Primary and Secondary FRAs

Primary Fire Risk Assessments are a relatively new concept. It’s recommended these FRAs are carried out by qualified, third-party accredited FRA providers - and we can help.

They were introduced through fire safety guidance document HTM-05-03 Part K, where FRAs of hospitals are now split into Primary FRAs and Secondary FRAs. While Primary FRAs relate to shared/overarching general fire precautions, facilities and the overall building management arrangements, Secondary FRAs relate to locally assessed or managed areas, such as wards or departments. So there may be dozens of secondary FRAs for one building.

With a dedicated FRA department, PartB has experienced fire risk assessors competent to deliver Primary and Secondary FRAs. They are further supported by our dedicated PartB Healthcare fire engineering team to offer specialised in-depth technical knowledge and experience.

We are experienced healthcare premises fire risk assessors, individually accredited on the National Fire Risk Assessor Register (NFRAR). PartB also holds third-party accreditation BAFE SP205 Gold standard, and our healthcare team is highly experienced in healthcare premises, acting as Authorising Engineer (Fire) for several NHS trusts across the country.

Across our teams, our fire risk assessors and fire engineers have a wealth of experience, understanding the significant complexity and unique nature of hospital sites, acknowledging the stark difference between hospitals and other premises types and sectors, their common features, as well as management arrangements. We also understand NHS Trust structures and associated constraints, and are well-seasoned experts in balancing fire safety, patient care and operational requirements.

Cath Owen is PartB’s Director of Fire Risk and Forensic Services. She said: ‘With a dedicated, competent FRM team as well as a healthcare division, we are proud to offer complete support to clients requiring primary or secondary FRAs. We provide a responsive, timely service and our approach is always to provide site-specific, pragmatic and proportionate fire safety advice - not a blanket approach. For us, fire safety is about real-world solutions, not ticking boxes to show you’ve solved a problem.’

If you’d like to know more about how we can assist you with healthcare FRAs, or any aspect of fire safety in your healthcare project, please get in touch. We’re happy to have a chat about your specifics to help you find what you need: clientservices@partb.co.uk