Make a household plan you can actually use

Choose a familiar situation: someone cannot get home, the electricity is off or you need to leave home for a while. Who needs to know, what help might be needed and where would you find the information? Those answers are the beginning of a plan.

Ready Scotland recommends a home emergency plan that people can find and use. Keep it short enough to read when you are busy or worried. If you live alone, the conversation might be with a friend, neighbour or someone who supports you.

1. Write down the people you would contact first and how to reach them. Check the numbers with them rather than relying on an old list.
2. Agree where to meet if you cannot return home or contact one another. Choose somewhere that the people involved could reach, taking accessibility and transport into account.
3. Discuss who may need help with communication, movement or care. Ask the person what would work for them, and agree arrangements with professional care providers where relevant.
4. Record where the plan and essential information are kept. Share the relevant parts with the people who have agreed to help, and keep a readable copy available without an internet connection.

A plan may need to include a visiting carer, someone at another address or a pet that relies on you. Give each arrangement a practical question: who would make contact, who has agreed to help, and what would they need to know?

Don't allocate a job to somebody without discussing it. If care or equipment needs specialist arrangements, record the agreed contact and where the instructions are kept. You can make help easier to arrange without putting a detailed medical history in a widely shared plan.

Check the risks and official information relevant to where you live, including local authority information and weather warnings. A household plan should help you find current advice, not predict exactly what will happen.

During an incident, emergency-service instructions take priority over an earlier arrangement. A meeting place might be inside an affected area, or staying put may be safer than travelling. Use the authority managing the incident to check what applies before acting on an old assumption.

Use the boxes while you read, or tick them on a printed copy. This site doesn't save your ticks.

• Can each person find the plan and the numbers they need?
• Would the contact arrangement still make sense if mobile data or home broadband were unavailable?
• Could the people involved reach the agreed meeting place, or is another arrangement needed?
• Do people providing help know what they have agreed to do?
• Have you updated any changed contact or support details?

If the conversation reveals a gap, choose the next useful task: checking a contact, agreeing collection arrangements or finding an insurance reference. The communications, mobility and documents guides take those tasks further. Keep the plan as the short place that joins them together, rather than copying every guide into it.