Fire Door -legal requirement

marc3

Hi,
apologies where no doubt covered before-but can't find anything.

am landlord of an apartment in an older property.
Our apartment door opens into a corridor.

I intend to put smoke seals/closers/intumescent paint on this door to upgrade its fireproofing.

That given-is their any specific legislation/requirement by law upon landlords to do this ?

We are governed by electrical safety certificates and other legal stuff-but to best onf my limited knowledge this area is a bit woolly and there is no specific legislation/requirement/obligation upon me,apart from a general coverall fluffiness of 'duty of care '
seems odd that on such a specific area there is no 'law '.
(managing agents don't seek certificates covering this aspect when renting on ones behalf for example )

am i correct or incorrect ?

if there is a specific law-can someone kindly guide me towards it please

00ec25

the requirement for fire safety is covered as part of building regulations (RIP Grenfell!) and, in the context of landlords, where applicable as part of the licensing requirements if the property is an HMO

you would already know if your flat was an HMO, so that just leaves building regs as your legal environment.

I am sure you have used google already?
http://www.safelincs.co.uk/fire-safety-information-for-landlords/

teneighty

Fire regulations on flats are a mess with numerous pieces of legislation which are quite vague. Hence why hundreds of high rise blocks have been clad with flammable materials.

For an existing property it is the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 which is basically risk assessment based. You can make the risk assessment say whatever you want it to say so you would need to check the fire plan for your building to see if the entrance door needs to be a fire door. If it is on a communal corridor on a protected escape route it probably does.

Upgrading an existing door can be a waste of time. The basic principal is what the actual door leaf is made from, so you could spend a lot of time and money trying to upgrade a door and it still will not achieve the required fire resistance. The other issue is that a fire door should have a test certificate to verify it achieves the required fire resistance, you cannot do that with an upgraded door so it will always be an unknown quantity.

Work like this should be done in conjunction with the freeholder or managing agents to ensure the overall fire plan is not compromised and the building as a whole is safe. It would be pointless upgrading your door if all the other doors in the building do not comply. It would make more sense to replace all the inadequate doors in one contract.

rentmekid

Buy a fire door blank from howdens. It will be much cheaper and more fire resistant than painting

Norman_Castle

Might be useful, not sure if its current.

http://www.cieh.org/uploadedFiles/Core/Policy/Publications_and_information_services/Policy_publications/Publications/National_fire_safety_guidance_08.pdf

G_M

Would yu not need the freeholder's consent to change the door?

Depends what exactly you do, and what your lease says.

teneighty

rentmekid wrote: »

Buy a fire door blank from howdens. It will be much cheaper and more fire resistant than painting

Technically the door and the frame/lining need to achieve the required fire resistance so just hanging a fire resisting door blank in an old frame may not achieve compliance.

However, with the frame the problem is usually the gap behind the frame/lining so it could just be a matter of removing the architrave and filling any gaps with an intumescent mastic/foam.

It can be a minefield so should really only be attempted by someone competent who understands the rules.

marc3

all helpful-thanks