Back up shortfalls
Wednesday, February 2, 2011 at 12:03PM 
The results of a survey of 175 UK small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), have been released
The results show that almost three-quarters (74 percent) of SMEs surveyed have some sort of formal business continuity plan in place: a surprisingly high figure.
However, for organizations with less than 100 employees, the proportion with no business continuity plans in place rises to 43 percent, with respondents citing reasons as varied as budget, lack of in-house expertise and resources.
The survey also reveals that more than a third of all respondents (40 percent) have experienced an incident which required them to invoke all or part of their business continuity procedures. This was due to unforeseen circumstances; from technical problems such as hardware or system failures, internet or network issues, or other factors such as severe weather conditions or a natural disaster.
Whilst the overwhelming majority of businesses (99 percent) surveyed do carry out data back-ups on a regular basis, there are anomalies in their business continuity plans that could impact recovery from an incident such as a natural disaster. When asked about the practical details of their back-ups, more than a quarter of all businesses (29 percent) keep their back-up tapes or discs on-site, either in a locked safe, secure room, or somewhere in the office, which offers no protection against physical damage to property, such as fire and floods. Some 21 percent have a designated staff member who is responsible for taking back-up tapes or discs home, raising the possibility that they could fall into the wrong hands, get lost or stolen in transit or be mistreated so that their capacity to restore is severely compromised.
The survey raises further concerns on recovery times. A significant proportion, 45 percent, accepted that it would take ‘some days’ for their business to be fully operational again following an incident. More reassuringly, however, some 55 percent are confident that they would be functioning again within hours, with little disruption to their business, customers or services.