Client: KIER
Site Name: Manchester Aquatics Centre
Value: £96,000
Sector: Retail
Product Details: Aluminium Walkways, Fixed
Guardrail
Want to discuss your requirements?
Want to discuss your requirements?
Ensuring the safety, compliance, and reliability of your essential access and emergency egress routes. Our expert inspections and testing help you meet legal duties and protect everyone on your premises.
Steps, stairs, and fire escapes are fundamental for daily building access and crucial for emergency evacuation. Consistent, professional testing is vital to ensure these structures remain safe, fully compliant with UK regulations like PUWER 1998, and always fit for their intended purpose. Overlooking these inspections can lead to significant safety hazards, potential accidents, and serious legal consequences for building owners and managers.
As the duty holder, ensuring this equipment is regularly inspected by a competent person is your legal responsibility. Atlus Safety delivers expert testing, giving you complete confidence. Get in touch to discuss your site’s specific requirements.
Atlus Safety provides thorough inspection and testing services for all varieties of steps, stairs (including modular and access stairs), and fire escapes, whether located internally or externally. Our highly skilled engineers perform detailed examinations in line with PUWER regulations and current industry best practices. This includes meticulous visual checks for wear and corrosion, assessments of structural integrity, stability, and load-bearing capacity where required. Upon completion, we provide clear tagging of all items, detailed certification, and a comprehensive report outlining all findings and any necessary recommendations.
The Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 (PUWER) clearly mandates that all work equipment, which includes stairs, steps, and fire escapes, must be suitable for use, maintained in a safe condition, and inspected regularly by a competent individual. This is particularly vital as these structures, especially those outdoors, are constantly exposed to conditions that cause deterioration, potentially leading to dangerous situations and increasing the risk of accidents.
Fire escapes, specifically, demand rigorous attention to ensure they are always ready for emergency use. Beyond the routine inspections required under PUWER, the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 (RRFSO) necessitates that they are consistently maintained in an efficient and fully operational state. Current best practice and official guidance, such as BS 8210:2020, also advocate for periodic, in-depth structural inspections by appropriately qualified engineers, every three years, to affirm their long-term soundness.
Under PUWER 1998, steps and stairs generally require a thorough inspection by a competent person at least every 12 months. However, the exact frequency can be influenced by a site-specific risk assessment, how heavily they are used, and the environmental conditions they are exposed to.
Fire escape testing includes detailed visual inspections for signs of corrosion, physical damage, or instability. It also involves checks on the security of fixings, the condition of treads, handrails, and overall structural integrity. A more comprehensive structural survey by a qualified engineer is also recommended at regular intervals (e.g., every 5 years).
PUWER places a legal duty on employers and those in control of premises to ensure that work equipment, which includes permanent means of access like stairs and fire escapes, is safe to use, correctly maintained, and regularly inspected by competent individuals to prevent harm.
Client: KIER
Site Name: Manchester Aquatics Centre
Value: £96,000
Sector: Retail
Product Details: Aluminium Walkways, Fixed
Guardrail
Client: Bristol City Football Club
Site Name: Bristol City Football Club –
Training Ground
Value: £7,000 Sector: Sport
Product Details: Horizontal Safety Systems
Client: Berkeley Group
Site Name: Royal Arsenal Riverside
Value: £68,000 Sector: Residential
Product Details: Davit Arms & Davit Sockets,
Freestanding Guardrail
Client: Premier Modular
Site Name: Hinkley Point C Nuclear Power
Station
Value: £180,000 Sector: Infrastructure
Product Details: Freestanding Guardrail,
Horizontal Safety Systems, Fixed Access
Ladders, Anti Slip Roof Walkways
Client: BAM
Site Name: Johnny Walker Experience
Value: £25,000
Sector: Leisure
Product Details: Abseiling Anchors, Ladder Ties & Ladder Restraints, Horizontal Safety Systems, Fixed Access Ladders, Stepover Platforms Walkway, Skylight Protection
Client: mace
Site Name: Finsbury Tower, London
Value: £21,000
Sector: Commercial
Product Details: Davit Arms & Davit Sockets
