It may be an everyday story of country folk, but The Archers can teach us all a good lesson

I was driving home this evening (16th January 2012), listening to Radio Four and battling the traffic on the A1. Whilst not being a regular listener to The Archers, I couldn’t help but be interested in the current story-line when it came on. Apparently, somebody has cut off Ambridge from the rest of the digital world by pinching a length of communications cable. Internet and fixed-line telephone have been disrupted and the villagers are suffering badly.

• At Home Farm, Brian Aldridge can’t carry on his business because he depends on Internet access.
• At Grey Gables, credit card payments can’t be authorised, online bookings can’t be checked and kitchen orders are taking twice as long because they all have to be placed over a mobile phone.

Unfortunately, nobody seems to have planned for this possible, but not probable event.

The manual card swipes have been disposed of, Not everybody has a mobile phone and nobody seems to have a 3G modem card for their PC.

Now of course The Archers is fiction, but the potential impacts that might result from losing your communications are not. Leave aside the specific cause, copper theft, and consider the impact on your business that might result if you lost your broadband and telephone.

Give some serious thought to how you would continue serving your customers, transacting your business and staying in contact. Then prepare some contingency plans, buy the necessary bits of equipment and practice, practice, practice.

And that’s Business Continuity Planning, courtesy of The Archers.

Image courtesy of The Daily Telegraph