The rules for escape doors are short and are more often broken by accident than by intent, usually because a security measure was added after the building was assessed. The fire safety order requires emergency routes and exits to be kept clear, to lead as directly as possible to a place of safety, and to be capable of being opened easily and immediately by any person who may require to use them in an emergency.
Opening direction
Doors on escape routes should open in the direction of escape where the number of people using them makes that necessary, and sliding or revolving doors must not be used for exits specifically intended as emergency exits. In practice the threshold for outward opening is low, and any door serving more than a small number of people is expected to open in the direction people will be moving.
Fastenings, which is where most failures are
The requirement is that the door can be opened easily and immediately, without a key, without special knowledge and in a single action. Panic hardware and emergency exit devices exist to satisfy this. Padlocks, deadbolts, keypads without a fail safe, chains and anything that requires finding a key are all failures, and they appear because somebody had a genuine security problem and solved it in the wrong direction.
Reconciling escape with security
The fire safety order does not require a building to be insecure. It requires the door to open from the inside without a key. Outward security is provided by the hardware type: panic bars with external access control, alarmed exit devices that sound locally when used, and monitored doors. Where a door is being abused, the answer is an alarmed device rather than a lock.
Signage, lighting and what is behind the door
The exit needs signage identifying it and emergency lighting where a loss of normal lighting would leave the route unusable. What lies beyond it matters just as much: a door that opens onto a fenced yard, a stacked pallet or a locked gate has not led to a place of safety, and this is found by walking the route rather than by reading the plan.
Questions people ask about fire exit doors regulations uk
Must every fire exit open outwards?
Where the number of people or the risk makes it necessary, and that catches most exits serving more than a handful of people. Small low risk situations can be different, and the assessment records why.
Are keypads allowed on escape doors?
Only where the door releases and can be opened in a single action without the code from the escape side, typically by a fail safe device that releases on alarm and on power failure.
Can a fire exit be locked when the building is empty?
Yes, provided it cannot be locked while anybody is inside and the arrangement is managed so that it never is. That management is the part that has to be evidenced.