Severe weather impacts on UK business continuity surveyed

Over half (58 percent) of senior decision makers in small businesses in Britain admit their business suffered as a result of the winter weather last week, despite 78 percent saying they thought their company was prepared to cope with the snow chaos, according to a survey of over 500 senior decision makers in small businesses, commissioned by Citrix GoToMyPC and carried out by YouGov.

Some small businesses did take steps to combat the weather conditions and ensure business as usual though, by enabling more staff to work from home (25 percent) and holding more online meetings (10 percent). The research does suggest however some small businesses could have done more to prepare for the unexpected, as only 42 percent said they have a business continuity plan in place.

The impact on small businesses was widespread, with businesses across Britain reporting problems. A quarter of small businesses decision makers say some staff were late into work, while 26 percent reported that some staff couldn’t make it into the workplace at all. In addition, 21 percent found that key suppliers and contacts were not available and 26 percent had to cancel or postpone business meetings.

However, small businesses also suffered as a result of unexpected disruption caused by widespread school closures and a lack of road salt.

As many as 74 percent of British workers were affected by last week’s winter conditions, with 8 percent forced to stay home due to school closures and 12 percent not able to work at all, according to a related GoToMyPC study of more than 2,000 adults. When asked about the most annoying aspects of the winter weather, a massive 71 percent voiced the lack of grit on roads as by far the biggest issue.

For the week beginning 4th January 2009, almost a quarter (24 percent) of British workers claimed they lost more than five working hours, with the survey showing that as much as 124 million working hours could have been lost last week alone as a result of the weather. This equals £1.35bn in lost productivity.

•Date: 20th Jan 2010 • Region: UK •Type: Article •Topic: BC statistics
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