Fire door maintenance in London is driven less by wear than by records. The Fire Safety Order requires fire safety measures to be maintained in efficient working order and in good repair, and in blocks of flats above a stated height the 2022 Regulations add checks at set intervals. London has a very large stock of exactly those buildings, which is why the question here is usually about evidence rather than about hinges.
What fire door servicing actually means
Article 17 requires the fire safety measures in a building to be subject to a suitable system of maintenance and kept in efficient working order and good repair. For a fire door that covers the leaf, the frame, the intumescent and smoke seals, the hinges, the self closing device, the glazing and the gaps around it. A door that closes onto a latch it no longer engages is not maintained, whatever the last invoice says.
Fire door inspections London: the check regime in a block of flats
In a building containing two or more sets of domestic premises and above eleven metres, the responsible person must check fire doors in the common parts at set intervals and make best endeavours to check flat entrance doors. Those checks are a regime, not a survey: their value is the record of each one and what was done about what it found.
What a London contract should leave behind
A schedule of every door with an identifier, the check result against each element, the defects found, what was repaired on the day, what was quoted, and what remains open with a date. Blocks change hands and managing agents change more often, so the record is what survives. A contract that reports a percentage compliant and names no door has left nothing usable.
Repair, replacement and who is competent
Many defects are repairable: seals, closers, hinges and small gaps. Some are not, and a door that has been trimmed, drilled through, or fitted with untested parts has lost the evidence that it performs. The person doing the work should be able to say which tested system the door and its components belong to, because a fire door is a tested assembly and not a collection of parts.
Questions people ask about fire door maintenance London
How often must fire doors in a London block be checked?
In buildings with two or more sets of domestic premises above eleven metres, the Regulations set the intervals for common part doors and require best endeavours on flat entrance doors. Below that height the general maintenance duty still applies.
Is a fire door check the same as a fire door survey?
No. A survey establishes what the doors are and what condition they are in. The check regime is the repeating obligation that follows, and it is the records from it that an officer asks for.
Can a fire door be repaired rather than replaced?
Often yes. Seals, closers and hinges are routine. What cannot be repaired away is a door that has been altered beyond its tested configuration.