UK businesses experience thousands of fire incidents each year, resulting in injuries, property damage and costly disruptions.
Many UK businesses lack comprehensive fire safety plans, leaving them vulnerable to incidents. Fire safety planning is essential for protecting lives, property, and ensuring business continuity.
In this blog, we explore the essential elements of a fire safety plan and why it’s important.
Why Fire Safety Planning Matters
Fire safety planning is crucial for businesses. Let’s look at the reasons why…
Regulatory Responsibility
UK businesses must adhere to The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. This law mandates that a business must have a comprehensive fire safety plan and a designated “Responsible Person” who oversees fire safety within the company. Failing to comply with legislation could result in fines, penalties, and potential legal liabilities.
Proactive Vs Reactive
Legal compliance is essential, but proactive fire safety planning is more than meeting regulations. Beyond ticking legal boxes, proper planning heavily minimises risks, enhances employee safety and enables fast action in emergencies.
Business Continuity
A workplace fire can have adverse effects on business operations. This can lead to revenue loss, disgruntled customers, and a damaged reputation. With a robust fire safety plan, businesses can recover faster after an incident.
Overall, emergency preparedness protects lives and prevents injuries, looks after workplace property, safeguards reputation and business activities, and can even reduce business insurance costs.
What Does Fire Emergency Preparedness Entail?
Emergency preparedness involves proactive measures to reduce fire risks, plan for emergency response and train staff effectively.
Businesses preparing for emergencies will undertake these key actions:
- Perform thorough fire risk assessments regularly.
- Introducing and maintaining fire prevention and suppression measures in the workplace.
- Creating, developing and communicating emergency procedures.
- Implementing staff training, including any ‘Responsible Persons’.
- Running through fire drills to identify any problem areas and support staff understanding.
Key Components Of A Fire Safety Plan
A fire safety plan outlines the procedures and protocols that are in place to prevent fires, minimise property damage and protect lives. Most fire safety plans will address the following factors:
Risk Assessment
Fire safety risk assessments identify fire hazards and help a business to develop prevention strategies.
Common fire risks include:
- Electrical hazards, like electrical equipment and cabling.
- Flammable materials such as chemicals and solvents.
- Cooking appliances, whether in a professional kitchen or a staff kitchen.
- Heating systems.
Fire Prevention/Suppression Measures
Working out the risks means you can effectively identify fire prevention and suppression methods.
For many workplaces, this can look like installing and regularly maintaining fire extinguishers, alarms and emergency lighting. Other measures include safe storage of flammable materials and effective training for employees.
Emergency Response Procedure
You need to have a set response procedure in the event of an emergency. Quick action may help reduce the damage a fire does, and employees are more likely to respond calmly and reliably if they have agreed-upon, rehearsed plans to follow if a fire occurs.
Elements to consider when developing your emergency response procedure include how the alarm will be raised, how the emergency services will be called and where to go to reach a place of safety.
Evacuation Plans
You must make sure that there are emergency exits are clearly signposted for everyone to evacuate promptly, and routes out of the building should also be marked and unobstructed.
Designated assembly points should be decided and marked, and all employees and visitors should be accounted for during drills as well as the real event.
Staff Roles & Training
Does your business already have a fire marshal? If not, it should have. A fire marshal’s primary duties are to minimise the risk of fires happening in the workplace and guide people out safely if one does occur.
Fire marshals perform key tasks in the event of a fire and will form part of your emergency response procedure. The same goes for individuals with first aid and fire extinguisher training.
When new employees begin working for you, you must train them on emergency procedure protocol and inform them about any new fire risks. You should also carry out at least one fire drill per year and record the results, keeping them as part of your fire safety plan.
Developing Your Plan: A Checklist
Here are our top tips for developing your fire safety plan…
Team Collaboration
You can benefit from involving a team with diverse perspectives to create a comprehensive fire safety plan. This means including staff from different departments and bringing in external safety advisors if needed.
Conduct a Risk Assessment
Your risk assessment will form the foundation of your fire safety plan. It will highlight any fire risks and help you assess the likelihood of an event occurring.
Based on your findings, you can develop control measures to mitigate the risks, such as fire prevention measures like proper storage of flammable chemicals and regular maintenance of electrical equipment.
Establish Clear Procedures
Your next step is to develop step-by-step protocols for:
- Fire prevention
- Raising the alarm
- Evacuation
- Post-incident reporting, recording and other actions.
Fire safety plan information should be easily accessible to all staff.
Invest in Training
Equip your team with the knowledge to prevent fires and respond effectively in an emergency. Envesca’s Level 1 and 2 Award in Fire Safety courses provide in-depth training to develop a robust plan.
Fire Safety Level 1 is a half-day training course designed to teach participants how to prevent fires from starting, what to do if a fire does break out, and how to use fire equipment safely. It is suitable for all employees in any size business within any industry sector.
Fire Safety Level 2 is a one-day course that covers fire marshal training. Participants will learn how to ensure that fire safety measures and evacuation procedures are in place and effective within your business. Upon completion, participants will be able to identify and report key safety issues and understand the purpose and structure of regular fire risk assessments.
Regular Updates and Revisions
Fire safety is not static, and risks can evolve and change. Your fire safety plan should be regularly reviewed and updated as your workplace and staff roster change and grow.
Fire Safety Planning Matters
Fire can put your people and your business at risk, from reduced business operations to penalties for forgoing compliance with fire safety laws.
A well-developed fire safety plan is a necessity, not an option, for responsible businesses.
Confused about fire marshal requirements? Not sure where to start with your fire safety plan? Envesca can help. Get in touch for our ultimate fire safety checklist.