Building Regulations and Fire Safety Procedural Guidance. July 2020 (Fourth edition)

Product Description

This guide has been prepared for use by Building Control Bodies and the Fire and Rescue Services but may also be of interest to any person with influence over a building’s fire safety arrangements, such as:

• designers
• developers
• occupiers
• employers
• building owners
• building safety managers
• Responsible Persons (as required by the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005)
• fire risk assessors

It explains the steps involved in approving the fire safety aspects of building work, and the interaction between the Building Regulations and other statutory fire safety requirements in England and Wales. If the procedures described in this guide are followed prior to work commencing on site, developers and designers will be able to receive fire safety information relevant to the Building Regulations and other statutory approvals in time to avoid abortive work. Owners and occupiers will also benefit, as this process will generate a basis for their fire safety management procedures and risk assessment.

By ensuring proper and timely consultation between Building Control Bodies and Fire and Rescue Services, and appropriate regard to the Fire and Rescue Service’s response, there should be no need for extra building work to be undertaken at the end of a building project and before the building can be occupied for its intended purpose.

Where functional compliance has been achieved by a fire engineered or management approach, there should be no need for fire safety enforcing authorities to undertake any remedial enforcement action at the time of occupation. Developers and designers should have provided owners and occupiers with sufficient information detailing how functional compliance was achieved to enable preparation of suitable fire risk assessment and management arrangements to ensure the building is safe when occupied.

Throughout this guide it is assumed that users are appropriately competent and conversant with the technical aspects of fire safety and its regulation, or that they employ professional advisors who have a proven competence. Although this guide has no legal force it is intended that all building control bodies and fire safety enforcing authorities should use the consultation procedures described in it as a model for arrangements they make, so that procedures will be the same throughout England and Wales.

Throughout this document there are various references to fire risk management, fire risk assessment and fire strategy. It is important to understand the principles of these terms intended within the context of the stage reached in the development process and not be restricted by terminology.