Add Financials Disaster Recovery Planning to Your To-Do List
The change from Daylight Saving Time is a good reminder to check smoke detector batteries. The same goes for checking your company's accounting software back-up plan. It's a good idea to incorporate that review into your year-end financial process. CFOs and Controllers should know the answer to each of these questions:
- Is there a backup?
- Is it current?
- How long will it take to get the financials back online after a disaster?
Backup Strategy
If your company runs on-premise accounting software, your IT staff is responsible for backing up the system. Most organizations have a disaster recovery plan that covers getting their technology systems up and running after unplanned interruptions.
When it comes to cloud accounting software, the provider is responsible for backing up the files running in their cloud. If you're not sure what your current provider's back-up plan is, request a copy. If you are in the process of evaluating new accounting packages, ask the vendors on your shortlist to provide their disaster recovery plan.
Frequency of Backups
First, a word about backups: Performing nightly backups is the best practice regardless of whether financials software is installed on-premise or in the cloud. Data replication is another way to back up a system. As the term implies, data is copied to a back-up location as it is processed. This provides an up-to-the minute back-up of the system but may require additional licensing fees.
On-Premise Backups: Most IT teams that maintain on-prem financials software will schedule nightly back ups, though a few will do a weekly back up instead. The best practice is to save backed-up files off-site. Another option is to perform a back-up to a separate in-house server. This is not the best solution since unforeseen events at the location could destroy both sets of data.
Cloud Backups: The cloud software provider backs up both the software and your company's financials database that runs in their cloud. The best practice in the cloud is the same as for on-premises – run a scheduled back-up during non-business hours. Data replication is also a back-up option in the cloud.
Recovery Timeline
A detailed disaster recovery plan should be a subset of your organization's business continuity plan. The difference is that the overall plan addresses how the company will get its people, processes, and infrastructure back on track; the disaster recovery plan focuses on getting the technology (including software) up and running again.
So, how quickly will your team have access to the restored system and how much of their work will be lost in the crash? Most back-up solutions allow for data to be restored to a specific "point in time." That could mean restoring from last night's back-up. Or, if backups are done weekly, the data could be several days old. The more time that passes between the back-up and the disaster event, the less data will be available for recovery. Keep this in mind as you consider the recovery timeline during your year-end financial review. You may want to discuss adjusting the back-up schedule with your IT team.
