By Michael Barnes, Director – Fire & Risk
As a building owner or Owners Corporation, do you know which Essential Fire Safety Measures (EFSM’s) must be endorsed on the annual fire safety statement for your building?
On the 1st January 2022, the existing building certification, subdivision, and fire safety requirements contained in the Environmental Planning & Assessment Regulation 2000 (EP&A Regulation) were transferred to a new Regulation?
The new regulation is the Environmental Planning and Assessment (Development Certification and Fire Safety) Regulation 2021.
The new regulation places the onus on building owners to ensure that, EFSM’s specified in the fire safety schedule and EFSM’s installed in the building but not listed in the fire safety schedule (for the building) are maintained and endorsed on the Annual Fire Safety Statement for the building.
Many buildings constructed before 1997 may not have a fire safety schedule. This creates a problem for building owners and owners corporations of “how do I comply with requirements of the Regulations, if I know don’t if the measures listed in the fire safety schedule are all the measures in the building”.
We are regularly approached by Building Owners and Strata Manager’s asking this very question.
Recently Credwell was able to assist an Owner Corporation to solve this very problem.
In this instance, we conducted an inspection of the building to establish what essential fire safety measures were installed in the building and their standard of performance.
Our inspection identified that:
- There were EFSM’s listed on the fire safety schedule that were not installed in the building. These measures had been endorsed on the Annual Fire Safety Statement for a number of years;
- The standards of performance listed on the Fire Safety Schedule for the building were incorrect; and
- EFSM’s were identified in the building which were not listed on the fire safety schedule.
Credwell negotiated with Council to correct the fire safety schedule and establish a program of routine service, assessment, and certification of all essential fire safety measures, ensuring the Owner’s Corporation complied with the new Regulation.
Credwell is always here to help with your fire safety schedule requirements:
We can help by:
- Establishing if your Fire Safety Schedule is correct;
- Preparing fire safety schedules for buildings if no schedule exists;
- Negotiating with Councils to correct Fire Safety Schedules; and
- Preparing specifications for the routine service, assessment and certification of essential fire safety measures.
To discover more about flexibility and options in building safety compliance please contact Credwell Fire & Risk at 02) 9281 8555 or info@credwell.com.au