Risk Assesments by post

[terry martin]

I recently had an enquiry from a landlord of a PH, she wanted to know was it normal for FRA's to be done over the phone!

  She explained that the RA company wanted to send her a questionnaire which she would fill in and return, they would then complete the RA and return it by post. at no time would they visit the premises.

  I was very surprised (and very concerned) to learn that there was more than one company offering this service to her.

Has anyone else had experience of this?  what’s your views?
 
 Personally my view is that there is no way you can carry out a RA correctly over the phone. How could you be sure the person answering the questionnaire was doing so accurately(with lack of experience I can see this being a big issue)? what if there was something not covered by the questionnaire?

[johnc]

Iam with you you cant risk assess over the phone.

[Martin Burford]

terry
Nothing surprises me where is this is concerned.............its happening all over...because the punters out there know they will never get a visit from the FA.
Conqueror.

[Mike Buckley]

Isn't this just the same as the tick the boxes Risk Assessments offered by companies or CDROM?

At the end of the day it is up to the FA to enforce the Regulations. Risking the "Good Old Days" label but when I was riding the red lorries we did inspect non certificated premises and if we came across something difficult or dodgy we refered it to the FP dept. It can't be that difficult to get a programme like that going for SMEs.

[terry martin]

Isn't this just the same as the tick the boxes Risk Assessments offered by companies or CDROM?

In a way Mike, there is a difference though. If you where to buy one of these tick box or CDROM RA's for you to complete at your leisure then you know your where responsible for the contents and would pay in the region of maybe a few £hundred for the template.

 These companies are offering a service of publishing the RA as a third party on information provided over the phone, This is going to give the impression to the occupier that it was carried out by a competent person. they would be naively confident that they had complied. and pay £thousands for the privilege.

it just seems such a rip off!

[Mike Buckley]

Yes it looks like another rip off. Looking at the posts on various forums it is happeniing in various forms all over the place, even if visits are made you cannot be sure of the competence of people doing it.

The worst part of it is I am pretty certain that if it came to court the RP would get the can and I suspect that if the RP tried legal action against the companies, the answer would be let the buyer beware.

I would have hoped that CFOA or which ever government department is currently is responsible for fire, would have grasped the nettle and created a coherant policy across the country to advise the new RPs and help prevent this type of thing

[BB]

i know one company who carried out genric postal R.A. to a large number of shops (national company). it was serious laking in preventive and protective measures other than the  address, R. Person and a few other minor details it was effectively the same R.A. Dangerour game they are playing. I fully agree  with you mike if it ever ended up in court.
The punters are being ripped off i'm sorry to say by certain companies!!!!