Winter is coming. Regardless of the time of year, however, it’s never a bad idea to create business plans for seasons that host certain obstacles.
Weather experts predict winter storms may become more severe and certain states in the U.S may suffer from extreme temperatures they aren’t used to, according to Business New Daily. If your business location resides in an area with possible snow or extreme cold, you need to make sure blizzards and ice don’t freeze your company in its tracks.
Facility safety
Whether or not you own the building your business operates out of, you need to make sure the facility is ready to deal with snow, cold and ice so your employees are safe and your daily procedures can continue. This may mean getting in contact with the location’s owner or doing some preventative maintenance yourself.
If you’ve ever owned a home, you should be aware of the damage heavy snows and freezing temperatures may cause. CNBC suggested facilities should be wary of snow accumulating on flat roofs and pipes freezing. If you’re going to leave the building unoccupied for long periods during the holidays, you may want to hire someone to look after the facility, shovel the parking lot and test the plumbing.
You should also be careful of heaters and other fire hazards. Your employees must be aware of possible dangers as they look for solutions to keep the office at a comfortable temperature.
“You need to devise plans to avoid dangerous commutes.”
Worker commutes
You can shovel and salt your walkway to prevent your employees from slipping as they walk through the door, but you can’t control road conditions. For the safety of your staff, you need to devise plans to avoid dangerous commutes.
Winter preparation may be the final reason you need to explore cloud hosting or other digital options. If your employees utilize convenient security business software solutions to perform their regular tasks, they could work from home without a drop in productivity.
As a security dealer, you may have service agents driving out to customers’ homes in less-than-perfect conditions. The Guardian advised small business owners to inspect vehicle fleets with the same care as facilities during wintertime. You should check the batteries, keep locks lubricated and invest in winter proofing.
Customer service
Another obstacle security dealers face in the wintertime is service problems. You can take steps to protect your own assets, but snow storms or ice may cause breakers or other third-party equipment providing consumers with alarm systems to break down.
Your alarm billing routines should accommodate changes to particular customer accounts. An automated solution could deliver a routine bill and a centralized financial data system maintains visibility in any occasion. With convenient alarm billing software, you can communicate changes to clients instantly and make simple adjustments to bills based on any outside factors.
Communication is key. Whatever system you use for customer service should alert you to problems before the consumer has time to take issue. You should let them know what plans are in place for emergencies and communicate solutions faster than they can become dissatisfied.