Fire risk assessment for a pub or restaurant: the five GOV.UK steps, the written record and a staff training check worked for twelve people

Every pub and restaurant has a fire risk assessment duty, whether the owner has thought about it or not. The practical questions are who holds the duty, what the assessment has to include, and whether the training part is done for every person on the rota, not just the manager.

What GOV.UK says

The two GOV.UK pages set out these points:

• The responsible person is anyone with control of non-domestic premises: employers, owners, landlords, occupiers, and others such as facilities or building managers. Where there is more than one, they must work together. In a tenanted pub that can mean both tenant and pub company, so ask who has the duty under the lease.
• The responsible person must carry out and regularly review a fire risk assessment of the premises, and keep a written record of it.
• They must also put in place and maintain appropriate fire safety measures, plan for an emergency, and give staff information, fire safety instruction and training.
• The page lists five steps: identify the fire hazards; identify people at risk; evaluate, remove or reduce the risks; record your findings, prepare an emergency plan and provide training; review and update the assessment regularly.
• Things to consider include emergency routes and exits, fire detection and warning, firefighting equipment, storing dangerous substances safely, an evacuation plan, and the needs of vulnerable people such as older people, young children and disabled people.
• You can do the assessment yourself with the standard guides, or appoint a competent person such as a professional risk assessor. The local fire and rescue authority can advise but cannot carry out the assessment for you.
• The page says you could be fined or go to prison if you do not follow the regulations. It gives no amounts. Fire and rescue authorities can inspect and issue fire safety notices setting out changes you must make.
• Scotland and Northern Ireland have different rules.

The training check, worked for twelve staff

The page asks for training and a written record but does not say how to prove the two together. A simple check is to count the records your own files should hold. In this example the team is 12, and each person should have two dated records: a fire induction and a last evacuation drill. (Two records per person is my choice for the check, not a GOV.UK figure.)

Checks on the table: 4 x 2 = 8 and 8 x 2 = 16; 8 + 16 = 24; 3 + 14 = 17; 24 - 17 = 7; 5 + 2 = 7. The share missing is 7 / 24 = 29.2%. Most of the gap is in new starters (5 of 8 records missing, 62.5%), which is the usual pattern: the induction slips in a busy first week. The figures are illustrative; run the same count on your real files.

Where owners slip up

• Treating it as a one-off. The page says to review regularly. It gives no fixed interval, so write down your own trigger: a refit, a new kitchen layout, a change in capacity, an incident.
• No record. The assessment must be written down, not held in the manager's head.
• Seasonal staff. Temporary Christmas staff need the same instruction as permanent ones; see the Christmas trading checklist.
• Starters. Put the fire induction on the new starter checklist, dated.
• Counting only fire. If you host big nights, the headcount rules in Martyn's Law are a separate duty.

What I did not read

I did not read the sector guide for restaurants and catering, or the one for pubs and nightclubs, so I give no rules on extinguisher numbers, alarm types, emergency lighting, the evacuation plan's content or how often to run a drill. I did not read the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 itself, the penalty provisions or the rules for premises with sleeping accommodation.

Overlyft builds AI staff who join your pub or restaurant team and take the job of keeping the fire paperwork current: they check the staff files for missing inductions and drill dates, draft the reminders and the review note, and a person approves each one.

This is general information, not legal or fire safety advice. Check the GOV.UK pages and speak to your fire and rescue authority or a competent assessor.