Holiday let owners beware! You are responsible for making sure the property you are letting is fire-safe, and for good reason. Failing to meet government standards leaves you liable to prosecution, and I wouldn’t call that unfair. After all, what good does it do you to needlessly put your clients at risk? ‘None’ is the answer. And at Fire Protection Online we have everything you need to get compliant quick. But before we talk products, let’s break down exactly what your responsibilities are.
Are Fire Risk Assessments a Legal Requirement for Holiday Lets?
A key term here is ‘responsible person’. The Fire Safety Order defines this simply as persons responsible for complying with legislation. This can be the owner, letting agents, or anyone else with control of the property. You probably clicked on this article because you are an owner of a property that you rent out to others for holiday purposes. I can tell you, quite certainly, that this makes you a ‘responsible person’.
Being a ‘responsible person’ means you are legally obligated to make sure that a Fire Safety Risk Assessment is carried out for your property. This should be updated annually as it entails accurate identification of risks, methods of mitigation, and escape routes. Your responsibility is to make sure this is done to a satisfactory standard. While you can complete the assessment yourself, you can arrange for an expert to do it for you. This is not a service we offer ourselves, so be scrutinous, and don’t fall for surprisingly cheap offers.
The basic steps of a fire risk assessment are as follows:
- Identify fire hazards
- Identify people who are at risk
- Evaluate, remove, or reduce the risks as much as possible
- Record findings, prepare an emergency plan, and provide training
- Review and update the assessment regularly
In the case of people at risk, you need to consider a wide range of demographics. Unless you have strict stipulations, your holiday let could be home to people of any age or physical ability. This is a key element of the government guide I will be explaining in the next section. There is also a more in-depth guide on carrying out the assessment, which you can find here.
How to Make your Holiday Let Fire Safety Compliant (a brief guide)
I’m going to head this up with a referral to the government’s official guide on making guest accommodation fire-safe. What follows is an abridged version of this guide, giving you a brief overview of your responsibilities. This will be accurate, but can’t cover everything, so please check the linked document if you want to be thorough. It is clearly stated that a fire risk assessment is an essential part of this process. The document provides a comprehensive template for this, and there are also stricter requirements for short-term lets.
I’ll cover two of the document’s largest sections: ‘Fire Hazards’ and ‘Fire Protection Measures’, with ‘Planning and Documentation’ added for good measure. Obviously, there are more components to this, but these are the most important for ensuring good fire safety habits and compliance.
A) Fire Hazards
You need to be aware of fire hazards commonly found in paying guest accommodation. For electricals, make sure wiring and appliances are checked by a qualified contractor. The same goes for the fuse board and circuit breakers, which should be correctly labelled.
You need a defined smoking policy, that also addresses vapes and e-cigarettes. Smoking in communal areas of bed and breakfast accommodation is prohibited, so it’s best to discourage it as a general rule.
You need to consider arson as well. Just make sure good security measures are in place; keep exits and entrances secure (while making sure escape is easy). Also, keep flammable materials (like recycling bins) clear of the premises to reduce the risk of fire spreading through openings.
We recommend you check heating systems annually. Portable heaters should be avoided for the most part; any in use ideally would have automatic cut-off switches. Never place a heater close to combustible material or by exit routes. If a gas or solid fuel appliance is installed, provide a carbon monoxide detector.
If your property has an open fire or log burner, consider providing a fire/spark guard and make sure the chimney is swept at least annually. Dry wood and kindling should be kept at a safe distance from heat sources.
Regularly clean and maintain cooking appliances and extraction fans, and make sure instructions are readily available for guests. Gas appliances must be serviced annually by a registered Gas Safe engineer. It is also wise to prohibit the use of candles, as they’re notably one of the biggest causes of domestic fires.
Observe safe practices with barbecues and other ‘dangerous substances’ like lawnmower petrol; restrict their use or provide clear instructions. There are more details in the government guide, but we’ve hit most of the biggest points.
B) Fire Protection Measures
These measures are for keeping people safe if a fire occurs. The measures should be proportional to the level of risk; for the sake of simplicity, the following advice should apply equally to most small holiday properties.
Emergency routes and exits must be as direct as possible, and should take into account disabled people, children, or other vulnerable demographics. Doors and walls around escape routes should also be sufficiently fire-rated to give enough time to escape. Doors must also be openable from the inside without a key.
‘Inner rooms’ are those where the only escape route is through another connecting room. Inner rooms should be kept to a minimum, but places like kitchens, utility rooms, bathrooms, etc. are acceptable as long as their own fire risks are low. Escape windows are only considered safe on the ground floor and are not an acceptable means of escape for mobility-impaired people.
Emergency escape lighting should be present in escape routes and must be operational when mains power fails. For very small premises, rechargeable torches or ‘night lights’ may be acceptable; make sure there is one in each bedroom and that it has clear instructions. Unsurprisingly, prominent fire escape signage must be in place.
Guests should not be expected to use firefighting equipment. The necessary extinguishers and other tools should be available with clear instructions, but their actual use should be down to trained staff. Our fire inspection services can help you make sure you have the right number and type of extinguishers.
Smoke alarms should be installed in most rooms and corridors, with heat alarms in kitchens or anywhere a false alarm is possible. The alarms should be tamper-proof and linked so they activate simultaneously. Much more information about fire-rated materials and requirements can be found in the government documentation.
C) Planning and Documentation
A simple version of your escape plan, as well as basic emergency info, can be included in a welcome pack. And, as a standard rule, guests should be told to leave the building by the nearest exit in the event of a fire, and that emergency services should be contacted, ideally from outside the property.
Escape plans must consider a range of potential guests (e.g. age, mobility, and language). This document should prove useful for accounting for disabled persons in a fire escape plan. Also, if you have a fire alarm system in place, your plan should directly address what actions should be taken upon hearing the alarm.
The measures and plans in place must be well-maintained and tested. You could carry this out yourself, but a trained contractor may be required. A record of testing and maintenance should be kept either electronically or in your fire log book.
Daily checks should be undertaken for exit routes, making sure they are kept clear of obstructions. We go up to weekly straight after this; with fire alarm testing, test a different call point each week. Also check that self-closing doors are working properly.
Each month, you should make sure all exit doors can be easily opened, paying extra attention to those not in regular use. Also test escape lighting units for correct operation. Actively test smoke/heat alarms to know if they can wake people up and perform other manufacturer-recommended maintenance.
Every six months, have fire detection and alarm systems serviced by a contractor. Also check the condition of fire doors. Finally, have emergency lighting and fire extinguishers serviced annually. Additionally, for each change of occupancy when staff/owners are not present, carry out the monthly and weekly tests/checks.
Essential Fire Safety Items for Holiday Lets
If you go down the list and just buy the first thing that comes up from a Google search, it’s gonna cost you. We would never suggest cutting corners, but it’s easy to overspend in this market. Whether it’s through bundles or just smart picks on individual products, you want to get compliant without going outside the boundaries of what’s considered ‘essential’.
We sell a few types of extinguishers that are designed to tackle multiple fire classes. Powder is the main one, an example of which comes with our basic Holiday Home Fire Safety Bundle. ABC powder is an extinguishing agent rated for the three most common types of fire: solids, liquids and gases. This is great, but does leave out what is probably the most common fire risk for holiday homes, that being Class F, cooking oil fires.
Cooking oil and fat fires necessitate the use of a wet chemical fire extinguisher or equivalent. One such equivalent is the Firexo All-fires Extinguisher, a 2- litre unit of which is included in our premium bundle (and can be seen just to the right). A more common way of tackling these fires is a reliable fire blanket; one of these is included in both of the aforementioned bundles. Our bundles also include the relevant signage for both the extinguisher and the fire blanket.
We’ve talked a bit about emergency lighting and how a small rechargeable device can suffice. A Nightsafe Nightlight can act as a standing emergency light near an exit. but can also be picked up and used as a torch to help someone find their way out. Our premium bundle includes one of these, as well as a smoke, heat, and carbon monoxide alarm, giving you at least one of all the fire safety essentials for your property.
Closing Words
Our holiday safety bundles do include a few other bits, like a first aid kit. But this article is long enough just talking about fire safety. And in the end, you will be best served by looking through that official guide from the home office. I’ll link it again here for convenience, but I hope this article is either a good starting point or a useful way to remind yourself of certain things. As I mentioned earlier, factual accuracy is assured here, so if you don’t want to read through that phonebook of a document every time you need to check something, then I hope what I’ve put together here will suffice.
I also hope you have a good idea of how you can achieve fire safety compliance for your holiday let. Specifically, how you can do so without excessive spending. In that vein, I don’t mind mentioning the fact that while the bundles mentioned in the previous section offer a great deal, you can get all the items individually cheaper from us than from anywhere else as well. We have a wider variety of bundles that may be of use to you, so please browse our range here.
As a holiday home owner, I hope you feel more confident about advertising your property and above all else, keeping your guests safe. Thanks for reading!
