What is a competent person?
A competent person is someone with the training, experience and knowledge to carry out a fire safety task properly. Competence is judged against the specific task rather than held as a general status.
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<a href="https://fireoptix.co.uk/glossary/competent-person">What is a competent person?</a> — diagram by
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</figure>The test is practical rather than formal. Someone competent to carry out a routine door check in a small office may not be competent to assess a complex residential block, and the same person may be competent for one and not the other on the same day.
The responsible person appoints them, and choosing badly does not transfer the duty. That makes the basis of the appointment — qualifications, registration, relevant experience — worth recording rather than assuming.
For assessments of complex or higher-risk buildings, third-party registration schemes are the usual way competence is demonstrated to an inspector or an insurer.
In practice
An assessment carried out by a facilities manager who did a short course.
He is conscientious and has produced something reasonable for a simple office. The building is a converted mill with sleeping accommodation above it.
Competence is relative to the premises, and the question is not whether somebody is competent but whether they are competent for this building.
The honest answer is often that a simple premises can be assessed in-house and this one cannot.
What goes wrong in practice
- Appointing on price alone for a building whose complexity was never characterised.
- No record of why the appointed person was considered competent, leaving nothing to show later.