Recovery Service Invocation
In the event of a disaster, Plan B DR will provide you with replacements for your systems running on virtual servers on our Rescue Platform.
A disaster can be any event, that in your opinion, prevents you from using your IT systems - either temporarily or permanently.
The Plan B DR service is invoked by calling our emergency phone number.
From this point on, Plan B DR engineers will be dedicated to getting you up and running as soon as possible. Your staff members are therefore free to concentrate on the problems at hand while we get your replacement systems running.
Because of the implications of bringing up a new service, all invocations must be authorised by a pre-appointed client executive(s) using a specific security process.
Once the authorisation process has been followed successfully Plan B DR engineering will agree the course of action, allocate virtual servers and boot up the appropriate Rescue images. They will also activate other services such as DNS & email redirections, and set up VPNs. All actions to invoke a particular service, and any dependencies between systems are documented in the Plan B DR Configuration Management Data Base (CMDB).
Plan B DR engineers will run test criteria to check the services are running okay and will then hand over the running systems to the your IT staff. In the extreme event of the your staff not being available, we can provide operational assistance under a support contract.
During a disaster, Plan B DR’s staff are dedicated to recovering your systems.
Accessing the Rescue Patform
Your access to recovered systems can be via a number of different methods. These could depend on the situation, your overall Business Continuity Plan and other provisions.
If your existing network is still available (which might happen if the disaster was confined to the server level) then a VPN can be simply established from that network to the Rescue Platform.
Alternatively, if you have a pre-provisioned alternative DR location, then again a VPN can be set up from the DR location. If the situation means that existing locations are not available then a roaming VPN service can be established that can be accessed by laptops or other mobile or temporary machines.
Plan B DR can help with holding BCP information and communicating this with staff via our DR portal or via SMS broadcast. We will do whatever we can to ensure your recovery is as simple and straight forward as possible.
Transferring off the Rescue Platform
Once the cause of a disaster has been dealt with and your original systems are recovered or replaced, Plan B DR will help with the transition back off the Rescue Platform.
The transition back to your live systems should be treated just like a traditional system migration, with the normal issues of data cut-over to be considered. If required, Plan B DR can help with the planning and implementation of the transfer
Alternatively, you may wish to consider taking the opportunity the original disaster has presented to consider rebuilding your systems on a virtualised architecture. Not only will this bring potential benefits of consolidation but also make transferring off the Rescue Platform extremely simple. Plan B DR can help plan and implement such a move to a virtualised architecture.
