The mortgage industry is preparing itself for a possible outbreak of bird flu, by putting contingency plans into place. Major lenders, such as HSBC, Alliance & Leicester and HBOS have already drawn up business continuity plans, some of which prepare for the loss of staff.
HSBC is the world's third largest bank, and employs 253,000 staff worldwide, operating in 77 countries. They have made plans for what they call the 'worst case scenario' - by predicting that around 50% of their staff would be affected and may not be able to travel to work, or have to care for someone who has contracted the disease.
HBOS says that they have measures in place for all eventualities, but have given no details about what their plans entail.
Our view
All financial services companies are required to have 'disaster recovery' plans anyway so we assume this will not be too different to other plans.