Carry out a fire risk assessment
Conducting a fire risk assessment entails identifying and mitigating potential fire hazards in a building
The first step to reducing the risk of fire in your property is to carry out a fire safety risk assessment.
Unlike gas and electrics, there is no fire safety certificate to obtain, however landlords in England and Wales are required to carry out fire risk assessments periodically under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005.
The risk assessment will take you through the property, step by step, so you can:
Identify possible causes and potential sources of fire
Assess the likelihood of fire breaking out
Identify potential hazards
See what sensible precautions could be taken to mitigate the risks
You can carry out the fire risk assessment yourself but may prefer to use a third-party fire safety specialist. As professionals in the field, they can often spot potential risks and make recommendations that might not have occurred to you.
The cost can vary, depending on the size of the property, but it’s likely to be around £300 for an average family home. Once you’ve had an initial professional assessment, you may then feel confident enough to review and update it yourself in future.
We’ve put together a useful landlord fire risk assessment template to help you, which you can download here.
Although there aren’t any hard and fast rules around how often you should review or update your fire risk assessment, the general advice is:
For modern buildings of up to three storeys, review the assessment every two years and update it every four
For older buildings or those over three storeys, review the assessment annually and update it every three years