City Fibre installed fibre in private owned flats building with no permission

Kairi1844

We need to documentation for insurance purposes in the event of a fire, you are talking about buying and selling.
Our worry is in the event of a fire we lack anything in regards to the work they did which as already mentioned is above our electrics and alarm system which they faulted already when installing their cables. 
But no to sell or buy properties this isn't required, but as a privately owned management company with our homes at risk in the event of a fire and a void insurance policy should we not have the correct paperwork showing what has been done in our communal hallway that may have impacted fire spread or start, then surely it's simple to see why I am seeking paperwork? 
Otherwise what do we say to our insurance? Oh sorry you need to contact a Tennant and ask him to contact sky to contact city fibre to ask because we don't know and haven't bothered finding out any information to cover our backs and our properties and investments lol 

noitsnotme

Kairi1844 said:

We need to documentation for insurance purposes in the event of a fire, you are talking about buying and selling.
Our worry is in the event of a fire we lack anything in regards to the work they did which as already mentioned is above our electrics and alarm system which they faulted already when installing their cables. 
But no to sell or buy properties this isn't required, but as a privately owned management company with our homes at risk in the event of a fire and a void insurance policy should we not have the correct paperwork showing what has been done in our communal hallway that may have impacted fire spread or start, then surely it's simple to see why I am seeking paperwork? 
Otherwise what do we say to our insurance? Oh sorry you need to contact a Tennant and ask him to contact sky to contact city fibre to ask because we don't know and haven't bothered finding out any information to cover our backs and our properties and investments lol 

I appreciate where you’re coming from.  This is why I was asking if the documentation detailing the installation is legally required or not.  If it is something that is required by insurance companies I can’t believe a company the size of City Fibre have just forgotten to ensure their contractor provides it.  They must do thousands of installations in multiple dwelling buildings every year.  If they weren’t providing this documentation and thousands of insurance policies were being invalidated as a result, surely we’d hear about this huge scandal?

What has City Fibre said when you informed them your insurer requires detailed installation documentation?

What exactly has your insurer said they require in terms of documentation?

Kairi1844

Hi, 
So you wouldn't need the documents if the agreement had been done with city fibre, this is the issue. If we had agreed for them to come, then let's say in the event of a fire we would then provide our insurance with city fibres details and they would go to them for any documentation related that may require. 
The issue is we have no contract with them as we did not agree to the install. 
So yes you are correct in normal circumstances when this has been ordered and authorized by the owner of the property you would not need this as the contract is with city fibre, we have no contract as it stands and even if you counted the order for the Internet from the Tennant, this would not count as he is not the owner of the flat and the fibre has been installed in the communal area, now making it every flats problem.
Hope that clears it up. Every year we have a fire Marshal also who has to attend and sign us off for fire safety, with any new work that is undertaken in the communal area he also require documentation for, so that is another thing we do for insurnsce purposes. As it is the communal area that is the front door and fire escape route this is why it is so important as it's for the building itself and also the safety of all those that live here.

noitsnotme

Kairi1844 said:

If we had agreed for them to come, then let's say in the event of a fire we would then provide our insurance with city fibres details and they would go to them for any documentation related that may require. 

Is this what it says in your insurance policy or something your insurers have told you? I’m genuinely interested so I can tell my family member what to look out for before they put an offer in.

Kairi1844 said:

Every year we have a fire Marshal also who has to attend and sign us off for fire safety, with any new work that is undertaken in the communal area he also require documentation for, 

Out of interest, had you authorised the work and no documentation was therefore provided (you said “you wouldn't need the documents if the agreement had been done with city fibre”) would the fire Marshall contact City Fibre to obtain the documentation?

Kairi1844

H,
No our insurance company has not told us, as if we told our insurance company now then we are admitting to unathorised work being carried out which goes against our policy. 
I am only seeking general documents such as certificate of the fibre they use and any fire related documentation regarding the materials used and fire warranties. 
This is not something you need to worry about regarding your family member, this is a very unique situation as we are the owners and management company and like I said if we had authorized it we would have a contract with city fibre and there would be no issue.
So if we had authorized it, our head director of the management company would of asked for documents when authorizing it upon completion for our fire Marshal, we ask all work carried out the same for our own records. Perhaps it's too much, but it's better to have too many documents than not when it comes to insurance and future claims. 

Kairi1844

Anyway we are considering instructing them to come and remove it all together due as not all owners are happy with the work so maybe soon I won't need to worry about the documents and just getting reimbursed for the call out and fix on the fire alarm. 

Cloth_of_Gold

We live in a small block of privately owned flats. Two different fibre optic internet providers have installed their equipment in the building and both first obtained a wayleave from the managing agent. They provided information and diagrams on how the installation was to be done but I don't recall anything about 'mitigation as far as fire stopping etc'.

noitsnotme

Cloth_of_Gold said:

We live in a small block of privately owned flats. Two different fibre optic internet providers have installed their equipment in the building and both first obtained a wayleave from the managing agent. They provided information and diagrams on how the installation was to be done but I don't recall anything about 'mitigation as far as fire stopping etc'.

Thank you for the first hand information, that’s very useful.  Did the documentation satisfy your insurer?

noitsnotme

Kairi1844 said: 

This is not something you need to worry about regarding your family member, this is a very unique situation as we are the owners and management company 

It’s not that unique.  Several of the properties my family member has already looked at have the same set up.  From the post above by Cloth of Gold, a diligent installer will provide diagrams of the installation but perhaps no details of the fire stopping element?

iniltous

Although a method statement is not a legal necessity, it’s standard business practice, most ‘businesses’ employing another business to undertake work , ( and in this case the common areas of an an MDU are effectively the concern of a ‘business’ ) pretty much insist on a method statement to be provided in advance of the work starting , there are generic statements basically stating that the company undertaking the work are insured, will work safely, will guard the work area , clean up afterwards etc , and there are site specific method statements where a more detailed description of what the works entail and how it  will be accomplished is provided , to a certain extent working in a MDU isn’t going to need the same level/standard of statement as (for example) working in a data centre where the potential to cause massive disruption has to be taken into account by the data centre management …..on one thing we can agree , City Fibre should know about wayleaves , method statement etc , but they certainly didn’t use them here.
TBH  , your attitude seemed to me to be one of ‘nothing to see here , perfectly standard installation, simply move on’ , which would be a ludicrous position to take .