Business Continuity Plan Template (Word)

Name: Business Continuity Plan Template (Word)
Brand: Plain Standards
Price: 29.00 USD
Availability: InStock

Business Continuity Plan Template (Word)

$29

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A ready-written document you adapt to your business. Instant download.

When something serious stops your business, this business continuity plan template helps you keep trading and protect your revenue, from the first hour until you are back to normal.

Used properly, this is what it does for your business:

✓More customers: customers kept informed and work kept moving, so they have less reason to go elsewhere.
✓More profit: days of lost trading cut back, because the back-up arrangements are ready before you need them.
✓Less stress: everyone knows who is in charge and what to do, even at three in the morning.
✓Look the part: a written plan to show any customer, tender or insurer who asks how you would cope.

Why not a free business continuity plan template? Many are written for large organisations, built around a single type of disaster, or a list of headings with nothing to tell you what goes under them. This one includes first-hour and first-day checklists, ready-to-adapt customer and media messages and a worked example, written by a former company director of over 30 years.

Director-built, not auditor-built

Plain English, no jargon

Instant download, yours to keep

"Plain Standards have continually under-promised and over-delivered. Outstanding service." Paul J, ATM Security

A workshop fire, a flood, a server that will not start, or the one person who knows how everything works off sick. When something serious stops a business, the damage usually comes less from the event itself than from the confusion that follows: nobody knows who is in charge, who to call or what to tell the customers.

In over 30 years running companies at director level, I learned that the plans that get used are clear, can be reached without getting into the building, and tell people exactly who does what. This template is the way I would set up a business continuity plan in any business: who leads, what must restart first, who covers for whom, and what to say to customers before they start calling your competitors.

Who this is for

Any small or medium sized business that would struggle if it lost its premises, its IT, a key person or a key supplier for a week. It suits a contractor, a workshop, a care provider, an office, a shop, a charity or a manufacturer. If a customer, tender or insurer has asked to see your business continuity plan, this gives you one in writing. You do not need any experience of emergency planning.

It is a continuity plan, not a set of emergency procedures. Keep your fire, first aid and other emergency procedures as they are; the plan tells you where to note them.

See an example

The worked example inside the template follows a kitchen fitting company with ten staff, one workshop and two vans. It planned for a fire in the workshop, and then it happened. Here is its plan in brief:

Critical activities: answer customer calls and email (within 2 hours); keep this week's fitting jobs going (within 2 days); invoice and pay staff (within 1 week).
In charge: the owner leads; the office manager is deputy.
First hour: everyone confirmed safe by 7.30am; fire service (fire department) on site; the office manager diverted the office phone to her mobile; a holding message went to every customer booked that week.
What customers were told: “Our workshop was damaged by fire overnight. Nobody was hurt. Your fitting is going ahead as planned, and we will call you by 5pm today to confirm your date.”
Back-up arrangements that worked: worktops (countertops) were cut at a partner workshop under an agreement made the previous spring; quotes and invoices were in cloud storage, so the office ran from home.
Afterwards: a debrief two weeks later added a second key holder and moved the spare van keys off site.

The template walks you through writing the same plan for your own business, section by section.

View full details

This is a ready-made business continuity plan template in Microsoft Word. It gives you everything you need to plan how your business keeps running, or gets running again quickly, when something serious goes wrong.

It is laid out in the order you would use it. It covers who is in charge, with a deputy for each role and a spending limit; a call-out list; key holders and building access; where to turn off the electricity, gas and water; what must keep running and how quickly; who covers for key people; what could stop you and your back-up for each; your data back-ups and how to keep working without IT; equipment and software records; a first-hour checklist and a first-day checklist; a customer holding message and a holding statement for the media; getting back to normal; staff and outside contacts, from your insurer to a locksmith; an emergency pack kept away from the premises; an incident log; testing and review; and the key words explained.

It also comes with a removable Start here page, a short note on writing a plan people will actually use, and a worked example you can copy: a kitchen fitting company whose workshop caught fire, and how its plan kept the week's jobs going. British and American terms are given side by side, so it works wherever you trade.

The first hour, already decided

The first-hour checklist covers what matters most while everyone is still standing outside: everyone accounted for, the leader told, the call-out list started, the building made secure, the phones diverted and a holding message sent to customers. Nobody has to think it up under pressure.

Who is in charge, and who steps in

Every role has a named person and a deputy: leading the response, speaking to customers, speaking to the media, looking after staff and contacting families. A separate table records who covers each key job if the person who normally does it is off, and whether they can do it today or need training first.

What to tell customers, written in advance

Customers tend to forgive a problem far more readily than silence. The template includes a ready-to-adapt holding message for customers, a table of who tells whom and how often, and a holding statement for the media that only your press officer issues.

Built from the best published guidance

Before writing it, we compared it against published business continuity guidance from government, the NHS, a high street bank and local resilience bodies in the UK, the US and Australia, so it covers the points those plans treat as standard. It is then written in plain English for a small business, not a large corporation.

Ready if you ever go for certification

ISO 9001:2026 asks businesses to tell customers about contingency actions when relevant, including when supply is disrupted (clause 8.2.1 e), and notes that the risks a business plans for can include delivering during and after a disruption (clause 6.1.2). This plan's customer messages and back-up arrangements help with both. You do not need any of that to get value from it today.

Where this leads

Business continuity plan: the free Learn page, with a worked example and how to write your own in seven steps.
Risk Register Template: list what could go wrong first, then copy the High risks into this plan.
The ISO 9001:2026 Certification-Ready System: the complete system for a business working towards ISO 9001.

Why buy from us

✓Built by a company director, not an auditor. Written by someone who ran real businesses before building management systems, so what you get works in the real world, not just on paper.
✓Written in plain English. No jargon, no clause-speak. If you are new to ISO 9001, it will make sense on day one.
✓The Operator's Take, in every document. Look inside any Plain Standards document and you will find a boxed note called The Operator's Take: a short, plain comment from someone who has run businesses, explaining why this document actually matters to yours, and how to get real value from it, not just tick a box for an auditor. No other provider gives you this, because it comes from having sat in the chair.
✓Honest, unaccredited, and clear about it. A genuine route to a working system, with no false claims and nothing hidden.

What is a business continuity plan template?

A business continuity plan template is a ready-made layout for planning how your business keeps running, or gets running again, when something serious stops it, such as a fire, a flood, an IT failure or a key person off sick. Instead of starting from a blank page, you fill in your own people, priorities and back-up arrangements under headings already in the order you would use them.

Is a business recovery plan the same thing?

Not quite. A business recovery plan is usually one part of a business continuity plan: the part that gets you back to normal after the disruption. This template includes it, alongside the first hour, the first day and keeping customers informed.

Does it include an example?

Yes. A worked example shows a kitchen fitting company with ten staff whose workshop caught fire: its critical activities, who led, what it did in the first hour, what it told customers and which back-up arrangements worked. Copy the pattern for your own business, then delete the example.

Is it suitable for a small business?

Yes, it is written for small and medium sized businesses. It skips the corporate jargon and keeps to what a small team needs on the day: who is in charge, who to call, what must restart first and what to tell customers.

What is the difference between disaster recovery and business continuity?

Disaster recovery usually means getting IT systems and data back. Business continuity is wider: keeping the whole business going, including people, premises, suppliers and customers. This template covers both, with its own section on data back-ups and working without IT.

Is this business continuity plan template in Word?

Yes, it is a Microsoft Word file (.docx) that you download straight away and edit like any other Word document. It also opens in Google Docs and other word processors that read .docx files, though a few layout details may shift slightly outside Word.

Is there an Excel version?

No, it is a Word document. A business continuity plan is read, signed off and printed for the emergency pack, and Word keeps the checklists, messages and contact tables together in one place.

Is there a free business continuity plan template?

Yes, there are free ones online, and some government and council versions are a reasonable start. Many, though, are written for large organisations or give headings with no guidance. This template includes first-hour and first-day checklists, ready-to-adapt customer and media messages and a worked example.

Is it an ISO 22301 business continuity plan?

No. ISO 22301 is the international standard for a full business continuity management system, with its own requirements. This template is a practical plan for a small business and does not claim to meet ISO 22301.

Written by Mike Armstrong, senior ISO consultant, former company director, and founder of Plain Standards. In over 30 years running companies at director level, Mike built his own management systems to drive profit long before he adopted ISO 9001, so he comes at this from the owner's side, not the auditor's. Plain Standards helps small and medium sized businesses get ISO certified without a consultant.

Add to cart, $29