What is a fire exit sign?
A fire exit sign marks an escape route and the direction to follow along it. Signs use a pictogram so they can be understood without reading English, and they are required where a route is not obvious.
They are written for somebody who does not know the building. A visitor, a contractor or a new member of staff follows signs; everyone else follows the way they came in, which is often not the nearest exit.
Direction is the part that matters and the part most often wrong. A sign pointing along a corridor is useless if the arrow was set when the corridor ran the other way, and a sign at a junction with no direction leaves people guessing at the moment it counts.
Signs on escape routes generally need to be visible when the normal lighting has failed, which ties them to the emergency lighting rather than leaving them as a separate concern.
In practice
A sign that points at a route nobody can take.
A door was sealed during a refit and the sign above it was left, because taking it down was not on anybody's list.
A directional sign that is wrong is worse than no sign, because it will be followed by somebody who does not know the building.
The people who need signage are by definition the people who cannot tell it is wrong.
What goes wrong in practice
- Arrows left pointing the wrong way after a layout change.
- Signs obscured by new fittings, shelving or hanging displays.
- Routes signed to an exit that is locked outside working hours.