What are essential safety measures? With more large commercial buildings and multi-storey residences being developed across Melbourne’s inner city suburbs, there is a growing number of residents and business owners living and operating in buildings managed by body corporates or owners corporations. These building management bodies are responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of all building features and facilities that are considered common property including ESMs, or ‘Essential Safety Measures’.
For strata managers, being aware of your building’s unique ESM configurations and maintenance timelines is crucial for keeping your building compliant with industry regulations, as outlined by both the Victorian Building Authority and the National Construction Code. Australian fire safety standards have also been developed to provide owners corporations with outlined installation and maintenance requirements for different types of ESMs that may be found in modern commercial and multi-storey residential buildings.
Our fire safety technicians here at Alexon have had extensive experience with the installation, servicing, and testing of ESMs across a range of both residential and commercial buildings. We’ve utilised our experience to provide the following guide on ESMs to be used by both strata managers.
Read on for some expert answers to some of the most common questions we receive about ESMs.
Our fire safety technicians here at Alexon have had extensive experience with the installation, servicing, and testing of ESMs across a range of both residential and commercial buildings. We’ve utilised our experience to provide the following guide on ESMs to be used by both strata managers.
Read on for some expert answers to some of the most common questions we receive about Essential Safety Measures:
1. What are essential safety measures?
2. Who is responsible for maintaining ESMs?
3. What goes into an annual ESM report?
4. What happens if your building is deemed to be non-compliant?
Essential Safety Measures are effectively any safety equipment or feature required by law in a building to protect occupants in the event of a fire-related emergency. Virtually all fire protection equipment and systems – from fire sprinkler systems to fire blankets – falls under the umbrella of ESMs.
ESMs also include fire safety features or architectural fixtures that are found in the building. In other words, fire doors, stairways, and fire exits (as well as the signage and lighting for these features) are also considered to be ESMs, and come with their own regulatory requirements. For example, all fire stairways, doorways, and exits are required by law to be kept free from obstructions to ensure the safe and prompt evacuation of building occupants in the event of a fire-related emergency.
As body corporates are responsible for maintaining common property (i.e. property that does not belong to any individual strata title owners), they are also responsible for the maintenance of ESMs that can be classified as ‘common property’. These are ESMs that can be found in common areas like car parks, foyers, elevators, staircases, on the building’s rooftop, and any shared facilities (i.e. gyms, kitchens, pools, etc.) within the building.
The costs associated with the installation of new ESMs in the building, as well as the repairs, maintenance, and testing of existing ESMs, must all be covered by annual strata fees and sinking fund levies. If emergency repairs are ever required, it’s the responsibility of body corporates to provide notice in writing to all strata title owners that a special levy will need to be paid by title owners to cover the costs of these repairs.
Although owners corporations are responsible for maintaining the ESMs in common areas, it is the responsibility of individual strata title owners to ensure that the ESMs located on their strata lot are kept in good working order. Owner occupiers and landlords are responsible for maintaining smoke alarms that are located on their strata titles, as well as any other fire protection equipment that may not be connected to a building-wide system. This does not include fire sprinklers or any other fire protection equipment or features that have been provided by the building, as these ESMs are also considered to be common property and are thus, the responsibility of your strata management team.
One other question that our technicians are often asked when performing installation and maintenance jobs is how strata managers can provide evidence that their buildings are compliant with industry regulations. Upon the completion of maintenance or servicing appointments for your ESMs, your fire safety technicians should provide you with a certification for all of the ESMs that have been serviced and deemed to be compliant with Australian Standards.
For individual ESMs, your fire safety technicians will provide summaries of the maintenance and testing conducted in the form of fire protection equipment logbooks. These logbooks can either be a physical record from each routine servicing appointment, or electronic files sent from your fire safety technicians through to your body corporation via email. At Alexon, we use Uptick software to provide a highly streamlined reporting and logbook entry process.
The records in your fire protection equipment logbooks should include the following information:
There is more to fire safety reporting than just providing logbook entries. Building owners are also responsible for collating ESM annual safety reports, these being reports that outline all of the installation, maintenance, and testing that has been conducted within that given year. ESM annual reports are used by your local fire authorities or building surveyor’s offices to determine whether all the ESMs in your building are adhering to the maintenance requirements outlined in the Australian Standards, such as AS1851, that pertain to that particular equipment or fire safety system.
Working with fully licensed and qualified fire safety specialists will help ensure that your ESM logbooks and annual reports are consistent and presented in full detail. These records can then be shared with your local fire authorities and municipal building surveyors to prove that your building is adhering to the regulations outlined within the Building Codes of Australia. Both your local fire authorities and building surveyor’s offices have the right to request a copy of both your ESM logbooks as well as your most recent annual report with just 24 hours notice for building managers. For this reason, it is absolutely imperative that strata managers keep their ESM annual reports up-to-date and stay on top of the maintenance schedules for each of their building’s ESMs.
Just as it is the role of the owners corporation to ensure all building ESMs are compliant with Australian Standards, it’s also the responsibility of strata managers to accept penalties if a building is ever deemed to be non-compliant. In these rare instances, local fire authorities and municipal industry offices may provide owners corporations with an infringement notice as well as a fine.
In some instances, non-compliance may also result in heftier fines if the risks to building occupants and occupants in adjoining buildings is considered to be high. Prolonged failure to comply may even result in prosecution, as non-compliance already opens your building up to litigation on the grounds of negligence.
Still stuck on understanding what are essential safety measures? We can help. Although owners corporations play a vital role in the maintenance of ESMs, all technical aspects of the servicing and testing of your building’s fire protection equipment and systems must be taken on by qualified fire safety specialists. This is where our team at Alexon comes into play.
With over twenty years of experience, our team at Alexon is equipped to provide tailored fire safety solutions across residential and commercial settings. We are one of Melbourne’s premier providers of fire safety services and are proud to do our part in keeping this city and all of its residents safe.
Melbourne-based strata managers are advised to contact our team of fire safety experts today to ensure that you can reap full advantage of our top-tier ESM reporting capabilities as well as all the other exceptional fire safety services that we provide here at Alexon.
Complete the form to request a call
from a friendly Alexon team member.
