The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 explained

Who is the responsible person?

Article 3 defines the responsible person. In a workplace, it is the employer, to the extent that the workplace is under their control. In any other premises it is the person who has control of the premises in connection with a trade or business, or the owner where no such person exists.

In practice a building can have several duty holders at once — a freeholder, a managing agent, and individual commercial tenants can all hold duties over different parts of the same site. Article 22 requires them to co-operate and co-ordinate. Disputes about who was supposed to service the alarm are not a defence; they are usually the first thing an inspecting officer finds.

The duty to carry out a fire risk assessment

Article 9 requires the responsible person to make a suitable and sufficient assessment of the risks to which relevant persons are exposed, for the purpose of identifying the general fire precautions they need to take. Where five or more people are employed, or the premises are licensed, the significant findings must be recorded.

Since the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 and the amendments made by the Fire Safety Act 2021, the expectation is effectively that the assessment is written down and kept current in all but the smallest premises. It must be reviewed regularly, and always after a material change — a refurbishment, a change of use, a change in occupancy, or a fire.

• Identify fire hazards: sources of ignition, fuel and oxygen
• Identify people at risk, including anyone especially vulnerable
• Evaluate, remove, reduce and protect against the remaining risk
• Record significant findings, prepare an emergency plan and give staff information and training
• Review the assessment and keep it current

General fire precautions you must maintain

Articles 8 to 22 set out the measures that follow from the assessment. These are the physical and procedural controls that most people picture when they think of fire safety, and each one carries an ongoing maintenance duty under Article 17 — equipment must be subject to a suitable system of maintenance and kept in efficient working order and good repair.

• Means of detection and warning — a fire alarm appropriate to the building, designed and maintained to BS 5839
• Means of escape kept clear, adequately signed and, where needed, lit by emergency lighting to BS 5266
• Firefighting equipment — extinguishers to BS 5306, serviced annually
• Compartmentation and fire doors that will actually hold back fire and smoke
• An emergency plan, staff training and fire drills

Enforcement and penalties

Fire and rescue authorities enforce the Order. An inspecting officer can issue informal advice, an enforcement notice requiring specific work within a set period, an alterations notice, or — where there is serious risk to life — a prohibition notice that closes all or part of a building immediately.

Serious breaches are prosecuted in the criminal courts. Fines are unlimited, and sentencing guidelines link the penalty to turnover and to the degree of harm risked, so prosecutions costing tens of thousands of pounds are routine even where nobody was hurt. Individual directors and managers can be prosecuted personally where a breach was committed with their consent, connivance or neglect.

What good compliance looks like in practice

The Order does not ask for perfection; it asks for a reasoned, documented and maintained approach. In an inspection, the difference between a warning and a prosecution is almost always the quality of the paperwork behind the hardware.

That means a current fire risk assessment by a competent assessor, an action plan showing what has been closed out and when, service records for the alarm, emergency lighting and extinguishers, fire door inspection records, and a log of drills and training. Keeping all of it in one place — a digital fire logbook rather than a folder in a cupboard — is the single easiest improvement most buildings can make.