Pub. 4 2013 Issue 1

www.wvbankers.org 20 access to the internet was a critical interruption to providing customer services. Reassessing the Plan. The areas of your plan, that did not work as well as intended, provides you an opportunity to reassess your plan and make changes where you consider appropriate and reasonable. As noted previously, most plans have certain single points of failure. The single points of fail- ure may not be eliminated, but you can take the appropriate steps to lessen the impact. For the first example noted previ- ously, some options to address the fuel shortage include: • Using the actual experience from the derecho, determine the amount of time you may need to maintain the use of the generator. Based upon the assessment of the actual data, consider maintaining an inventory of diesel fuel provided you have a safe place to store the fuel. • Consider installing a natural gas generator that does not rely on diesel fuel to function. In the second example, a bank may encounter an interruption to their internet service provider. In this case, the bank could consider: • Identifying a secondary / backup internet service provider provided that one is available for your area. • Consider a satellite connection provided the performance is acceptable. • Most importantly, review the procedures you implemented to service your customers during the event. In some cases, certain reports may have been identified and used to assist a bank with servicing customers. The bank should consider generating these reports daily to ensure that they are available in the event there is an extended interruption to accessing a key service provider. In addition, the bank should identify solutions that allow the bank to obtain updated critical reports daily (i.e. accessing the service provider from a different location such as another branch that has other internet service providers available, or another arrangement for an alternate connection). Conclusion. The events of 2012 actually provided all of us with critical information regarding our disaster recovery / business continuity plan. While the events were costly and inconvenient, it is critical that we take advantage of what we learned from these events and assess our plans from the les- sons learned during these interruptions. Where considered necessary and cost beneficial, changes should be incorporated into your plan. Q Q What Did You Learn? — continued from page 19 6W $OEDQV %XFNKDQQRQ 0DUWLQVEXUJ :9 ZZZ FKDSWHFK FRP $ZDUG ZLQQLQJ $UFKLWHFWXUH :9 $,$ +RQRU $ZDUG 8SVKXU &RXQW\ &RXUWKRXVH %XFNKDQQRQ :9 6RXQG DSSURDFK 6ROLG GHOLYHU\ Chris Joseph is a PLLC Member of Arnett Foster Toothman PLLC, Certified Public Accountants, in the Charleston, West Virginia office. A Certified Public Accountant, Certified Information System Auditor, Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control and Certified Information Technology Professional, Mr. Joseph can be contacted at 800-642-3601 or through email: chris.joseph@afnetwork.com .