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You either know well from experience - or you will someday find out, that your system up-time is very dependent on having a good Uninterruptible Power Supply system - also referred to as a UPS or battery backup. With the proliferation of branching and live remote access interfaces (ATM's, Internet Banking, etc.) this has become a much more critical issue.
For credit unions with Branches, a good battery backup system can provide for your branches to continue working when you don't have power in the main office. It can also mean that your members can continue to utilize the remote access features such as Internet Banking, ATM's, Debit Cards, and Audio Response in the event of power outages at the main office. And providing these continued services also protects your liability from the risk of stand-in transactions if you system is not accessible. For ASP Credit Unions the main issues are on CUDP's side, but you still want to make sure your critical equipment is on at least a small Battery Backup System.
One major problem with backup batteries is that they tend to lose the ability to hold a charge over time. So what starts out as a great backup battery backup system naturally loses it's capability over time. So you need to plan to regularly upgrade UPS systems or at least replace batteries. Battery replacement is actu
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ally fairly inexpensive and can extend the life of a battery backup system for several years. The problem is knowing when replacement is necessary. As a general rule, our experience tells us that after about 3 years, you will need to start thinking about replacing batteries.
So how can you check your battery run time? For those that have purchased newer UPS systems from us in the last couple of years, we have been pushing network management cards for your UPS. This puts the unit on the network and allows you to browse to the UPS utilities. At that point you can check event logs, run tests, and most importantly do a calibration after which it will report a fairly accurate estimate for how long the batteries will power your current load of equipment. This obviously can be very helpful for your planning.
For those that don't have the network card, the best way to test it is to try and get any critical computers like your RS/6000 shutdown but not turned off so they are still drawing power. Then you can pull the power cord from the wall and time the amount of time the equipment stays on until it shuts off completely. If it shuts off immediately, then your batteries will not hold a charge and you need to take action very soon.
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