How Commercial Property Managers Should Prepare for Storms

12/23/2019 (Permalink)

Back up any property files in the cloud

Proper property management is especially important during an emergency. If you are a commercial property manager, you should take the below steps as part of a storm preparedness plan.

Keep an Emergency Contact List

Property managers need to make sure everyone in the building is accounted for following a disaster. You should thus keep an emergency contact list that includes:

• The names of the workers in each office
  
• The email addresses of these workers
  
• The cell and office phone numbers of the workers
  
• The names of employees with special needs who might need assistance during an evacuation
  
  

You may also want to document the schedules of each worker. That way, you will know who is and is not in the office building at certain times. Be sure to back up the list so it can be accessed remotely if necessary.
Your storm preparedness plan should also include the phone numbers for local police, ambulance and fire services. Put these numbers next to any public address systems, two-way radios and phones in your building.
You should additionally list contact information for your local commercial building restoration services company. This business can help with flood or storm cleanup.

Educate the Staff
Make sure that all of your staff members understand what to do during a storm. In general, engineers, front desk workers and managers should remain on the property as long as possible to keep the building running and assist with evacuation.

Back Up Important Documents
While flood cleanup experts can fix physical storm damage to your property, restoring intellectual property is more difficult. That is why you should back up any property files in the cloud. You can also keep them in a hard drive that is stored in a waterproof and fireproof location.
A disaster can strike your commercial building at any time. However, by making a storm preparedness plan, you can mitigate the flood damage to the property.