After 18 months of consultation and preparation, Humberside Fire and Rescue Service has today implemented a major change to the way it deals with Automatic Fire Alarm (AFA) activations.
Engines will no longer be sent during normal working hours to non-sleeping risk business premises where an alarm is sounding unless backed up by a call confirming there is a fire.
During the period 2016-18, HFRS responded to an average of over 1,600 calls to AFAs - 86% of these turned out to be false alarms. This equated to thousands of hours of lost time and revenue for businesses and a stretch of Fire Service resources sending up to four appliances to merely confirm a system fault or a malicious activation.
Whilst call-outs are expected to go down, businesses which do not engage with our Business Safety Advocates following a false alarm ie. refuse to move a sensor or fail to display correct signage to their staff, put themselves at risk of being charged for HFRS attendance. This new cost recovery policy would only be invoked on the fourth false alarm call-out in a 12 month rolling period.
All the details on the changes in policy can be found under the Unwanted Fire Signals section of the website.