial recovery.

About PCNB
Pacific Coast National Bank offers a broad range of commercial and consumer banking services, headquartered in San Clemente, Calif., with offices in San Clemente and Encinitas. Shares are offered under the symbol PCST.ob. Visit www.pacificcoastnationalbank.com.

About Compushare
Compushare, Inc., a California Corporation headquartered in Orange County, is a Financial Technology Management company that enables community financial institutions to focus on their operations, franchise value and safety.  Their expertise and CIOTHiNK! business approach toward technology performance and compliance assures strategic success.  Founded in 1995, Compushare provides technology services and compliance services on an outsourced basis that addresses business concerns in Strategy, Safety, Soundness and Support.

About Agility
Agility specializes in disaster recovery and business continuity for small and medium sized businesses. Within 48 hours of a disaster, Agility delivers its equipment to the recovery site and works with its clients to restore normal operations.

The bank tapped its $225-a-month deal with Agility Recovery Solutions, a business-continuity firm, to open a temporary headquarters in Fallbrook for 60 days on land donated by a resident. Agility opened a 720-square-foot mobile branch, complete with a power generator, satellite system and computer system sufficient for 45 employees, according to Michael Hahn, president and COO of PCNB.

“Residents were thankful for having us here,” says Hahn, who notes the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency approved the bank’s request for a temporary facility in only 24 hours. The bank’s largest contribution? Helping affected residents wade through reams of loan-application pages from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, as well as answering questions about potential renovation loans.

“The primary reason we did it was to build up our image in the community,” he admits. “I’m sure it’ll pay off, maybe with some deposit customers or loan customers. And from a CRA [Community Reinvestment Act] perspective, we felt like this is an area we needed to help out. We want to give back and we have some talented people who can.”

According to Bob Boyd, the president and CEO of Agility, the entire project will cost Pacific Coast about $50,000, beyond the monthly fee.

One Iowa agency, Millhiser-Smith Agency Inc., located in hard hit Cedar Rapids, Iowa, relied on a disaster plan it created with professional help some years ago that worked perfectly.

"Our disaster plan included Agility Recovery Solutions to cover all the bases," said Lottie Miller, director, E&O Compliance and Insurance Resources. "When our electricity went out we had a generator, we had complete back-up for phone and computer files and even a place to relocate if we needed it, through this company."

"One of the unfortunate aspects of this flooding event is that it was centered on the heart of the city itself," Miller said. "Like many Midwestern towns, Cedar Rapids was built along the river, a lifeline of transportation and development for pioneer settlers. Then the very thing that provided life and prosperity to a foundling community in those early days, turned on its modern day residents in a manner
incomprehensible to the business and residential communities residing alongside the river today."

Planning is key
Preparation is key, according to Miller. She emphasized that there are several recovery companies that will help you create a disaster plan and provide the tools to continue to operate your business. She said the important point is to make "the decision to get a plan in place."

Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions, is currently working with several agencies in Iowa. Boyd said that his company delivers any or all of the four key elements of recovery, including power, technology, space and connectivity resources.

Boyd said that insurance agencies and other businesses struggle to serve clients when office locations are within the catastrophe area.

"Many agency heads look at the added expense of hiring a company like ours as unnecessary until an catastrophic event such as the flood along the Mississippi really hits home," Boyd said.

Boyd said membership dues for Agility Recovery run about $250 a month. That fee guarantees that help will be at the agency or business doorstep within 48 hours, often even sooner.

Agents meet challenges
Bob Skow, CEO of the Independent Agents of Iowa, said that many agencies were hit hard but a good many were able to relocate or with the help of cell phones, laptop computers and the back-up of computer files allowed to continue service without too much interruption.

"We have been blessed in that the vast majority of agencies have been spared," Skow said. He said that towns such Waverly, Iowa City, Cedar Rapids were all devastated by the flood, but many agencies were in higher ground locations and that factor made a difference.

Skow agrees that disaster plans make a big difference and said he knew some agencies in New Orleans survived and thrived because of planning ahead.

Anderson Baker, president of Gillis, Ellis and Baker of New Orleans, agrees with Skow and offered some advice as well.

"Our plan worked flawlessly and we had a mobile facility equiped with all that is necessary technology tools within 48 hours," Baker said. "We reaped the rewards of good planning and didn't have to worry about errors and ommissions."

Baker warned Midwest agents about offering advice to policyholders regarding flood policies and on business interuption coverage.

Baker said that agents should remember that to very careful in their advice to policyholders. "No agent has the ability to settle business interuption claim."

"You can offer support and advice but that is a far as it goes," Baker said.

Rebuilding again
For the most part, Iowans and their insurance agents are standing tall and have a positive attitude, Lottie Miller of Millhiser-Smith said.

"Iowans are resilient people. We've dealt with much that Nature throws at us for centuries and have always fought back, regaining lost ground," Miller said. "We must look forward and work, as a community, clean up, rebuild and make our city something of which we can again be proud. I am counting on that."

Find this article at:
http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/midwest/2008/06/20/91195.htm

The generators supported storm rescue and recovery efforts and powered city halls, civic centers, 911 command centers, community shelters, water plants and more.

"Agility Recovery was literally a lifesaver," said Arthur Byrn, mayor of the City of Mayfield. "They brought us generators that not only powered city hall, but also our emergency shelters and water plant. People had a warm place to sleep and clean water to drink. Our ability to recover made all the difference in the world."

The disaster planning initiative was finalized in late 2008 by the Kentucky League of Cities Insurance Services (KLCIS) and Agility Recovery Solutions. In essence, the program provides vital ancillary services, such as communications and power, in response to disasters or disruption of business.

The program is the first partnership of its kind in the nation between a municipal league representing cities and a disaster response provider.

Reprinted from KLCIS press release, 2/12/09:

Kentucky cities utilize Agility Recovery for both proactive continuity planning and, if needed, disaster recovery. Agility continually works with the cities to plan for interruptions caused by natural and manmade disasters. Planning initiatives address critical areas like emergency communication plans, alternative office and administrative space, technology replacement, employee continuity and more.

“We were drawn to the flexibility of the program,” said Sylvia Lovely, executive director and CEO of Kentucky League of Cities. “In the case of January’s ice storm, our cities really needed generators, and they got them. But in the event of a tornado, fire, or even a server failure, our cities will need other tools. And they have complete access to the resources they need because of this disaster recovery program.”

“We didn’t expect our first experience with Agility to be a state-wide natural disaster,” said Bill Hamilton, executive pool administrator/chief insurance services officer with the Kentucky League of Cities. “We learned a number of good lessons for going forward, but what we do know is that this is a solution that helped people and allowed our cities to restore government more quickly.”

“Agility restored these organizations’ operations within 12 to 24 hours of receiving each disaster declaration,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery. “Our generator and satellite resources are currently in place with insurance agencies, banks, city halls, civic centers, 911 command centers, community shelters and water plants. All of the recoveries are a direct result of the snow and ice storm that continues to pummel the U.S.”

One Agility recovery is taking place in Paducah, Ky., a community of over 25,000 residents in western Kentucky. The majority of the city is without cellular phone service and the city government is utilizing Agility’s alert notification service to coordinate its internal recovery efforts. Two Agility-provided generators are onsite and powering the city hall and public works buildings

In addition to Paducah, Agility is in contact with the nearly 400 cities throughout Kentucky that are part of the Kentucky League of Cities, an association that provides resources, advocacy and assistance to help make cities more livable. 

One insurance agency in Dexter, Mo., about 170 miles south of St. Louis, is utilizing its Agility-assisted disaster recovery to help the community. The agency is up-and-running with an Agility generator and opened its doors for locals to utilize a free soup kitchen, wireless Internet and even beds. All this is happening while the agency’s employees are taking claims from their clients. The agency’s community efforts will continue until power is restored, which may take days or weeks.

Power and connectivity resources are only two aspects of Agility’s recovery capabilities. The company also has mobile office units and computer/server technology that can be delivered to a client’s site within 48 hours of a disaster declaration. Put together, the power, connectivity, space and technology resources form a self-sustaining mobile office, free from land-based power and connectivity resources.

Visit AgilityRecovery.com for more information.

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He added, “The truth is that it’s not that difficult to put a plan together to survive any type of catastrophic event—a disaster or something like H1N1.”

Mr. Paulison said FEMA and Homeland Security Web sites have detailed steps for putting a plan together as well as practicing the plan to make sure it works.

He recommended sites such as:

• www.ready.gov

• www.flu.gov

“These are easy to use and free,” he said.

When he was at Homeland Security, he noted, their contingency plan was practiced with employees working from remote sites to make sure they could all communicate and do their jobs.

Bob Boyd, chief executive officer of Agility Recovery Solutions consulting firm, who also took part in the phone conference, said it is no surprise that smaller businesses trail larger ones in this respect. “Large enterprise companies have a program and maybe Sarbanes-Oxley requirements and a dedicated staff,” he said.

Smaller companies, he noted, are “just now beginning to figure out how to get their arms around it, and they’re potentially more susceptible to events than a large enterprise.”

Mr. Boyd, by example, mentioned that a large bank with a branch closed can have customers visit another branch, whereas a small business wouldn’t have the same options.

According to the 2009 Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity Survey from Charlotte, N.C.-based Agility:

• Ninety percent of smaller companies (less than 100 employees) surveyed spend less than one day per month preparing and maintaining their continuity plans.

• One in five (22 percent) spend no time maintaining their plans.

• Comparatively, 20 percent of larger companies (more than 100 employees) spend over 10 days per month on their continuity plans.

In exercising a plan, Mr. Boyd said, assumptions that have been made sometimes are not valid. “It’s better to find that out.”

Dr. William Lang, former associate chief medical officer at the Dept. of Homeland Security, said during the conference that in preparing for the H1N1 virus, larger organizations can begin with their existing disaster plan and apply it to the H1N1 risks. Small to medium size business, however, may not have an all-hazards plan in place as a starting point.

He added that smaller businesses often don’t have a risk manager employed to implement a plan. “The risk manager is the owner of the business,” he said. “And how much time is [the owner] going to spend on risk management versus operating his business?”

Mr. Boyd pointed out that smaller businesses—that haven’t been mandated by a regulator to put a plan in place—may perceive that implementing an all-hazards plan is too time-consuming and costly.

Dr. Lang said a roadblock to putting a pandemic plan in place is what he called “pandemic fatigue,” or apathy, caused by the perception that the H1N1 virus may be a “non-event.”

While the likelihood is that we may be facing a “bad flu season” rather than a full-blown pandemic, some businesses may be hit with high absenteeism rates, he observed.

He explained that the effect to businesses is different than other disasters because it affects people rather than the facility, meaning that companies need to protect their employees.

Situations that need to be planned for include:

• Employees who may have used up their sick leave.

• Contractors who may come to work sick.

• Parents who might have to stay home to care for a sick child and need to be covered for in the office.

“A pandemic doesn’t have geographic lines, unlike a hurricane or earthquake,” he said.

He said insurance agents and brokers can play a big part in helping smaller businesses get up to speed in this area. “This is a perfect opportunity for agents and brokers,” he said, adding that some insurers give discounts for recovery plans.

“ICBA is pleased to be working with Agility Recovery Solutions to provide community bank members with yet another compliance resource to help guide them on both new and existing regulations,” said Dan Clancy, ICBA senior vice president of services. “We are also pleased that Agility has the ability to offer community banks disaster recovery solutions so they can be available to their customers, even during a time of crisis.” Agility Recovery Solutions, a former division of GE, has 21 years of disaster recovery and testing experience. Agility currently serves over 1,000 financial institutions across North America assuring each has a viable, federally compliant disaster recovery plan.

“Community banks are the local engines that drive economic stability and prosperity in their communities,” said Bob Boyd, president and CEO of Agility Recovery Solutions. “We are thrilled to offer ICBA’s community bank members an array of compliance and disaster-recovery resources to help them continue to serve their customers to the highest degree of excellence—even in the midst of unforeseen events and challenges.”

Agility developed ReadySuite Financial to provide financial institutions with a comprehensive, turnkey disaster recovery solution, including access to self-contained mobile-banking facilities, generators, computers, and satellite communications. The solution offers a convenient location for customers to engage in financial transactions despite an interruption in their banks’ operations.

For additional information, visit www.icba.org or http://www2.agilityrecovery.com/financial.