Fire Risk Assessment

The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 states that individual businesses are now responsible for carrying out their own ‘Fire Risk Assessments’ on their premises or the part of premises they occupy.

The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order became law in October 2006 and from that date all previous fire safety legislation including Fire Certificates is no longer valid.

The Order states that:-  

• You must appoint one or more competent persons, depending on the size and use of your premises, to carry out any of the preventive and protective measures required by the Order (you can nominate yourself for this purpose). A competent person is someone with enough training and experience or knowledge and other qualities to be able to implement these measures properly.

• You must provide your employees with clear and relevant information on the risks to them identified by the fire risk assessment, about the measures you have taken to prevent fires, and how these measures will protect them if a fire breaks out.

• You must consult your employees (or their elected representatives) about nominating people to carry out particular roles in connection with fire safety and about proposals for improving the fire precautions.

• You must inform non-employees, such as temporary or contract workers, of the relevant risks to them, and provide them with information about who are the nominated competent persons, and about the fire safety procedures for the premises.

• You must co-operate and co-ordinate with other responsible persons who also have premises in the building, inform them of any significant risks you find, and how you will seek to reduce/control those risks which might affect the safety of their employees.

• You must provide the employer of any person from an outside organisation who is working in your premises (e.g. an agency providing temporary staff) with clear and relevant information on the risks to those employees and the preventive and protective measures taken. You must also provide those employees with appropriate instructions and relevant information about the risks to them.

• If you are not the employer but have any control of premises which contain more than one workplace, you are also responsible for ensuring that the requirements of the Order are complied with in those parts over which you have control.

• You must consider the presence of any dangerous substances and the risk this presents to relevant persons from fire. • You must establish a suitable means of contacting the emergency services and provide them with any relevant information about dangerous substances.

• You must provide appropriate information, instruction and training to your employees, during their normal working hours, about the fire precautions in your workplace, when they start working for you, and from time to time throughout the period they work for you.

• You must ensure that the premises and any equipment provided in connection with fire fighting, fire detection and warning, or emergency routes and exits are covered by a suitable system of maintenance, and are maintained by a competent person in an efficient state, in efficient working order and in good repair.

• Your employees must co-operate with you to ensure the workplace is safe from fire and its effects, and must not do anything that will place themselves or other people at risk. 

Full details of the requirements can be obtained by downloading the appropriate PDF guide for your premises from www.communities.gov.uk/fire/firesafety/firesafetylaw/

If you have not carried out a risk assessment, or do not feel competent to do it yourself and would like us to do it for you, please contact us.

Our rates are very competitive, and you will know that the job has been done professionally.