Posted By s.micklewright As the need for a fire certificate will be replaced by risk assessment will this mean that a risk assessment should be carried out in houses of multiple occupancy? I work for a housing provider and where before we had the fire service issue such certs, I take it now we will have to carry out a Fire RA. Should be busy then!

Posted By Stuart Nagle S... Houses in Multiple occupation is a multi-legislation nightmare in respect of a lot of aspects, including fire risk management. The latest Housing Act 2004, implements the legal requirements for all Local Authorities to licence HMO's (which will require inspection) and obviously one of the areas of concern is fire risk. There will be particular differences between HMO's that are new and should comply with current or recent Building regs, and the likely more larger sector of HMOs that are existing and do not generally comply with building regs per se. In most instances the main problems will arise in respect of common areas, stairs, landings, addition stairways etc and the provision of fire detection, fire alarms, call points, sounders and emergency lighting, signing etc and the need to inspect, test and certify. In addition, landlords may also have to consider the private dwellings themselves in respect of fire risk and penetration of compartments by fire and fire resistance, and the fire resistance of common areas (including for example spread of fire due to flammable coatings - paints ect) Two areas that need to be looked at are British standards - CoPs for fire detection and alarms in residential buildings, and other advice that is available (some free via the WWW) that needs to be examined. Without getting bogged down here, I suggest you have a look at the WWW via a search engine (inputting 'HMO' without the hyphens) and take a look at what you get. I got three large folders of information (about 225mm of paper in total) that took a week to read and digest.... Also. Contact your local authority environmental department - I did, and had a nice chat with a chap who was very experienced and offered much good advice before I started my research on this... Good luck... Stuart

Posted By Jeff Manion We have a document that may assist you through your issues, send e-mail and will respond. Please mention fire risk assessment in your request. Jeff Manion