If your building has a dry riser or wet riser in place BAFE strongly recommends using an appropriately Third Party Certificated provider for your service and maintenance requirements. It is a legal requirement to ensure these provisions are maintained appropriately, so it remains ready and effective in an event of a fire.
As the person or team appointed responsible for fire safety in your building (Responsible Person/Duty Holder), it is important to demonstrate you have acted with due dilligence to source a quality provider for these works. By specifying an appropriately Third Party Certificated provider you can be confident you have acted responsibly.
BAFE operate a Scheme called BAFE SP105 which covers Dry and Wet Riser/Falling Installations. This Scheme exists to deliver independent evidence that providers are competent to deliver quality service and maintenance works for your dry riser or wet riser/falling installations.
The BAFE SP105 Dry Riser/Wet Riser Service and Maintenance Scheme exists to ensure that companies have quality evidence of competency (and operate a quality management system) to provide one or more of the following services:
The result being that when a BAFE SP105 Registered Company services/maintains a dry riser or wet riser they will have the skills required to ensure they are fit for purpose as originally specified and are ready in the event of fire. Furthermore, they will have to demonstrate, through the assessment process, that they completed the work in accordance with the Scheme requirements.
Each system visit, whether an annual or interim maintenance will require a Certificate of Conformance to be issued in line with Scheme requirements to confirm it is in full working order.
This scheme observes best practice, including working to several British Standards including BS 9990 and BS 5041 (Parts 1-5). BS 9990 is the code of practice for non automatic fire-fighting systems in buildings and BS 5041 (Fire hydrant systems equipment) covers multiple specifications for dry and wet risers. It is not the public’s responsibility to know these details, but to be confident that their chosen provider does.