Wolverhampton runs mandatory HMO licensing only. There is no additional HMO scheme and no selective licensing here, so the licence duty starts at five people. A house let to five or more people from two or more households, sharing a kitchen, bathroom or toilet, needs a licence. The fee comes in two parts, currently around £977 to process the application and £570 once the licence is granted, and the council reviews it every year. The threshold, the current fee and the conditions sit on City of Wolverhampton Council’s HMO licence page. Check that page for the live position, because the council can bring in a new scheme.
So a three or four person shared house is not licensable in Wolverhampton on its own. That does not remove the fire safety duty. If you let it, run a business from it, or manage a building with common parts, you still need the written fire risk assessment.
West Midlands Fire Service will ask for the written assessment
West Midlands Fire Service is the enforcing authority for most premises in Wolverhampton. They can inspect, serve enforcement and prohibition notices, and prosecute. Their own guidance says fire risk assessments are a legal requirement for workplaces and that the responsible person has to conform to the Fire Safety Order. Their audit will ask whether you have a written assessment and whether the measures in it are actually in place.
The person who appoints the assessor is still the responsible person. There is no licence to write one.
The towers at Heath Town and the terraces near the university
Wolverhampton’s stock pulls in two directions. Heath Town has tower blocks of 21 to 23 storeys, with a dedicated water tank on the roof for firefighting. Any block over 11 metres brings the fixed fire door checks and the communal-area duties with it, and a tower is the most involved assessment on this list. Around the City Campus, opposite Molineux, Whitmore Reans is Victorian terraces with student and private lets dotted through it. Those are older shared houses, where fire stopping between the rooms and up the staircase is what the assessment usually finds missing.
Blakenhall adds a third kind of building. The terraces along the Dudley Road have shops on the ground floor and homes above, so one assessment has to deal with a business and sleeping accommodation in the same structure. Say what the building is when you ask for quotes, because a tower, a shared terrace and a shop with a flat over it are three different reports.
If you rent from a social landlord, start with them.
The HMO licence and the fire risk assessment are two duties
An HMO licence is a housing licence from City of Wolverhampton Council. The fire risk assessment is a duty under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. You still need the written fire risk assessment. The licence starts at five sharers; the fire safety duty does not wait for it. It applies to a smaller HMO, a shop with a flat above, and every communal area in a block.
What a Wolverhampton report should actually name
A report that could have been written for any city is not suitable and sufficient here. For a Heath Town tower it should name the height, the fire doors and the firefighting water supply, not “common parts” as a heading with nothing under it. For a Whitmore Reans terrace it should name the fire stopping between the sharers’ rooms. For a Dudley Road shop with a flat above it should name the separation between the business and the sleeping accommodation.
Checking an assessor in Wolverhampton
There is no statutory register of fire risk assessors, in Wolverhampton or anywhere else, so the checking falls to whoever signs the invoice. A high-rise block is complex work, so ask for qualifications, professional body membership, indemnity cover and a sample report for a comparable building before you appoint. The full list of questions, and what a competent answer sounds like, is on what a fire risk assessment costs.
What it costs in Wolverhampton
The building sets the price, not the postcode. A shared terrace in Whitmore Reans is a morning. A Heath Town tower over 11 metres, with its fixed fire door checks and communal areas, is a bigger job that takes longer before anybody writes a word. National ranges, and what moves a quote inside them, are on what a fire risk assessment costs. Ask for a fixed price against a written description of the property rather than an hourly rate.
Birmingham is the other West Midlands city on this site, with its own additional HMO scheme: fire risk assessments in Birmingham.
HMO licensing in Wolverhampton
My HMO has four sharers. Do I need a licence?
Not in Wolverhampton. The council runs mandatory HMO licensing only, which starts at five people from two or more households. Below that there is no licence, but the fire safety duty still applies.
Does an HMO licence replace the fire risk assessment?
No. West Midlands Fire Service will still ask for the written assessment.
I own a flat in a Heath Town block. Whose job is the assessment?
The responsible person for the communal areas, usually the landlord or the managing body. The block’s common parts need a suitable and sufficient assessment, and a tower over 11 metres carries extra fire door duties.
Getting a quote from an assessor covering Wolverhampton
Describe the premises and we will pass it to assessors covering Wolverhampton. Say whether it is a shared terrace, a shop with a flat above, or a block of flats.
Not in Wolverhampton? See all the areas we cover.