Top 5 Ways to Implement Proper Fire Codes Throughout Your Commercial Facility

Your busi­ness faces many chal­lenges, but most of these con­cerns seem tiny com­pared to the dev­as­ta­tion a fire can cause. Indeed, many busi­ness­es nev­er ful­ly recov­er from a seri­ous fire, so prop­er pre­ven­tion and pro­tec­tion are cru­cial. Busi­ness­es in the U.S. have to com­ply with cer­tain fire codes any­way or risk being penal­ized by var­i­ous reg­u­la­to­ry bod­ies. But how do you make a fire pro­tec­tion plan that tru­ly pro­tects your peo­ple, assets, and inter­ests? Let’s go over five ways to imple­ment prop­er fire codes through­out your com­mer­cial facility.

Five Ways to Imple­ment Prop­er Fire Codes Through­out Your Com­mer­cial Facility

1. Know the Rel­e­vant Codes and Regulations

There is a spe­cif­ic fire code for com­mer­cial build­ings as out­lined by reg­u­la­to­ry bod­ies like the Occu­pa­tion­al Safe­ty and Health Admin­is­tra­tion (OSHA), IFC (Inter­na­tion­al Fire Code), and The Nation­al Fire Pro­tec­tion Asso­ci­a­tion (NFPA). How­ev­er, dif­fer­ent facil­i­ties don’t have to abide by the exact same code – these reg­u­la­tions dif­fer based on mul­ti­ple fac­tors, includ­ing the munic­i­pal­i­ty, facil­i­ty size, occu­pan­cy, oper­a­tions, type, age, and more. Accord­ing to the NFPA, for instance, some facil­i­ties deemed ​“busi­ness occu­pan­cies” don’t require sprin­kler sys­tems while oth­ers do – it depends on whether or not a giv­en area con­tains ​“high-haz­ard con­tents that exceed the max­i­mum allow­able quan­ti­ties per­mit­ted by the code.” Know­ing which rules your com­mer­cial facil­i­ty must fol­low is essen­tial not only for pro­tect­ing your peo­ple and assets but also avoid­ing any legal penalties.

2. Thor­ough­ly Train and Edu­cate Your Staff

Your facility’s fire codes shouldn’t be some well-kept secret – on the con­trary, every occu­pant should have access to this infor­ma­tion. To get every­one on the same page, con­duct peri­od­ic fire safe­ty train­ing and drills. Every employ­ee should know how to safe­ly respond in the event of a fire, and key per­son­nel should be well-versed in fire pre­ven­tion pro­to­cols (e.g., turn­ing off cer­tain sys­tems after use, care­ful­ly mon­i­tor­ing gas and elec­tric sys­tems when in use, how to oper­ate fire extin­guish­ers, etc.).

3. Post Clear Sig­nage Through­out Your Facility

Sig­nage is an essen­tial aspect of any fire safe­ty pro­gram. Occu­pants should know when they’re near haz­ardous areas, where alarms and extin­guish­ers are locat­ed, where and how to prop­er­ly exit the build­ing, etc. Even if a spe­cif­ic type of sig­nage isn’t man­dat­ed by your facility’s fire code, you can nev­er have too many indi­ca­tors in place that keep your peo­ple safe and your assets pro­tect­ed. Con­sid­er the loca­tion, size, and clar­i­ty of these signs, so they’re clear­ly vis­i­ble and digestible by anyone.

4. Update Fire Pre­ven­tion and Pro­tec­tion Pro­to­cols, Meth­ods, and Resources

Fire codes are often fair­ly rigid, but that doesn’t mean you can’t make peri­od­ic adjust­ments to increase safe­ty and save mon­ey with­in these para­me­ters. Fire pre­ven­tion and pro­tec­tion tech­nol­o­gy are only improv­ing, and rely­ing on out­dat­ed sys­tems can grad­u­al­ly put your facil­i­ty at risk (and put your busi­ness at risk of falling out of com­pli­ance). Know­ing this, don’t over­look key invest­ments in mod­ern sprin­klers, alarms, extin­guish­ers, fire stop­ping mate­ri­als, fire­proof­ing mate­r­i­al, smart con­trol devices, etc. This state-of-the-art tech­nol­o­gy will improve safe­ty, com­pli­ance, and effi­cien­cy at your com­mer­cial facility.

5. Work Close­ly with Fire Pro­tec­tion Experts

No one said nav­i­gat­ing fire codes and safe­ty pro­to­cols was easy. Imple­ment­ing the var­i­ous meth­ods men­tioned above often requires the help of fire pro­tec­tion experts. At the very least, fire­proof­ing providers can install, main­tain and patch fire­proof­ing paint in your facil­i­ty – more com­pre­hen­sive ser­vices can help you sim­pli­fy your fire pro­tec­tion plans, edu­cate your peo­ple, con­duct reg­u­lar inspec­tions, and more. With over 100 years of com­bined expe­ri­ence of our fire­proof­ing teams, we can help to answer many of the ques­tions you may have regard­ing your fire­proof­ing needs. At Kaloutas, we’re ded­i­cat­ed to keep­ing our clients safe and com­pli­ant when it comes to fires and oth­er haz­ards in your com­mer­cial facil­i­ty. . Read our blog, ​“How Work­ing with a Fire­proof­ing Con­trac­tor Will Ensure Your Safe­ty and Com­pli­ance Require­ments Are Met” to learn more.

And to learn more about us and all that we do, con­tact us online or give us a call at 978−532−1414 today.