Fire Safety Practitioners Need to be Accredited

Sometimes strata managers and other property professionals prepare or issue annual fire safety

statements. This statement is a declaration by or on behalf of a building owner that the fire safety measures serving a building have been assessed by an accredited practitioner (fire safety) as being capable of performing to the required standard, and that the exit systems in the building have been checked. On 1 July 2020, the NSW Government approved the first industry accreditation scheme for accredited practitioners (fire safety) – administered by the Fire Protection Association Australia (FPAA). In an annual or supplementary fire safety statement, only practitioners accredited by the FPAA in the Fire Safety Assessment (FSA) class can:

• carry out the assessment of statutory fire safety measures (as detailed in clause 166 of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Regulation 2000)

• carry out the assessment of certain non-statutory fire safety measures, specifically fire alarm monitoring and emergency planning

• inspect a building’s fire exit system.

For any other non-statutory fire safety measure, the building owner will need to determine that the person selected is competent to undertake this work. Much like the role undertaken by building owners previously.

Practitioners accredited by the FPAA and the measures each practitioner can assess are on the FPAA register.

Publication provided by Fair Trading nSW