Fire safety questions for landlords and building owners

When people ask about fire risk assessment cost in Sutton, they usually want to know whether size or the number of floors matters more. Both do, but layout often matters most. A three-storey converted house with shared hallways takes longer to assess than a single large open-plan shop, because the assessor must check every escape route, each door that protects it, and the walls between separate occupancies.

The type of occupancy changes the work too. A building let as an HMO needs checks on bedroom doors and communal alarms that a standard block of flats might not. So does the age of the building, since older conversions often have hidden voids that require a closer look at compartmentation. The specialist firm sets the fee based on how long the inspection and the report will take, rather than applying a flat rate per floor. You can read more about what the work covers on the <a href="/fire-safety/fire-risk-assessment-sutton">fire risk assessment page</a>.

The law says the person doing the assessment must be competent, but it does not hand out a single licence that proves it. A competent person for a fire assessment is someone with enough training, experience and knowledge of the specific building type to spot what could go wrong and write down what should happen next.

For a small converted house, that might mean someone who has spent years looking at similar buildings across south London. For a larger purpose-built block, it usually means someone holding a third-party certification from a recognised scheme. The important thing is that the competence matches the complexity of the building. If you are unsure whether the person you are considering is right for your premises, ask them what types of buildings they normally assess and how they keep their knowledge current. More detail on this sits in the <a href="/duties/arranging-an-assessment-sutton">guide to arranging an assessment</a>.

Many owners wonder if they need a formal document when they only run a small premises. If you employ five or more people, or hold a licence like an HMO registration, the law requires a written record. Even below that threshold, having one is the only way to prove the assessment happened.

A written record is simply a document that names the hazards found, the people at risk, and the actions taken or planned. It does not need to be fifty pages long for a two-bedroom flat above a shop. It does need to be clear enough that someone else could read it and understand what was checked and why. Keep it somewhere safe and update it when the building changes. The <a href="/duties/help-and-advice-sutton">help and advice section</a> goes into what a typical record contains.

If you own a house converted into flats and let just one of them while living in another, you still have duties under fire safety law. The common parts, such as the hallway, stairs and any shared lobby, fall under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. That means someone must consider the risks in those shared areas.

Whether you need a full formal assessment depends on the layout. A house split into two self-contained flats with a shared entrance hall needs one. A house where you rent out a single room and share a kitchen does not fall under the same rules, though general safety still applies. If you are asking yourself whether you need a fire risk assessment, the answer almost always turns on whether other people use shared space to get in and out. Read more about <a href="/duties/responsible-person-sutton">who the responsible person is</a>.