Leicestershire Fire and Rescue Service is the enforcing authority for fire safety in non-domestic premises and in the common parts of blocks in Leicester. The duty is the national one and does not vary by city: a suitable and sufficient assessment of the risks, the significant findings recorded, the actions carried out. What varies is the premises, and this city has a manufacturing base that puts particular things in front of the assessor.
What the assessment has to establish
The people at risk and how harm would reach them. Ignition sources, fuel and oxygen. Means of escape judged against the people who actually use the building. Detection, warning, firefighting equipment and the maintenance behind them. It ends in significant findings and an action plan with owners and dates. A report that stops at a hazard list has described the building without deciding anything.
Manufacturing and workshop premises
Textile and garment production remains a visible part of the city's economy, and it occupies a lot of older industrial and above-shop floorspace. Racking and stock raise the fire load, subdivision of an open floor rarely comes with tested compartmentation, and travel distances lengthen as machinery is added. Where the process uses heat or flammable materials, the assessment has to name that plainly rather than generically.
Terraced housing in multiple occupation
Large areas of Victorian terrace are let room by room. That brings sleeping risk, occupants who may not share a language with the notice on the wall, and a licensing regime that runs alongside the fire safety order rather than instead of it. Escape from an upper floor through a shared kitchen is the arrangement that most often fails, and it is fixed by layout rather than by another extinguisher.
Enforcement in practice
The service audits premises, acts on complaints and follows up after incidents, with powers from advice through an enforcement notice to prohibition. An auditor asks for the assessment, its significant findings and evidence the actions were done. A current assessment with an untouched action plan is the most common way a visit goes badly, because it shows the duty was bought rather than discharged.
Questions people ask about fire risk assessment Leicester
Who enforces fire safety in Leicester?
Leicestershire Fire and Rescue Service, as the fire and rescue authority for the area. Where premises are licensed housing in multiple occupation, the city council's housing team holds its own overlapping duties.
Does a small workshop need a written assessment?
The assessment is required at any size. Where five or more people are employed, or a licence is in force, the significant findings must be recorded, and a written record is what an auditor asks to see.
How often should the assessment be reviewed?
Whenever there is reason to think it is out of date, and on any material change to the building, the process or the occupancy. Adding machinery or subdividing a floor is such a change.