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🏥 Sleeping Risk · Dependent Occupants

Fire Risk Assessment for Care Homes & Supported Living

A care home is the hardest fire risk assessment there is, because the standard answer — get everyone out — does not apply. Residents may be asleep, immobile, confused, on oxygen, or physically unable to leave without two members of staff. The assessment has to work with the building you have, the staffing you actually run at three in the morning, and the dependency of the people in each room. We assess care homes, nursing homes, supported living and extra-care schemes across the North West and beyond.

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Evacuation Strategy Tested

We assess whether your progressive horizontal evacuation strategy actually works with your compartmentation and your night staffing — not just whether it is written down.

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PEEPs Reviewed Resident by Resident

Personal emergency evacuation plans are only useful if they reflect current dependency. We check them against the people in the building.

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Evidence CQC Will Ask For

A defensible, dated assessment with a prioritised action plan — the document inspectors expect to see alongside your training and drill records.

Why It Is Different

Evacuation Is the Whole Problem

In an office you evacuate. In a care home you usually cannot — not quickly, and not everyone. The Fire Safety Order still requires that everyone can be got to safety, so the strategy is built around moving residents horizontally, through fire-resisting construction, into an adjoining compartment where they are safe to wait. Everything in the assessment follows from whether that will actually work.

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    Progressive horizontal evacuation depends on compartmentation. The strategy only holds if the compartment walls and doors do their job. A single breached wall above a ceiling, or a fire door held open on a wedge, converts a survivable plan into an unsurvivable one. This is where we spend our time.
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    The strategy has to survive your night staffing. A plan that assumes six staff is not a plan if there are two on at 3am. We look at the ratio of staff to dependent residents at the worst point of the rota, and at how long the first phase of evacuation would realistically take.
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    Dependency changes; the file often does not. Residents deteriorate. A PEEP written on admission for someone who walked in unaided is dangerous once they cannot. We check that PEEPs are reviewed and that the information is where staff will find it at night.
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    Bedroom doors are life safety, not joinery. Self-closers disconnected because they slam, doors held open for observation, hinges and intumescent strips painted over — these are the most common findings in the sector and among the most serious.
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    Ignition sources are specific to care. Oxygen concentrators and cylinders, emollient creams on bedding and clothing, mobility scooter and wheelchair charging, profiling beds, smoking arrangements. Each needs assessing where it actually happens.
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    The Order and CQC overlap but are not the same. Your legal duty is under the Fire Safety Order 2005 and enforced by the fire and rescue authority. CQC will separately want to see that premises are safe and that staff are trained. One good assessment serves both; neither substitutes for the other.

What we work through with you

Compartmentation line by line · Fire door condition and closer function throughout · Detection and alarm coverage, zoning and how staff are alerted at night · Progressive horizontal evacuation routes and refuge capacity · PEEPs against current resident dependency · Night staffing versus realistic evacuation time · Oxygen, emollients and charging arrangements · Kitchen, laundry and plant risks · Training, drill and night-drill records · The emergency plan itself, and whether staff could follow it under pressure.

On Site

What We Assess in a Care Home

The site visit is longer than for most premises, because the strategy has to be tested rather than assumed.

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Compartmentation & Fire Doors

Every compartment line, every door on it. Gaps above ceilings, service penetrations, damaged seals, closers that do not close the door onto the latch.

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Evacuation Routes & Refuges

Whether adjoining compartments can actually hold the residents you would move into them, and whether beds and hoists fit through the openings on the route.

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Detection, Alarm & Staff Alerting

Coverage in bedrooms and voids, zoning that tells staff where the fire is, and how the alarm reaches staff who are elsewhere in the building at night.

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PEEPs & Dependency

Sampled against real residents. Are the plans current, specific and available to the staff who would use them?

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Night Staffing Reality

The rota at its thinnest against the time the first phase of evacuation would take. This is the number that decides whether the strategy is credible.

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Sector-Specific Ignition Risks

Oxygen storage and use, emollient-contaminated fabrics, charging of mobility equipment, laundry, kitchen and any smoking provision.

In Practice

What We Most Often Find

None of these are unusual. All of them matter, and all of them are fixable once they are written down.

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Fire Doors Wedged for Observation

Staff need line of sight to residents, so doors get propped. The answer is not to tell staff to stop — it is hold-open devices linked to the alarm, and we specify them.

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PEEPs That Describe a Former Resident

Written on admission and never revisited. Dependency has moved on, and the plan has not.

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Compartmentation Breached by Later Work

Cabling, nurse call, Wi-Fi and heating upgrades pass through fire walls and are not always sealed. It is invisible from below and it defeats the whole strategy.

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Drills That Never Run at Night

Daytime drills with full staff prove very little about the shift that matters most.

The Stakes

Care homes are where fire safety failures cost lives

Fire and rescue authorities inspect care premises as a priority, and enforcement in this sector is not theoretical — prohibition notices restricting or closing parts of a home are used where the evacuation strategy is not credible. Non-compliance with the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 is a criminal offence carrying unlimited fines and, in serious cases, up to two years’ imprisonment. Alongside that sits CQC’s interest in whether your premises are safe and your staff are trained, and your insurer’s interest in whether you can evidence any of it.

Tell Us About the Premises. Fixed Fee in 2 Hours.

Property type, rough size, number of storeys and what it is used for is enough for us to quote. Survey within days, and your written report within 48 hours of the visit.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Does a care home legally need a fire risk assessment?
Yes. Under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 the Responsible Person for a care home must carry out and keep up to date a suitable and sufficient fire risk assessment. Since section 156 of the Building Safety Act 2022 came into force on 1 October 2023, that assessment must be recorded in full in writing, along with the identity of the person who carried it out — regardless of the size of the premises or the number of staff.
What is progressive horizontal evacuation?
It is the strategy most care homes rely on. Rather than taking everyone out of the building, staff move residents horizontally through fire-resisting construction into an adjoining compartment on the same floor, where they are protected and can wait. It avoids moving frail or immobile people down stairs in the first minutes of a fire. It only works if the compartmentation is intact and the adjoining compartment has the capacity and the staff to receive people.
What is a PEEP and does every resident need one?
A personal emergency evacuation plan sets out how a specific individual will be got to safety — what assistance they need, what equipment, how many staff, and anything relevant such as oxygen use or cognitive impairment. In a care setting, anyone whose evacuation would differ from the general strategy needs one, which in practice means most residents. The critical point is that it must reflect the resident's current dependency, not their condition on admission.
How does this relate to CQC inspection?
They are separate duties that examine the same building. Fire safety law is enforced by the fire and rescue authority under the Fire Safety Order. CQC assesses whether the premises are safe and suitable and whether staff are competent, and will expect to see a current fire risk assessment, evidence that its action plan is being worked through, and training and drill records. A good assessment supports both, but complying with one does not discharge the other.
How often should a care home assessment be reviewed?
There is no fixed statutory interval, but the assessment must be reviewed whenever there is a significant change — building work, a change to compartmentation, a change in the dependency profile of residents, a change to staffing levels, or after any fire-related incident. In a care setting, where dependency shifts continually, annual review is widely treated as the minimum and many operators review more often.
Do you assess supported living and extra-care schemes too?
Yes. Supported living, extra-care housing and specialised housing raise a distinct set of questions, because tenants have their own front doors and a degree of independence, but may still need assistance to evacuate. The strategy — often stay put, sometimes not — has to be matched to the construction of the building and to the actual needs of the people living in it, and the two are frequently out of step.
How long does a care home fire risk assessment take?
Longer than most premises of the same floor area, because compartmentation and doors are checked throughout and the strategy is tested rather than assumed. We will tell you the expected duration when we quote, and we work around meal times, medication rounds and residents' routines. The written report follows within 48 hours of the visit.
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