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How often must a block fire risk assessment be redone? No fixed interval, six blocks worked
The law sets no review interval for a block fire risk assessment, only "regularly" and after change. Six blocks worked against a written house rule.
A leaseholder asks the managing agent when the block's fire risk assessment was last done, and the answer is "a while ago". Is that a breach? The honest answer is that the law does not give an interval to count against, so the managing agent has to set one and write it down.
What the sources say
The Fire Safety Order, article 9, requires the responsible person to make a "suitable and sufficient" assessment of the fire risks. The GOV.UK residents' guide says that person is usually the landlord, freeholder, managing agent or housing provider, depending on who is responsible for the shared parts.
For a building with two or more sets of domestic premises, section 1 of the Fire Safety Act 2021 puts the structure, external walls and common parts inside the Order, along with the doors between flats and the common parts.
On review, the Order says the assessment must be reviewed regularly, and in particular where there is reason to suspect it is no longer valid or after a significant change to the premises. A record is made as soon as practicable after each assessment or review, and the article page I read states no size threshold for that record. The GOV.UK guide repeats "reviewed regularly, especially after changes to the building" and gives no number of months.
So there are two triggers: time (undefined) and change (defined only as "significant"). Neither gives a date.
Six blocks, worked
Take an invented portfolio and an invented house rule: review at least every 12 months. The date is 20 October 2026.
| Block | Last assessed | Days since | Against 365 days | Change since? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | 14 February 2023 | 1,344 | 979 days over | None recorded |
| B | 2 September 2024 | 778 | 413 days over | New flat entrance doors fitted in 2025 |
| C | 3 November 2025 | 351 | Due in 14 days (3 November 2026) | None recorded |
| D | 30 March 2026 | 204 | Within the rule | Ground-floor unit became a flat in September 2026 |
| E | 18 June 2021 | 1,950 | 1,585 days over | None recorded |
| F | 20 January 2025 | 638 | 273 days over | None recorded |
Check: 351 + 14 = 365, so the 12 months ends on 3 November 2026. The overdue figures are 1,344 - 365 = 979, 778 - 365 = 413, 1,950 - 365 = 1,585 and 638 - 365 = 273.
Result: A, B, E and F are overdue by the house rule, C is due in 14 days, and D is inside the 12 months but has had a change after the last assessment that is likely to need a review. That is five blocks needing action today and one coming up. If the agent had only counted months, D would have looked fine.
Block B also shows why a change matters on its own: the assessment predates the new entrance doors, so the record no longer describes what is on the stairs.
What goes wrong
- Treating "no fixed interval" as "no interval". The Order says regularly; a four-year-old record on a block that has changed is hard to defend as regular.
- Recording the date but not the review. A review with no note of what was looked at is just a date.
- Keeping the assessment with the contractor. The responsible person needs it to hand.
For the checks that sit alongside this, see how often fire door checks are needed in a block of flats, the fire and building safety duties that apply to a block and a compliance readiness check.
A simple rule to write down
- Set one review interval for every block, in writing, and say who approves changes to it.
- List the change events that trigger an early review: new doors, works to external walls, a change of use, a lift or plant room alteration.
- Record the date, the assessor and what changed each time.
- Keep the current copy where a resident or inspector can be shown it.
What I did not read
I did not read the Order's guidance for those with legal duties, the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022, or the Building Safety Act 2022 provisions that changed the recording rule, so I make no claim here about the date that change took effect. I did not read any case law on what counts as a "significant change", and I did not read a particular lease or management contract. The six blocks, their dates and the 12-month house rule are invented examples; the 12-month figure is not in any source I read.
Overlyft builds AI staff who join your block management team and keep the assessment ledger: they list each block's last review date, flag any change event logged since, and hand the property manager a short list to approve before a new review is booked.
This is general information, not legal advice. Check the legislation and take advice on a particular block.
Where this comes from: legislation.gov.uk, The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 article 9 (risk assessment: made by the responsible person, suitable and sufficient, reviewed regularly and where there is reason to suspect it is no longer valid or after significant change, record made as soon as practicable, no size threshold stated on the page). legislation.gov.uk, Fire Safety Act 2021 section 1 (for a building with two or more sets of domestic premises the Order covers the structure, external walls and common parts, and the doors between flats and common parts). GOV.UK, Residents' guide to fire safety in blocks of flats (responsible person usually the landlord, freeholder, managing agent or housing provider; assessment of the common parts; "reviewed regularly, especially after changes to the building"; no fixed interval given). Read 20 October 2026.
AEO Lookup editorial team
We write practical guides for people who run small UK firms, and we check every fact against its source on the date shown. Read how we review, or tell us if something has changed.
