Internet Access

How important is it to your Agency?

Is access to the internet important to your office's operation?  Of course it is and you'd have a difficult time conducting business without it.  For some, it means access to your management system...that hurts!  For most if not all, it's access to carrier web-sites for quoting and issuance of new business, and processing of endorsements, claim submissions, policy, claim & billing inquiries.  Let's not forget e-mail!

So what's your contingency plan if you lose access to the internet?   Do you have one?

Short of a major natural disaster or terrorist attack, the answer is pretty simple if you think about it...ISP (Internet Service Provider) redundancy. 

Yes, that means that your agency may want to consider employing more than one means of accessing the internet.  What's the cost?  That depends upon the different services offered in your location, but the bigger question is, what is the cost to your agency in lost production time if you don't? 

Businesses generally utilize ISP's supplying and supporting T-1 or T-3 lines, Cable, or DSL service.  If you're still using a dial-up modem, God bless you for your patience.     FiOS (Fiber Optic) access is available to some, however, coverage is quite limited and this may not be a viable option for you.

Since you already have access to the Net thru one of these mediums, consider employing one or more of your other choices as a back-up.  A combination of Cable and DSL would probably be your best option from a "network speed" standpoint.  T-1 lines seem to be fading in favor of T-3 lines, however, the costs are more prohibitive than Cable or DSL. 

And yes, there is the age old dial-up modem.  They're not viable for network connectivity, however, in a real pinch, consider placing modems and dedicated phone lines on some of your workstations so that when the all else fails, you at least have minimal access, and can continue to conduct business.         

Redundant access to the internet is not only practical, it's a no brainer!  We all know about the finger pointing; ISP - it's not on our end, it must be someone else you're trying to connect to; Carrier - same here, everyone else can access us; Management System Vendor - it must be your ISP or your network systems support provider. 

Employing a redundant internet access contingency plan will certainly keep you up and running as well as isolate where the connectivity problem really lies.