Fire Risk Assessments
What we do
At Prestige Fire Safety, we are the experts in fire risk assessments in Cambridgeshire, and the East Anglia region. We have conducted over 1,000 fire risk assessments across apartment blocks, offices, schools, hospitals, factory units, and train stations, in and around Cambridge, Newmarket, and Bury St Edmunds. Our experienced assessors use a granular approach to identifying potential fire risks before they happen. Many of our team have active or retired fire service experience, so with a combined in-house expertise of over 100 years, your premises couldn’t be in safer hands.
Why You Need a Fire Risk Assessment
A Fire Risk Assessment is a legal requirement. If you are responsible for a building, as an employer, owner or occupier of the premises that aren’t a ‘single private dwelling’ (a private home), you need to make sure that a competent person completes a Fire Risk Assessment at your premises. It is a legal requirement and your duty to ensure that any fire risks and hazards on your premises are identified and then take appropriate action.
If five or more people work at your premises or your business has a license under enactment in force, you need your fire risk assessment to be a written record. You also need to make sure that you review your risk assessment regularly and whenever significant changes have been made on your premises that may impact it. It’s good business sense as well as a legal requirement. Often businesses don’t recover after a fire, and effective fire prevention starts with understanding the risks. This, of course, starts with a fire risk assessment. Therefore, it’s vital that you conduct a proper fire risk assessment, using a qualified company like Prestige Fire Safety.
Who needs a Fire Risk Assessment
As previously stated, if you are responsible for a building that has more than five occupants at any one time, you need a fire risk assessment. This means that you need to get a fire risk assessment for hospitals, schools, offices, and landlords of larger apartment blocks and dwellings need to complete a fire risk assessment as well. It is your legal duty and responsibility to ensure the safety of anyone on the premises of your property. By conducting a fire risk assessment, you are fulfilling your legal duties. If you own a building in Cambridge with more than five occupants or more, then don’t hesitate to contact Prestige Fire Safety to learn more about our fire risk assessments.
Benefits of a Fire Risk Assessment
A fire risk assessment enables you to identify all the fire risks and hazards in your premises so that they can be dealt with accordingly. They can either be deemed acceptable, or managed appropriately, depending on the severity of the risk involved.
At Prestige Fire Safety, we take all circumstances into account when assessing fire risks. A few things we consider are:
- Ascertain fire risks
- Identifying the people at risk from fires
- Evaluating these risks
- Recording the findings of the assessment
- Making recommendations to be taken on board for the future
By carrying out a risk assessment, we can also make sure that you’re meeting legal obligations for fire safety. As well as this, the identification of any fire risks allows you to take action against them, thereby reducing the risk of fire in your premises considerably.
Our Fire Risk Assessment Expertise
We have many Cambridge-based risk assessment clients. For each of our clients, we make sure we check the following:
- The use, layout, and construction of the building
- The number and nature of occupants, including any vulnerable occupants
- Whether there is any history of fire loss in the building
- Electrical equipment on site which could be a source of ignition
- Smoking areas and measures taken to prevent smoking causing fires
- Defence against arson
- Portable and installed heating devices which may trigger fires
- Protection against fires caused by lightning
- General housekeeping & keeping key areas clear of combustible materials
- Any fire hazards introduced by building works or outside contractors
- The storage arrangements for any dangerous/flammable liquids
- The configuration of escape routes and how they are maintained
- Measures in place to limit fire spread, such as compartmentalisation
- That emergency lighting is installed correctly & is in working order
- The correct use and locations of fire safety signs
- There is adequate means of raising the alarm in case of fire
- The right fire extinguishers are in the right locations
- The correct installation and maintenance of other devices, such as sprinklers
- Who manages fire safety for the building, and how well
- Whether there are regular fire safety training & evacuation drills
- Correct maintenance and testing procedures of fire safety systems are in place
- That correct documentation and records of fire safety measures are being kept
Once we have conducted our on-site assessment, we will create written documentation of your fire risk assessment, which is a requirement if there are more than 5 occupants on your property. We can then develop a fire safety plan for your property, and if necessary, we will also implement an action plan.
We recommend that you review your fire risk assessments every 12 months, and we are happy to provide this continued service for you.
If you would like us to carry out a risk assessment on your premises in the Cambridgeshire area, or have any queries about the process, please give us a call and we’ll be happy to talk to you about fire risks and how to reduce them.
We can also help with Fire Stopping and Passive Fire Protection, Fire Compartmentation Surveys, the installation of Fire Curtains, and Fire Door Inspections.
Fire Risk Assessment FAQs
Yes, you can conduct your own fire risk assessment if you are a qualified competent person. However, most businesses have their fire risk assessment conducted by a professional team who know how to ensure you meet legal requirements and can write up the proper documentation you need to prove you have had a fire risk assessment. You will save yourself time, money, and potential legal fees in the long run if you hire professionals to carry out your fire risk assessment.
We recommend you review your fire risk assessments every 12 months. If you choose us to carry out your fire risk assessments, we are happy to help with the annual review. It makes it easy for you as we will already be aware of your premises and can run through any future risk assessments smoothly and without any hassle.
A Fire Risk Assessment is a legal requirement. If you are responsible for a building, for example an employer, owner or occupier of premises that aren’t a ‘single private dwelling’ (a private home), you need to make sure a suitably competent person carries out a Fire Risk Assessment.
All business premises and every block of flats must have a Fire Risk Assessment by law.
As the responsible person you must carry out and regularly review a fire risk assessment of the premises. This will identify what you need to do to prevent fire and keep people safe. You must keep a written record of your fire risk assessment if your business has 5 or more people.
Under Fire Safety legislation introduced in 2006, the responsible person for a premise is required to carry out a fire risk assessment.
For more information and guidance on fire risk assessments and your responsibilities, visit the government website: https://www.gov.uk/workplace-fire-safety-your-responsibilities/fire-risk-assessments