As fire safety regulation continues to change, Nicola John, Director of Fire Door Maintenance (FDM), explains why a joined-up approach is essential for inspecting fire doors, and the benefits for housing providers.
Following the Grenfell Tower tragedy and the recommendations in the Hackitt report, a raft of new legislation has been implemented. This includes the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 which set new legal duties for those who own or manage multi-occupied residential buildings over 11m high. Enforced in January 2023, these regulations demand new procedures for checking fire doors to make sure they are still suitable after their original fire risk assessment.
The person legally responsible for a building’s fire safety, known as the ‘responsible person’ must carry out annual inspections on all flat entrance doors, and quarterly checks on fire doors within communal areas and which cross corridors. A responsible person is usually the building’s landlord or manager. Evidence of the steps taken to comply with the regulations must also be recorded.
The overall aim is to ensure fire doors are in good working order, including checking for any defects which could undermine their ability to prevent fire and smoke from spreading.
From 1 October 2023, housing providers will also have to contend with another new piece of legislation. Section 156 of the Building Safety Act comes into force, including more stringent requirements relating to the recording and sharing of fire safety information. For residential blocks over 18m, fire door inspections must be documented as part of the changes.
The scale of the challenge
For owners and managers of larger residential portfolios, particularly social landlords, these changes present many challenges. With hundreds, or even possibly thousands of doors to check, significant resources will need to be put in place to comply with the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 as well as future fire safety amendments.
To address this issue, some housing associations and local authorities have begun to adopt specialist software to assist with scheduling fire door checks and reporting. But that still leaves a gap in the process. To carry out the inspections quickly and effectively, people are needed on the ground – and for many organisations, these people are in short supply.
Another important consideration for the social housing sector is the quality of the fire door inspection. Although Government guidance on the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 states checks should be ‘simple and basic’ the importance of a more thorough approach should not be underestimated.
To make sure a door is safe and futureproofed, sourcing the manufacturer’s primary test evidence is strongly recommended. In line with the ‘golden thread’ policy post-Grenfell, this will confirm if the correct components have been installed on each door and have not been substituted or changed. Inspecting a door to this standard will, however, require more knowledge and expertise, adding to labour challenges.
Specialist partners
With housing providers of all sizes having to navigate these issues, the need for a more holistic service is clear. In response, specialist companies have been launched providing a pool of operatives readily available across the UK to deliver fire door inspections at scale, and to a higher standard.
Specially trained in fire door inspections, these operatives have the skills to identify and fix issues on numerous different types of fire door from a range of suppliers and manufacturers.
Before any work begins, details of the manufacturers of the fire doors within a building are sourced. This information is provided to the operatives as part of the bespoke training process, enabling them to know exactly what to look out for during the inspection and ensuring they are aware of any potential risks.
With extensive experience of the door manufacturing industry, the operatives can also source primary test evidence when inspecting the doors, and work alongside software providers, complementing their service and providing additional information such as the test evidence, for reporting purposes.
Completing the jigsaw
With the new fire safety regulations now firmly in place, there is an urgent need for housing providers to develop a robust system for carrying out fire door inspections. And with more legislation coming down the line, the importance of a robust approach is more important than ever before.
Housing associations and local authorities will need to ensure the appropriate resources, skills and knowledge are in place across the entire inspection process. By working with a specialist partner, housing providers will benefit from an integrated, efficient service which ensures fire doors are inspected by a skilled team and to the highest safety standards.