Regulations for Businesses

A guide to the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005

This Order is the primary legislation regarding fire safety. The Fire Precautions Act 1971 and the Fire Precautions (Workplace) Regulations 1996 were revoked when the Order came into force on 1 October 2006.

• View a copy of the Order here
• View our collection of fire risk assessment guides

The responsibility for ensuring the Order is complied with rests with

• The responsible person (the employer), providing the workplace is to any extent under his/her control
• The person who has control of the premises (occupier or otherwise), whether the undertaking is for profit or not
• Or the owner

In the majority of premises it will be fairly obvious who the responsible person is. There will be premises where the responsibility for fire safety rests with a number of people. In buildings that are occupied by a number of different businesses the responsible persons must co-operate, as should the owner or managing agent for the building.

The Order exemptions are:

• Domestic premises
• Offshore installations
• A ship (normal ship-board activities)
• Fields, woods, agricultural land and forestry
• Aircraft, locomotive, rolling stock, trailer or semi-trailer
• Mines
• Borehole Sites

Enforcement

Similar to Health and Safety legislation, this Order is about self-compliance. The enforcement of the Order will generally be by the local Fire and Rescue Authority, however in certain premises the Order will be enforced by:-

• The Health and Safety Executive
• The fire service maintained by the Secretary of Defence
• The relevant Local Authority
• A fire inspector authorised by the Secretary of State

Hereford & Worcester Fire and Rescue Service will enforce the Order in the following circumstances:

• Routine inspections of which due notice will be given
• Following a complaint
• Following a fire, (post-fire inspection)

Dependent on the risk, enforcement action may take the form of:

• Verbal advice
• Advice in writing
• A schedule of works
• An agreed action plan
• The serving of an Enforcement Notice
• The serving of an Alterations Notice
• The serving of a Prohibition Notice
• Simple caution
• Prosecution

The person on whom a notice is served may appeal to a Magistrates Court within 21 days of the issue of the notice.

Should the responsible person and the Fire and Rescue Authority disagree on the measures required to remedy an area of non-compliance, (providing both parties agree), then the matter may be referred to the Secretary of State for a determination.

Further information on fire safety legislation can be found on the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) website.

A guide to the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022

The Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 (the Regulations) have been introduced as an important step towards implementing the recommendations of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 1 report. The Regulations were introduced under Article 24 of the Fire Safety Order and came into force on 23 January 2023.

The regulations apply to England only. The Regulations can be found on the UK Government website.

Supplementary guidance has also been provided to support Responsible Persons on how to conduct routine checks on fire doors and provide information to residents.

To submit building safety documents to Hereford & Worcester Fire Service as part of the duty of these regulations please follow the link to our building safety notifications page.

You can also find out more in our FAQs and where to go for further information.

What do the Fire Safety (England) regulations require responsible persons to do?

• The Act applies to England and Wales. However, the Regulations only apply to England.
• Information on how the Act applies within Wales can be found on the Welsh Government website.

The regulations require RPs in multi-occupied residential buildings to take specific actions, depending on the height of the building:

• some provisions apply regardless of height
• more are needed once a building reaches 11 metres, and
• further requirements are introduced when a building reaches 18 metres (or 7 storeys) or more.

The Regulations set out requirements for responsible persons of all multi-occupied residential buildings, of two or more sets of domestic premises:

• Fire Safety Instructions: they must provide relevant fire safety instructions to their residents on how to report a fire and what a resident must do once a fire has occurred.
• Fire Door Information: provide residents with information relating to the importance of fire doors in fire safety.

The Regulations also set out requirements for RPs of multi-occupied residential buildings of over 11 metres in height:

• Annual and quarterly checks fire door: They must undertake best endeavours to carry out annual checks of flat entrance doors. They must undertake quarterly checks of all fire doors in the common parts.

The Regulations for high-rise residential buildings (at least 18m or 7 storeys in height) also require responsible persons to:

• Building Plans: provide their local FRS with up-to-date building floor plans by electronic means and to place a hard copy of these plans, alongside a single page building plan which identifies key firefighting equipment, in a secure information box on site.
• External Wall Systems: provide to their local FRS information about the design and materials of a high-rise building’s external wall system and to inform the FRS of any material changes to these walls. Also, they will be required to provide information in relation to the level of risk that the design and materials of the external wall structure gives rise to and any mitigating steps taken.
• Lifts and other Key Fire-Fighting Equipment: undertake monthly checks on the operation of lifts intended for use by firefighters, and evacuation lifts in their building and check the functionality of other key pieces of firefighting equipment. They will also be required to report any defective lifts or equipment to their local FRS as soon as possible after detection if the fault cannot be fixed within 24 hours, and to record the outcome of checks and make them available to residents.
• Secure Information Boxes: install and maintain a secure information box in their building. This box must contain the name and contact details of the RP and hard copies of the building floor plans.
• Wayfinding Signage: install signage visible in low light or smoky conditions that identifies flat and floor numbers in the stairwells of relevant buildings.

What do RPs need to do?

RPs need to have implemented  the changes. The NFCCs Protection Reform Unit (PRU)  has worked with the Home Office to support the development of standard templates to assist both RPs and FRSs to ensure consistent and useful information is collected and received.

RPs are encouraged to:

• Begin to use the Fire Risk Assessment Prioritisation Tool (the FRAPT), to start forming their fire risk assessment review prioritisation strategies. RPs should first consider the accompanying guidance. RPs should ensure their reviewed assessments take into account the requirements of the FSO (as amended).
• Consider what steps are necessary to be ready to share additional information with FRSs 
• RPs may submit their information to HWFRS through the building safety information portal
• Regulations fully came into force on 23 January 2023.
• RPs need to comply with the new Regulations., e.g. ensure they have installed wayfinding signage, and have secure information boxes.

Fire Risk Assessment Prioritisation tool

A new Fire Risk Assessment Prioritisation Tool has been made available.  The prioritisation tool is an online tool designed to support Responsible Persons to develop a prioritisation strategy for updating their fire risk assessments, following commencement. The prioritisation tool can be accessed within The Fire Safety Act commencement guidance, available here.

For the other changes, including the requirements to provide additional information to FRSs, The Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 came into force on 23 January 2023.

Where can I find out more information?

You can find out more by visiting the NFCC website.

The Fire Safety Act can be found here with factsheets and guidance here. The Fire Safety (England) Regulations can be found here on the UK Government website.

The Home Office has produced a series of fact sheets which provide more detailed information on what the Regulations mean in England:

• Overview Fact Sheet
• Secure Information Box Fact Sheet
• Design and Materials of External Walls Fact Sheet
• Floor Plans and Building Plan Fact Sheet
• Lifts and Essential Fire-fighting Equipment Fact Sheet
• Wayfinding Signage Fact Sheet
• Information to Residents Fact Sheet
• Fire Doors Fact Sheet

Information on how the Act applies within Wales can be found on the Welsh Government website.

External Wall Design & Construction

Regulation 5 of the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 require responsible persons (RP) of high-rise residential buildings to prepare a record of the design of the external walls and share it with the fire and rescue service. The purpose of providing this information is to assist with operational pre-planning and to provide information that will be of value to responding crews at the time of a fire.

As well as providing details of the materials used in the wall construction, responsible persons will also be required to provide information on the level of risk of fire spread that the external wall structure poses, and any steps that have been taken to mitigate these risks.

RPs should complete the below form to provide fire and rescue services with the necessary information required by the regulations. 

External wall report (PDF, 353KB)

Floor & Building Plans

Regulation 6 of the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 require responsible persons of high-rise residential buildings in England to share up-to-date plans of the building with their fire and rescue service. The plans will be used by operational firefighters during an incident and need to be clear, simple and easy to use.

Electronic sharing of plans

The responsible person should send electronic copies of the plans to buildingsafety@hwfire.org.uk

When sending plans, please ensure the name and address of the building to which the plan relates is clearly identified.

• Please provide the plans in either JPG, PNG or PDF format.
• Where possible, send the plans as one file rather than a separate file per floor.
• Files should not exceed 25mb in size.
• You will receive an automated email confirming the receipt of the plans. If there are any issues with the files provided or more information is required, a member of our team will contact you.

Storage of hard copies

The responsible person is also required to provide a copy of the plans inside the premises’ secure information box. The plans should be sized to fit on A3 paper and, where necessary, printed in colour to assist in easy identification of the plan symbols.

To ensure a copy of the plans can remain with the incident commander at all times as well as be used by firefighters inside the building, at least two copies of each plan should be provided inside the secure information box. Recognising how the plans will be used and the conditions they may be exposed to, plans should be laminated to ensure they remain usable throughout the course of an incident.

Faults and repairs

Regulation 7 of the Fire Safety Regulations 2022 states that Responsible Persons (RP) of high-rise residential buildings must undertake monthly routine checks of specific fire safety equipment.

Lifts and essential fire-fighting equipment

Regulation 7 of the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 requires RPs of high-rise residential buildings to undertake monthly routine checks of specific fire safety equipment. The equipment covered by this requirement is:

• Lifts for use by firefighters or evacuation lifts
• Automatic door release mechanisms
• Evacuation alert systems
• Fire detection and alarm systems
• Rising mains
• Smoke control systems
• Suppression systems

Where faults with any of this equipment are identified, the RP must take steps to rectify the fault. If the fault cannot be rectified within 24 hours, then the fault must be reported to the fire and rescue service. The fire and rescue service must be informed once the fault has been rectified.

This information will assist fire and rescue services by highlighting faults with equipment, which both residents and firefighters may rely on for their safety, so that it can be factored into their operational response.