What Belongs in a Financial Firm's IT Disaster Recovery Plan?

Whether caused by a severe hardware failure, an accidental data deletion, or a targeted ransomware attack, how quickly and cleanly a firm recovers is dictated entirely by what was written down before the crisis occurred.

The problem with most Disaster Recovery (DR) documents is that they operate under the assumption that an IT team will just "figure it out" when the time comes. A true disaster recovery plan does the exact opposite—it removes the need for thinking during a crisis.

High Availability vs Disaster Recovery

It is a common misconception that moving to Microsoft 365 or hosting servers in Azure eliminates the need for Disaster Recovery. The cloud provides High Availability (meaning if Microsoft has a server issue, they route your data to a working server so you don't notice). It does not provide Disaster Recovery.

If a rogue employee deletes an entire SharePoint site, or a cybercriminal encrypts your client databases, Microsoft will happily sync those deletions and encryptions across their highly available servers. You still need an independent, isolated plan to retrieve that data.

The components that actually matter

A resilient DR plan for an FCA-regulated business goes far beyond listing which backup software is installed. It must cover the logistical and operational realities of a full outage:

• Recovery Time Objective (RTO) & Recovery Point Objective (RPO): These must be stated in hard hours and minutes. How long can the firm genuinely survive without the CRM (RTO)? How much data can the firm afford to lose between backups (RPO)? These metrics should dictate your investment in IT support solutions.
• A strict sequence of recovery: You cannot restore the client portal before restoring the Active Directory server that handles logins. An inventory of which applications depend on which databases ensures recovery happens in a logical sequence, rather than by guesswork.
• Immutable backups and tested restores: A backup is just an assumption until it is restored. With ransomware specifically targeting backup files, your data must be immutable (un-deletable for a set period). Regular, documented restore testing is the only way to prove to auditors that the plan works.
• Alternative access routes (Failover): If your primary office internet goes down, or your VPN fails, how do staff securely access critical applications to continue trading or communicating with clients?
• The communication matrix: During a crisis, an engineer should be fixing the server, not answering questions from panicked partners. The plan must assign a non-technical crisis leader responsible for communicating with staff, clients, and vendors.
• Regulatory reporting triggers: If client data is impacted, who is legally responsible for notifying the ICO or FCA? The plan must explicitly state the timelines (e.g., the strict 72-hour ICO window) so compliance obligations are not missed in the chaos.

Why financial firms need managed continuity

Building a DR plan that holds up under real pressure—and keeping it current as your technology stack evolves—is rarely something an internal team has the time to manage effectively alongside daily helpdesk tickets.

Providing that resilience is exactly the kind of work we handle through our managed IT support for financial services. We design continuity strategies around the specific recovery objectives and strict regulatory duties of wealth managers and investment firms, ensuring that when the worst happens, the recovery is clinical, calm, and compliant.