Backup Site - Choosing

Choosing

Choosing the type is mainly decided by an organizations cost vs. benefit strategy. Hot sites are traditionally more expensive than cold sites since much of the equipment the company needs has already been purchased and thus the operational costs are higher. However if the same organization loses a substantial amount of revenue for each day they are inactive then it may be worth the cost. Another advantage of a hot site is that it can be used for operations prior to a disaster happening.

The advantages of a cold site are simple--cost. It requires much fewer resources to operate a cold site because no equipment has been bought prior to the disaster. The downside with a cold site is the potential cost that must be incurred in order to make the cold site effective. The costs of purchasing equipment on very short notice may be higher and the disaster may make the equipment difficult to obtain.

When contracting services from a commercial provider of backup site capability organizations should take note of contractual usage provision and invocation procedures, providers may sign up more than one organization for a given site or facility, often depending on various service levels. This is a reasonable proposition as it is unlikely that all organizations using the service are likely to need it at the same time and it allows the provider to offer the service at an affordable cost. However, in a large scale incident that affects a wide area it is likely that these facilities will become over subscribed.