Companies urged to test disaster plans

In light of the unexpected and horrendous attacks at the heart of the United States financial and government centres, organisations should heed the call to action now, said Malcolm McCaig, partner in assurance and advisory at Deloitte & Touche.

McCaig told AccountancyAge.com: ‘No one likes to see disasters like this happen. Every organisation should have a plan they can follow. This is a wake up call. A call to action. Do it now and don’t wait. It could happen to any of us at any time.

‘Don’t expect insurance to be the answer,’ he urged.

The economic cost as a result of yesterday’s events is still unknown, but many economists are already warning that this could tip the US into full recession.

A world recession, say commentators, will only worsen the human suffering inflicted on the US.

Research conducted earlier this year revealed disaster recovery continued to lack the attention it requires.

Respondents to a poll in March by GlobalContinuity.com, a business recovery portal, revealed that the majority (59.5%) agreed the ‘attempt to turn business continuity planning into a wider management discipline has failed’.

McCaig who had to cut short his interview with AccountancyAge.com because Deloittes was testing its disaster recovery systems pinpointed two kinds of ‘culprits’. ‘The first are companies that don’t have a plan and the second are those companies that have a plan but don’t keep it up-to-date,’ he said.

A biennial survey conducted by Aon, a risk consulting organisation, revealed this year that the UK’s largest organisations viewed ‘the loss of reputation’ and ‘failure to change’ as the two greatest risks. A total of 129 companies responded to the survey, half with annual sales exceeding £1bn.

Risks of physical damage and crime fell right down the list of companies’ priorities, according to the findings.

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