Fire Risk Assessment Checklist - Five Step Checklist To Carry Out A Fire Risk Assessment

Fire risk assessments are now a legal requirement for all business premises in the UK. While many companies use consultants to undertake their fire risk assessments, there is no reason why you cannot carry them out yourself, provided your workplace is relatively straightforward and that you have a reasonable understanding of fire safety issues.

Fire Risk Assessment should follow the approved five step process, and you can use the following checklist to guide you through your assessment. The following guide is of necessity fairly basic, but you can find more detailed advice online, including free fire risk assessment forms to complete as you go along.

Stage One - Identify Fire Hazards

The best way to go about spotting fire hazards is to think about what would be required to start a fire. Any fire needs three things in order to start. These are a source of ignition, a supply of fuel and oxygen. Check all areas of your building to find possible hazards. Sources of ignition range from the pretty obvious, such as anything involving a naked flame or sparks, to the slightly less obvious. Examples include light bulbs which heat up, any kind of heater and portable electrical appliances, which often lead to fires if they malfunction.

Anything which can burn is potential fuel for a fire. Look for paper and card (for example stationary supplies or empty boxes). Check for furnishings and fabrics, plastics, including foam cushions and any potentially flammable materials such as gas canisters.

No fire can burn without oxygen, and for the purposes of a fire risk assessment, what we are concerned with is just air, and how it moves around your premises. For each area you look at, consider the extent to which a fire could get a ready supply of air and how it might spread. Look at doors and windows (fire doors in particular) and any ducting, such as for your ventilation system.

Stage Two - Identify People Who Are At Risk

If a fire did start, look at who would be at risk from it. Give particular attention to anyone working alone or in an isolated part of your premises. Also consider anyone who would have greater difficulty in understanding or with mobility, such as foreign workers, children or disabled people. Do not forget to include visitors or members of the public, or contract workers, who may not be familiar with your workplace and your procedures.

Stage Three - Evaluate The Risks

This is a very important stage in your fire risk assessment process. Once you know what the hazards are and who is at risk from them, you need to assess the likelihood of those hazards resulting in a fire, and the risks posed to the people in your premises. Once you have done this you need to put in place measures to manage or eliminate those hazards, and to manage or eliminate the risks to people.

Stage Four - Record Your Findings

You are only legally obliged to do this if you employ five or more people, but it makes sense to do it anyway. The easiest way is to complete a fire risk assessment form as you go through the process. These can be downloaded free online.

Stage Five - Review Regularly

Circumstances change, and the hazards will change with them, so you need to review your assessment on a regular basis. Annually is probably a good starting point. If anything obvious changes in your workplace, such as new equipment, machinery, materials or systems, you should review your fire risk assessment at that time to see whether the changes have any impact on it.

If you feel that your workplace is perhaps a little complicated to undertake your own fire risk assessment, or if you simply do not have the time, there are many fire safety consultants who can do this work for you.