According to the law all types of business premises and flat blocks must conduct a fire safety assessment. While this is a compulsory procedure for many, not everyone is well acquainted with the measures of fire safety. In such situation as a resident you can seek support of fire safety assessors nearby by looking for “FIRE RISK ASSESSMENTS NEAR ME”.
People generally ask about the meaning of fire safety assessment as risk assessment for fire must be the main purpose of safety plans of buildings.
Unfortunately, fire risk assessments get overlooked frequently. It can result in buildings getting unnecessarily exposed to risk along with potential life loss at times.
WHAT IS ASSESSMENT FOR FIRE RISK?
Fire risk assessment is an undertaken review of building for assessing the fire risk along with recommendations for ensuring building safety, when required.
If your building accommodates 5 occupants or less, then fire assessment isn’t necessary to write down. Thus, it isn’t always document.
However, it is recommended to have assessment for fire risk in writing, as it is simple way for communicating findings and ensuring that all recommendations are efficiently carried out.
LEGAL GUIDELINES FOR FIRE SAFETY ASSESSMENT
There are certain guidelines that must be followed for fire risk assessment.
If you’ve got fire safety assessment near you, you can regularly review the condition. The following has to be included in review:
- All 12 months after original assessment must be done.
- In 5 years new assessment has to be conducted
- When the building purpose substantially changed
- When building structure, like layout changes
- When there are considerable changes in occupancy
Changing building’s layout, its usage, type of occupants living or using building significantly affects plans for fire safety. Thus, it is vital to review the fire safety risk assessment if any of the above occurs.
When your flats or business premises occupies more than 4 residents, then you are legally obligated to document fire risk assessment.
CONDUCTING FIRE SAFETY ASSESSMENT
According to legal guidelines, fire risk assessment can get conducted through any competent individual or entity.
Their competency means that the fire assessment near you should be easily able to assess the premises or building against above listed factors.
A professional fire risk assessor is well acquainted with the following:
- Understanding of necessary fire safety legislation with fire safety principles like how people react to fire and fire development
- Knowledge about fire risk, hazards with factors related to special risk occupants (like elderly patients and patients unfamiliar with young staff, premises, etc.)
Also they must be able to do following:
- Get fire safety plans developed for necessary changes and you must record the actions
- They must record all significant findings in a clear and detailed manner
- Get action plans implemented if it seems necessary
- Continuously update risk assessment
Professional fire risk assessor has undergone detailed training and is well versed in legal requirements and recent guidelines such, including how they must be applied to various building types.
For simple types of buildings where risk assessor is an employee of occupier, Fire Risk Assessment Competency Council suggests it would be possible that studying suitable guidance documents with aforementioned attributes can be ideal for determining the competency of fire risk assessor. However, for complex buildings, it is likely that there is a requirement for certain applied skills and knowledge of that of sufficiently qualified specialists.