Flood protection for business property

You should assess the potential risk of flooding to your business. By understanding what the risks of flooding are for your business you will be able to decide what to do about it.

Understand the risk of flooding to your business

You should assess how much damage a flood might cause if flooding were to occur around or near your business property. For example, your losses could be high if you have a lot of expensive stock on the ground floor of your shop or warehouse. Businesses that have taken action and are flood-prepared can save between 20 and 90 per cent on the cost of lost stock and moveable equipment when there's flooding so it is worth having a flood plan in place.

You can use the River Agency's flood map to find out about the chance of flooding to your business property from rivers or the sea. Think about other flood risks, particularly if your property is at the bottom of a hill or below sea level. You can also assess the potential of flood risks to your business property from surface water. If this is the case a more detailed flood risk assessment for your premises is advisable. 

Advantages of flood preparation

Taking steps to prepare for potential flooding to your business could benefit your business in the following ways:

Damage limitation

Significantly reduce damage to property and stock, business disruption, and recovery costs.

Legal compliance

Helps your business to comply with regulatory requirements.

Liability

Reduce your exposure to civil or criminal liability.

Credibility

Enhance your business' image, credibility, and reputation by demonstrating that you take your flood preparation responsibilities very seriously.

Social responsibility

Helps fulfil your responsibilities to protect employees, the community, and the environment.

Insurance

Helps you to obtain insurance coverage and may also help reduce insurance premiums.

Flood risk assessment

Your flood risk assessment can help you decide what to do to control the risks of flooding to your business by:

• Protect your business premises and take steps to limit potential damage. See reduce potential flood damage.
• Preparing a business flood plan of how your business will prepare if flooding looks likely and how your business will respond if a flood does take place.
• Making sure that you have the right insurance cover for flood damage and business interruption. See insure your business against flooding.
• Training employees so they know what actions to take in the event of a flood or on receiving a flood warning. See flood training for employees.

For more information see business impact analysis.