If you run a business, let property or manage a building in Manchester, the law requires you to have a written fire risk assessment. Nobody is licensed to write one, so judging who is competent falls to you.
This page covers who enforces fire safety law in Manchester, the ward by ward licensing rules that catch landlords out here, and how to check an assessor before you appoint them.
Who enforces fire safety law in Manchester
Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service is the enforcing authority for most premises across the city. They can inspect without notice, serve enforcement and prohibition notices, and prosecute. A prohibition notice can shut a building the same day it is served.
The first thing asked for on an inspection is the fire risk assessment. Not being able to produce one, or producing something that could describe any building in the country, is where the problem starts.
Manchester licensing is ward by ward, and that trips people up
Manchester operates additional HMO licensing in designated wards rather than across the whole city. That makes it easy to get wrong, because two similar properties a mile apart can sit under different rules.
- Designated wards include Crumpsall, Moss Side, Rusholme, Fallowfield and Old Moat. These are the areas with the heaviest shared housing concentration.
- The threshold drops to three or four occupants from two or more households, against the national mandatory threshold of five.
- The fee is around 750 pounds for a five year term, with reductions for accredited landlords.
- Designations run five years and have to be re-declared by the council to continue, so boundaries and end dates move.
Check the current designations with Manchester City Council before relying on any of this, including ours. Ward boundaries and scheme dates change, and the council’s own list is the version that counts. Being outside a designated ward does not remove your fire safety duty, it only removes the licence.
What makes Manchester buildings different to assess
- One of the largest student populations in Europe. Fallowfield, Rusholme and Withington are dense with shared houses, and sleeping accommodation is the hardest thing to assess properly.
- A decade of city centre tower building. Ancoats, Deansgate and the Green Quarter mean a lot of buildings where evacuation strategy, compartmentation and cladding are the entire assessment.
- Converted mills and warehouses. Manchester has more of these than almost anywhere, and converted industrial buildings are where fire stopping and compartmentation most often fail, because the original structure was never designed for residential use.
- A large hospitality and licensed trade, where the assessment turns on occupancy numbers, kitchen risk and getting people out of a crowded room at night.
The law is the same everywhere. What changes is who you should appoint. Somebody who assesses small offices is the wrong choice for a converted mill or a student HMO.
Checking an assessor in Manchester
There is no register, so ask directly:
- What are your qualifications, and who awarded them? Time in the fire service is valuable but it is a different discipline to fire risk assessing.
- Are you third party certificated? If yes, take the registration number and check it with the scheme, not the logo on the website.
- What is your professional indemnity cover? Ask for the figure, not just whether they hold it.
- How many buildings like mine have you assessed in Manchester? A converted mill, a student HMO and a city centre block are three different jobs.
- Can I see a sample report? Client details removed. If they will not, that tells you something.
What it costs in Manchester
Price tracks the size of the building, how complex it is and whether anyone sleeps there. A single storey unit and a six storey conversion are not comparable jobs and the quotes should not look alike.
Get more than one quote, in writing. Check each one states whether a return visit is included, whether the action plan is part of the fee, and whether somebody will explain the findings to you. Those three answers matter more than the headline figure. For the national picture on pricing, see what a fire risk assessment should cost.
Areas we cover around Manchester
Assessors listed here work across the city and Greater Manchester, including Fallowfield, Rusholme, Withington, Moss Side, Chorlton, Didsbury, Ancoats, Salford, Stockport, Oldham, Bolton, Bury, Rochdale, Trafford and Tameside.
Get quotes from Manchester assessors
Describe the premises and we will pass it to assessors covering Manchester. We pass it on and nothing else happens to it.
Not in Manchester? See all the areas we cover.