The New Angle On Fire Watch Services Just Released

While emergency evacuation drills are good practice in fire safety and a key part of staff training, false alarms can simply be a waste of everyone's time. Not least for the emergency services, who could be called out for no reason if your alarm system is automated. We should all do what we can to be certain that the Fire Watch Guards Services are free to deal with real emergencies.

If false alarms occur more often than not, they may have a real and disruptive effect on your business and productivity. Another negative impact may be that if you have too many false alarms, the Fire Services will not respond with no specific manual request. Which is not good news if you ever have a real fire.

A false alarm may be a symptom of a fault on your system, so they should never be ignored. If you can't find the cause of an alarm activation, it's always best to call in an engineer to investigate the problem. The very last thing you'll need is for the exact same thing to happen a day or two later because of same small fault. Even worse, it may very well be a signal that an element of the alarm is not properly functioning, which could have a serious impact within the event of a real fire, allowing the fire to spread far more than it otherwise might.

Many false alarms are caused by people within the building not being aware that a fire alarm system is in place, or at least not understanding the kinds of thing that can activate the fire alarm. You can deal with these through a few simple procedures:

Ensure staff and visitors realize that your building is protected by an automatic fire alarm system

Make this data part of your induction training and fire safety training for all staff.

Have prominent notices up at all main entrances to your place of business. Use the next wording: "These premises are protected by an automatic fire alarm system. Please obtain permission from the site manager before undertaking any work involving flame, smoke, heat or sparks."

Make certain that no-one carries out any 'hot works' without permission from the Well being as well as Safety Representative, fire Marshall, or whoever has responsibility for authorising such works

Staff need to know that any work involving flame, smoke, heat or sparks must have special permission.

Build this into staff training and ensure it really is included in staff manuals, operating plans, etc.

Have a Hot Works Permit system or similar mechanism to make sure that contractors working on site follow your safe working procedures.

Build this requirement into contracts with any contractors who will undertake work on the premises.

Make certain that no work involving the generation of dust or perhaps the use of spray paint is done in an area with smoke detectors in, unless the detectors are properly protected.

Make sure that somebody has specific personal responsibility for managing this and similar matters.

If possible, smoke detectors may be replaced with heat detectors, but only by an experienced engineer.

The alternative to swapping to heat detectors is to cover and protect the smoke detectors during the period of work (with paper, plastic, etc).

This certainly will not be done lightly, as covered smoke detectors will clearly not work correctly, if at all, within the event of a real fire.

The situation should be risk assessed, and alternative means of detection put in place (such as a person in the area with specific fire-watching brief throughout the period of works).

Ensure that somebody has the specific personal responsibility for removing the covering from the detectors in the event the work is finished. It's vital that this really is done promptly in order that the alarm system is fully functional straight away.

Make sure that the fire alarm system is tested in the event the work is completed, to be certain that it really is functioning correctly.