Safety During a Power Outage at Your Business

Dealing with a power outage at home is bad enough, but when it’s your place of business there’s even more to think about. 70% of businesses will face a power outage in the next 12 months, and weather-related outages have doubled since 2003.

Hopefully, you have a standby generator that can power your major systems if the power goes out. If you don’t, you’ll have to take additional safety steps.

At your business, you need to think about keeping both your customers and your staff safe. Here are some tips that can help.

Know the Weather Situation

If there’s severe weather in the area, a manager should be keeping an eye on the situation. You can do this online or using a battery-operated weather radio. It’s important to monitor the weather without alarming customers or seeming disinterested in work.

Customers may ask your employees about the weather and it will look good if they are informed. At the same time, monitoring a storm shouldn’t draw attention away from sales and other work duties.

Have Lights Ready

When the power goes out, the most disorienting part is that suddenly no one can see. Have emergency lighting in your business. If you have a standby generator, you can count on the lights coming back on in just moments. Otherwise, you need to rely on other systems.

Having appropriate lighting can help keep customers in your establishment, which means more sales and profit for you. If you don’t have pre-installed emergency lighting, have lanterns ready for employees to use. They can help customers find their way around or leave the building if necessary.

Have a Backup Payment System

One of the worst parts of a power outage is losing the ability to make sales. Unless you have a standby generator, you won’t be able to run your regular point-of-sale system. This can mean hundreds or thousands of lost dollars if you don’t have an alternate payment method.

Consider having a manual credit card reader available for non-cash customers. That way you can continue to ring up sales and you don’t have to lose out due to an outage.

Many power outages are short term – it would be a shame to have everyone leave only for the power to come on a few minutes later!

Take Steps for Asset Protection

Unfortunately, some customers will see a power outage as a chance to take a “five-finger discount.” Be sure that your emergency plan includes asset protection, especially if you are a retail store. Even in a major storm, you don’t deserve to have merchandise stolen!

Fortunately, a standby generator can help you get back to business as usual in just a few minutes. If you don’t have one, though, you’ll want to make sure you’re able to protect your goods.

You also want to take steps to protect electronic information. Data is incredibly valuable, and you want to make sure it isn’t compromised during an outage. Having data backup and appropriate cybersecurity will help keep everything secure.

Get a Standby Generator to Keep Business Humming

No one wants an interruption to their business. Even an hour of downtime can cause your company thousands of dollars. Having a standby generator can keep everyone safe and help your business continue as usual.

You won’t have to worry about not being able to see, and you’ll have fewer concerns about asset protection and safety. If you’re ready to get the security of a generator for your business, contact us today.