Passive Fire Inspection & Baseline Surveys
Know what is actually in the building before you build the rectification programme.
Overview
FRS carries out passive fire inspections and baseline surveys across fire doors, service penetrations, structural protection, ducts, dampers, cable transits and fire-rated construction. The purpose is to create a usable record of the installed condition: what can be identified, what appears defective, what evidence exists, and what still needs to be resolved.
Every defect we record is categorised, and the categories mean the same thing on every report we issue.
A report that says "fail" without saying what kind of failure, where it is and what to do about it has told you very little. Ours names the category, the asset and the location, says what we recommend, and shows you the photograph.
Start here
What is the problem?
Two different jobs
An inspection answers a defined question about a known asset or scope. A baseline survey starts earlier: it establishes what assets and passive-fire conditions exist, how they can be identified, and where the records are incomplete. Existing buildings often need both before a sensible repair programme can be priced.
What an inspection should leave behind
- A unique asset or location reference another person can find again.
- The system or asset type, where it can be identified from records and site evidence.
- The condition observed on the day, separated from assumptions.
- Photographs that show context as well as the defect detail.
- The project or test evidence available at the time of review.
- The specific information that is missing where a conclusion cannot be supported.
- A practical next action: monitor, obtain records, investigate further, rectify, replace, or escalate for technical review.
- Any passive-fire material identified as asbestos-suspect, flagged so it is dealt with before anything is disturbed.
- A report format suitable for grouping repeat conditions into a commercial scope.
Which standard an existing building is measured against
Not the current NCC, and this is the single most common misunderstanding we meet on an existing building.
In Western Australia the National Construction Code takes effect through the Building Regulations 2012, made under the Building Act 2011. Those regulations put a standing duty on the owner of an existing Class 2 to Class 9 building — regulation 48A — to keep the building's safety measures capable of performing to the standard in the relevant building standards for each part. "Safety measures" is defined to include building fire integrity, which is passive fire protection.
And “relevant building standards” is defined as the edition of the Building Code named in the certificate of design compliance for the most recent building permit for that part — not the newest edition published. Where there is no permit history, it is what applied when the building was last licensed or, failing that, when it was built.
So the first thing we ask for is the building's approval history, before access. Without it an inspection can record what is there and what condition it is in, but it cannot reach a compliance conclusion, because the standard to compare against has not been established. Where that history does not exist, we report that as a finding rather than quietly substituting the current edition and handing you a defect list against a standard your building was never required to meet.
It also means one building can hold several editions. A part altered under a later permit carries the later edition, so a single-edition assumption across a whole asset will be wrong somewhere.
General information about the regulatory framework, not legal advice. Your building surveyor is the right person to confirm what applies to your building.
Older buildings
Passive fire materials installed before about 1990 can contain asbestos. Sprayed protection on structural steel is the clearest example — coatings applied between the 1930s and the 1970s were often asbestos-based and are friable, meaning they release fibres when disturbed rather than only when cut. Older fire doors, some board products and various insulating materials raise the same question.
This changes how a survey is done. We establish the construction era and check the asbestos register before anyone touches anything. Suspect material is photographed in place and recorded as a finding — not probed, sampled or scraped to identify it. Where the material status is unresolved, that is what the report says, and the passive-fire question waits behind it.
It also changes what happens next. Identifying asbestos is a separate discipline from assessing fire protection, and the two scopes are planned around each other rather than run as one job. We will tell you which parts we can carry out and which need a licensed assessor or removalist.
Why it matters
An inspection is visual, plus the evidence behind the installation.
Non-destructive as standard, with every item recorded individually rather than sampled. Opening up is separately agreed work, never assumed.
Technical library
Inspection guides.
How should inaccessible passive fire items be reported?
Record the access limitation and the area it affects, as a finding in its own right. Do not turn "not inspected" into "acceptable" because the asset could not be reached.
Scott CunninghamWhat is a passive fire baseline survey?
A baseline survey creates a usable starting record for an existing building or portfolio: what assets and conditions can be located, what records exist, what can be observed, and what is missing before a maintenance or rectification programme is built on top of it.
Scott CunninghamWhat is the difference between an observation and a compliance conclusion?
An observation is what the inspector can see, measure or confirm from records. A compliance conclusion compares the actual condition against the applicable requirement and the evidence behind it, and may need information a visual inspection cannot supply. Reporting the second as though it were the first is how a register becomes unsafe to rely on.
Scott CunninghamWhat should a passive fire inspection record?
For each item: the asset or location, what was observed, the relevant evidence or the gap in it, and a next action. "Pass" or "fail" without the reason is rarely enough for whoever has to price or rectify it afterwards.
Scott CunninghamWhat should you do before inspecting passive fire in an older building?
Establish the building's era and check the asbestos register before anyone inspects anything. Two separate dates matter here and they are easily confused. In Western Australia a workplace building constructed on or before 31 December 2003 requires an asbestos register — that is the date that triggers the obligation, not the 1980s or 1990s. The exemption runs the other way: a workplace built after that date can go without a register only where no asbestos has been identified and none is likely to be present. Separately, sprayed protection applied to structural steel from roughly the 1930s into the 1970s is friable, so it is treated as the highest priority on site — friable material releases fibres when disturbed rather than only when cut, and era alone makes it suspect rather than proven. The material question comes first; the fire-protection question waits behind it.
Scott CunninghamQuestions
Frequently asked questions
- Does a baseline survey mean every passive-fire item is opened up?
- No. The extent of destructive or intrusive inspection has to be agreed. Where a hidden condition cannot be verified from accessible evidence, the report says so rather than assuming it.
- Can you inspect a building while it remains occupied?
- Yes — most of the buildings we inspect are occupied. We work to the access and permit arrangements the building already has, and flag up front any area that needs a shutdown to be seen properly.
- Can you use somebody else's defect report?
- Yes. Send the report or register first. We can work from existing information and identify where the description is sufficient to price, where site verification is needed, and where the reported defect does not state the actual reason for rejection.
- Our building is from the 1970s. Does that change anything?
- Yes, and it changes the sequence rather than the price. We establish the construction era and check the asbestos register before inspecting, and suspect materials are recorded rather than investigated. It is usually less disruptive than people expect, provided it is planned that way from the start.
- Will the report say everything is compliant or non-compliant?
- The report tells you what each item is, what condition it is in, and what evidence sits behind it. Where a conclusion needs a record we cannot see on site, we say which record is missing — so you know exactly what to chase rather than being left with a maybe.
Drawings, photos or a defect report in front of you?
Send what you already have. We will tell you what else is needed before the work can be reviewed, priced or booked for site inspection.