PEEP stands for Personal Emergency Evacuation Plan and is essential to ensuring that you and your employees can vacate a building safely in the event of an emergency. A PEEP should be in place for any employees who have a mental or physical impaired to ensure they are evacuated safely and effectively.
Within this article we will be discussing the importance of a PEEP, what is included in a PEEP and who is responsible in the event of an emergency evacuation.
What is Included in a PEEP?
It is the duty of the ‘responsible person’, as outlined in the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 to ensure PEEPs are created for anyone who needs assistance, as part of their fire risk assessment duties. PEEPs should be reviewed at least annually to ensure it’s still relevant and suitable, as an individual’s situation may change or the building layout may alter.
There are seven key aspects of a PEEP that should be identified when the plan is created.
Firstly, you must complete an identification of needs assessment. This is designed to help you to identify the equipment you will need to evacuate the individual such as an evacuation chair for a wheelchair user if they are on upper levels of the building. There are specific assessment forms to be filled out based on whether the individual is mobility impaired, audio impaired or visually impaired, templates of these forms can be accessed on Gov.uk. An assessment must be completed for individuals with short term and long term impairments. An assessment may also need to be completed for long term visitors.
Secondly, you must have planned evacuation routes in place that are accessible to all. As a business owner, property manager, building occupant or anyone else with control of a non-domestic premises, ensuring that you have a fire evacuation plan in place is a legal obligation. Additionally, it is a legal requirement for the fire evacuation plan to be displayed in prominent and easy to access areas of the premises. As part of a PEEP that should be a mapped route to be taken with the impaired individual to evacuate them to safety – during the identification of needs assessment the rooms used by the individual and the equipment required to evacuate will be included.
Thirdly, as part of your fire evacuation plan there must be clearly marked assembly points as it is also a legal requirement under Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, which states that “emergency routes and exits must lead as directly as possible to a place of safety”. Assembling points on paper should be at least 50 meters away from a building however we recommend following the additional advice. You must be in a location that is free from the effects of fire, this must take into account environmental factors such as roofs sliding off the building. As a guideline we recommend that your evacuation zone distance is the height of the building + 50%.
In the event that there are multiple individuals that need support in the event of an evacuation, it is recommended that the building create a refuge space. A temporary refuge is a designated safe space where people who require assistance can wait for it. Its construction should be fire-resistant and provide a safe route to final exit – for example, at the head of a stairway. The refuge area must be clearly indicated using signage, and should be of sufficient size to accommodate people using it as a refuge and any people passing through on their way out of the building.
Fire wardens must be able to count all evacuees to check that the building is empty and no one is still occupying the building and in danger. Visitors on-site should be shown the fire evacuation plan at the start of their visit and should be alerted as to whether there are any planned fire drills, they also must be chaperoned by a member of staff at all times.
Fourthly, roles and responsibilities of fire wardens must be understood as they will be communicating with the emergency services once they arrive and are also responsible for ensuring all occupants are evacuated. Individuals who have been assigned to assist any impaired individuals must understand their roles and responsibilities should an emergency arise. Any emergency plan relies on the ability of staff to respond efficiently in order for it to be effective. Therefore, staff will require appropriate training, which may include fire drills, appropriate use of fire extinguishers and specific training for nominated members of staff, such as fire marshals. At FTC-UK we offer training for both fire wardens and fire extinguisher to ensure that your staff receive high quality annual training so that they are qualified in the event of an emergency situation.