There are some production and service industries where a hundred percent service level is essential. These can be Internet services, server providers, customer support. However, the severity of different natural disasters, hurricanes and Tsunamis can disrupt the level of service, just like Hurricane Sandy recently. It is impossible to provide phone or email support when the head office’s lines are not working. This is one of the situations when having a plan B provided by outsourcing agencies comes useful. Although companies can order monthly packages at most of these international firms, some of them also offer an emergency service standby package, providing operations managers a peace of mind that customers would still be serviced at a high standard as normal.
Dealing with Electricity and Phone Line Cuts
When electricity is cut because of severe weather; wind, ice or other natural disasters, it is impossible to deal with queries. Indeed, it is possible that the majority of employees would be unable to get into the office. Looking at the Canadian Ice Storm in 1998, it is evident that a large area and half of Quebec was put to a hold due to the weather for six whole days. With more than 130 power towers destroyed, and communication almost impossible, companies lost millions of dollars. Being prepared for climatic emergencies is important for all companies, and operation management plans should include the offers of outsourcing partners as an emergency resort.
Outsourcing Backlog
When backlog in orders and processing builds up, a company has two options: they would either ask existing staff to do overtime for usually 1.5 times their normal hourly rate or find a reliable outsourcing agency to work on the project. It is easy to communicate the expected completion and calculate the cost of the project that way, without putting more pressure on employees. Internal training documents can be provided for the agency to train the workers fast and effectively. Production industry backlogs are a little harder to outsource, due to the need for moving equipment. However, digitalization has created more opportunities for all business areas.
Time Zone Advantages of Outsourcing
When outsourcing to Asia or any other country, it is easy to get ahead and offer faster turnaround processing times than the competition. After a climatic emergency, most companies would take weeks – if not months – to recover information, data and resume business as normal operations. This is a good opportunity for companies making the most out of their outsourcing; they can win big projects and companies by getting a competitive advantage of price and effectiveness.
Data Server Maintenance Outsourcing
Getting prepared to data loss and server power disruption is important for information technology companies. In the data server industry, many firms choose to get their servers duplicated offshore, so the maintenance can be carried out from either their main office or abroad. Syncing the servers on a daily basis would provide them with a security copy of all customer data, and enable the company to carry out processing when other firms are closed because of the climatic emergencies.
– BackOffice Pro
