Hotel Alarm Policy

[stevew]

Advised by a client today that his overnight policy (see below) is normal in the hotel industry.
One employee on site who will respond to the FAP and immediately silence the alarm.
He will place an emergency call to the fire service and then investigate the cause of the alarm.
There are in my opinion many scenarios with this approach that concern me.
Is he correct regarding the industry standard?

[Messy]

A one person response is perhaps not ideal, and in many parts of the UK, the fire service will not turn out until a fire is confirmed.

Other than that, the policy is fine

[kurnal]

Is it an addressable alarm? With a zoned alarm silencing the alarm disables all of the zone involved- not a great idea with a single member of staff. If more detectors operate the alarm will not re-sound till reset. Why not set up a staff alarm to avoid disturbing the guests prior to the investigation? A timed delay of say 3 minutes or so will allow an investigation but with the assurance that if another detector operates or the staff member gets hurt the alarm will sound.  

[stevew]

Thanks for the response.
Fortunately the fire service response you refer to Messy has not Ben adopted in the FA area concerned.

Your comments Kurnel give me some room to discuss further with the client.  It does however encourage me to suggest that the staff member does not investigate but places the emergency call and then monitors the evacuation of the guests.

Providing the fire safety systems are well managed and maintained with false alarms rare then I see no reason why the FA should not respond to the call without waiting for confirmation of a fire.                                          I have always liked the phrase ' I can smell smoke'

[David Rooney]

All valid points but even one false alarm at 3 in the morning is usually enough to have a whole bunch of riled guests queuing up for their money back before breakfast is served and a very upset hotel manager.

With the advances in AFD together with lower costs there isn't any excuse for hotels not to have addressable systems and a delayed evacuation / search period.

[wee brian]

Didn't something like this happen at Summerland?

The benefit of only one person on site/investigating is that he/she cant silence it again if it triggers again.

[kurnal]

It strikes me that we get it all wrong with hotels and fire alarms. A point that hit me very hard twice in the last couple of weeks at about 4am in the morning standing in the car parks in Edinburgh and in Milton Keynes.

With hotels built to current Building Regs standards and addressable alarms why don't they all program the system to incorporate a verification delay and double knock, if they desire for additional life safety they could program a local cause and effect to ensure a localised  warning is given if a smoke detector in a bedroom triggers. 

[Messy]

It strikes me that we get it all wrong with hotels and fire alarms. A point that hit me very hard twice in the last couple of weeks at about 4am in the morning standing in the car parks in Edinburgh and in Milton Keynes.

With hotels built to current Building Regs standards and addressable alarms why don't they all program the system to incorporate a verification delay and double knock, if they desire for additional life safety they could program a local cause and effect to ensure a localised  warning is given if a smoke detector in a bedroom triggers. 

I couldn't agree more Kurnal - but I guess its the cost in terms of infrastructure, testing, maintenance and additional staff required on nights - plus their training requirements.
Not a huge expense for the Hiltons, Dorchesters and Ritzs of the world, but maybe for the budget end, it could be the difference between profit or loss.

On the other hand, I am not sure I would ever go back to a hotel where I have stood in a car park at 4am, regardless of how lovely Edinburgh and MK are at that time of the morning. So there are surely good commercial reasons for not upsetting your punters

[Mike Buckley]

Another aspect to remember is the disabled guests, no major problem if they are on the ground floor and can self evacuate but a bigger problem if they are on upper floors and require assistance.

[John Webb]

Didn't something like this happen at Summerland?

The benefit of only one person on site/investigating is that he/she cant silence it again if it triggers again.

Summerland wasn't a hotel, but a leisure centre without sleeping accommodation.
A disused kiosk was set alight outside the building; several people used a hose-reel on the outside fire, not realising that the fire had penetrated the exterior wall. The alarm was not activated until the fire broke out of the hollow wall construction into the building with considerable violence - and promptly destroyed the fire alarm system wiring - so if the alarm did sound it was only for a few seconds.
The 'fire team' had never had proper training.
The management didn't think to remove the disused kiosk.
The external wall was changed from reinforced concrete to a coated steel sheet without reference back to the Fire Brigade....
and quite a few other failings in design and management of the building all added up to 50 deaths.

[wee brian]

sorry cant have been summerland then. I remember a case where a security bod kept cancelling an alarm - not realising the building was on fire.

[AnthonyB]

That sounds a bit like New Look, they kept resetting the alarm despite the store being ablaze.

[Dinnertime Dave]

Advised by a client today that his overnight policy (see below) is normal in the hotel industry.
One employee on site who will respond to the FAP and immediately silence the alarm.
He will place an emergency call to the fire service and then investigate the cause of the alarm.
There are in my opinion many scenarios with this approach that concern me.
Is he correct regarding the industry standard?

It concerns me too. Here goes-

You've silenced the alarm, not reset and called the fire service. Why?

If you have silenced the alarm, you must think that there isn't a fire - You don't need the fire service.

If you call the fire service you must think there is a fire so you don't silence the alarm.

When you investigate after silencing the alarm, you find a fire how do you then sound the alarm?

[Phoenix]

I'm with you regarding this case, DD.  Your logic is sound. 

I wouldn't say that it's not an ideal worth pursuing that all hotels should have investigation periods but a hotel manager cannot just adopt an ad hoc two stage process without first having a competent person ensure that safety is maintained at the appropriate level. 

An alarm system with a proper built in investigation period will automatically lapse into stage two (giving the evacuation signal) after some predetermined time but a silenced single stage alarm won't.  What if the person investigating gets distracted by trying to extinguish the fire or by assisting a mobility impaired person who heard the initial sounding of the alarm, or what if they succumb to the fire.  Nobody gets an alarm signal then. 

And we don't know anything about the construction of the building.  It could be a purpose built concrete block but also it could be a converted Victorian house without lobbies to a single staircase protected by upgraded panelled doors.  There might be 200 bedrooms or there might be five.  It could be 5 star or it might be hostel type accommodation.  All these things make a difference.

As for this "ad hoc" process being an industry standard, I don't think so.  It may be adopted many places and it may be absolutely safe and justifiable in all those places but it cannot be standard practice without having a number of qualifying conditions attached, as alluded to above.

[Mike Buckley]

As soon as I hear someone say that something is 'standard practice' the alarm bells start ringing. It frequently means that someone bluffing based on what they want to do and what some of their mates think. Unless of course it is down in writing from a reasonable source.