Possibly you could be a manufacturer of candles.

Possibly you could be a manufacturer of candles. There is so much to take into consideration, and we have not covered all of it here. Then there may be people on your premises who are not familiar with them, such as customers or visiting salesmen or a plumber or electrical contractor. For instance, keeping sources of ignition and flammable materials apart. Have you got a meeting point arranged so that everyone can be counted? If you share a building with other businesses, have you consulted with them, and do THEY have proper fire procedures in place? You may have done everything that you can, but if the business next door hasn;t, it could be a serious problem. If a fire starts, who is going to call the fire brigade? Of course, you need to consider firefighting equipment. The list goes on. Your firefighting equipment also has to be in good order and working properly, so it needs checking over by a professional on a regular basis. For instance, if you run a retail store you may have a lot of paper used for wrapping, and you probably store a lot of plastic bags also.

There is a simple answer, though, and that is to have a specialist company undertake your fire risk assessment for you. There are many things to take into consideration when carrying out a fire risk assessment. You also need to plan your escape routes. Certainly, everybody is at risk if there is a fire, but some may be more at risk than others because of where they work, or when they work, or the equipment that they use. Could something such as a lorry be blocking the fire exit from the outside? Does everyone know what to do if a fire breaks out, and have you had a regular fire drill? You should run a fire drill at least once a year. Children, the elderly, and the disabled may be especially at risk. Not the least of these is combustible materials that you may have on the premises.When you are an employer, the law places many responsibilities on you as regards the potential for fire on your premises and evacuation plans for your employees should a fire break out. Could a source of heat or sparks fall or be pushed into ultrasonic horn something that could catch fire? Or the other way around?

Can you secure any fuel that an arsonist might use? Are your premises protected against possible arson? Then you have to consider how you will know there is a fire. You have to carry out a fire risk assessment of your building or buildings, and if you employ more than five people you have to keep a written record of your assessment and the steps you have taken to improve fire safety. Next you have to remove or reduce the risk. A wool shop is obviously going to have a lot of wool. If you run an engineering workshop, you may have machine oil. They need to be free of clutter and your fire escape doors need to be in good working order too. Then you need to consider people. When you look at the time you would have to spend doing it yourself at your hourly rate, the fire risk assessment cost will actually save you money.

You should also keep a copy of it elsewhere in case the original is lost. You may have enough of it, but have you enough staff trained to use it? It;s always possible that you had five people trained to use the extinguishers, but three of them have left your employment, so you don;t have enough people now. Certainly, that means there is a fire risk assessment cost, but since you have to do it as the law requires, you will most certainly save yourself the cost and frustration of a DIY job. You need to have fire detection equipment and fire warning equipment that everyone on the premises can hear. However, if you have someone who is deaf, they will not be able to hear, so you may need alarm signals such as flashing red lights. You need to think about heaters, lighting, naked flames, welding or grinding processes, electrical equipment, matches, cigarettes, or anything else that could cause sparks.. Better still, you know it is going to be right