Block & Communal FRA London — Building Safety Act 2022 Ready

Under Article 3 of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 the responsible person is the freeholder, an RTM (Right to Manage) company, or the managing agent appointed by either. Where the building is run by a residents' management company the directors are jointly the responsible person. The Building Safety Act 2022 layers an additional "accountable person" duty for HRBs above 18m or 7 storeys.

The communal parts only — the stairwell, lobby, lifts, communal electrical and gas risers, the entrance hall, the external escape routes, the bin store and any communal plant rooms. Individual flats are not in scope. Where the flats are HMOs in their own right (a Section 257 conversion, for example) the flat-level FRA sits alongside the block FRA.

A building qualifies as an HRB under Section 65 of the Building Safety Act 2022 where it is at least 18 metres in height or has at least 7 storeys, and contains 2 or more residential units. HRBs require registration with the Building Safety Regulator, an accountable-person duty, a safety case report and golden-thread documentation. The PAS 79-2 FRA sits inside the wider safety case for HRBs.

The cost of producing the FRA itself is recoverable under most standard leasehold service-charge clauses — it is a building-management cost. The cost of remedials identified by the FRA is more contested. Routine maintenance remedials (signage, fire-door self-closer replacement, fire-extinguisher servicing) are usually recoverable. Larger remedials (sprinkler retrofit, compartmentation upgrades, cladding replacement) may fall under BSA 2022 leaseholder protections that prevent recovery from qualifying leaseholders.

Schedule 8 of the Building Safety Act 2022 protects "qualifying leaseholders" from being charged for cladding remediation and certain historic fire-safety defects where the building is above 11m or 5 storeys and the leaseholder held the lease on 14 February 2022. The protections do not cover all remedials — routine maintenance and post-2022 defects sit outside the protection. The FRA action plan needs to flag this distinction clearly.

Reviewed annually under Article 9(3) of the RRO 2005, and fully rewritten on any material change — refurbishment, change of use, change in occupancy, identification of a previously unrecorded defect. The annual review is a £115 service. A full rewrite is required where the building has been refurbished or where the occupancy mix has materially changed.

Golden-thread documentation is the digital record of fire-safety and structural information required for HRBs under the Building Safety Act 2022. It covers the design, construction and ongoing management of the building. The PAS 79-2 FRA is one of the core documents in the golden thread, alongside structural records, fire-stopping records, resident-engagement evidence and maintenance logs.

Leaseholders or residents can report the building to the London Fire Brigade enforcement team. The LFB can serve an enforcement notice under Article 30 of the RRO 2005 requiring the responsible person to commission an FRA and act on findings. The LFB also prosecutes 30–50 RRO 2005 breaches per year, mostly on uncompleted action plans or wholly absent FRAs.

A Section 257 converted block is an HMO under Part 2 of the Housing Act 2004 even where each flat is self-contained. The FRA for the communal parts is required under both the RRO 2005 and the Management of HMOs (England) Regulations 2006 Schedule 14. The two regimes overlap — a PAS 79-2:2020 FRA satisfies both, provided the report names both regulatory frameworks in scope.

A small block (up to 8 flats) takes 4–6 hours on site plus 10–14 hours report-writing. A medium block (9–30 flats) takes 1–2 days on site plus 16–24 hours report-writing. A large or HRB-scoped block runs into a multi-week engagement involving structural records, fire-stopping records and resident-engagement evidence. We deliver the written report within 5 working days of the final site visit.