Landlords Should Avail Fire Safety Management Service to Ensure Safety of the Residents

A Landlord was given a 24-week prison sentence (suspended for 18 months) and ordered to pay £12,000 fine for failing to comply with Fire regulation and placing a person at risk of death or serious injury. 

The Landlords building included a children’s nursery, a women’s centre and three residential flats. His premise caught fire in April 2017, resulting from an electricity meter placed at the bottom of a communal stairway. This blocked residents’ only exit and entry to their accommodation. 

The Court revealed that the building had no Fire Safety Risk Assessment to ‘address’ the multiple uses of the property, ‘despite assurances by the Landlord to planning chiefs that there would be sufficient Fire Doors and adequate detectors’. Firefighters also later found, after tackling the Fire, that Fire alarms were not working, as ‘no power was supplied to the system’. 

The Landlord admitted failing to comply with Fire regulations in relation to Fire doors, locks on emergency doors, provision of emergency exit routes and ‘failing to ensure that the premises and facilities were subject to suitable systems of maintenance’. 

London Fire Risk Assessments advice to Landlords: Fire Safety Management is the responsibility of the appointed ‘Responsible Person’ of the premise. And as outlined above if you do not fulfil your responsibility it can easily result in serious, life threatening consequences. 

Having a building with multi use occupancy is complicated and that is why you should consider using a Fire Protection Consultant – someone who is ‘qualified’ to carryout a thorough Fire Safety Risk Assessment.

Once a thorough Fire Safety Inspection of the building is carried out a Fire Safety Risk Assessment will be compiled. These are the ‘parts’ of a Fire Safety Risk Assessment:

• Fire Safety Inspection
• Fire Risk Assessment
• Fire Safety Management Plan – Significant Findings
• Fire Safety Policy
• Fire Safety Emergency Plan

If you wish to discuss any Fire Safety issues with a Fire Protection Consultant please contact London Fire Risk Assessments friendly team – 01689 89087.