The Business Case for Early Fire Strategy

Developers are increasingly aware of fire safety as a project risk — particularly following the Building Safety Act 2022 and the Gateway 2 approval requirement for higher-risk buildings. Yet despite this awareness, late fire strategy appointment remains one of the most common avoidable sources of programme delay and cost overrun on UK development projects.

This article makes the business case for early fire strategy input — not as a regulatory compliance exercise, but as a fundamental project management decision.

Where the Money Goes When Fire Strategy Is Left Late

When a fire strategy is first produced at building control stage — as is still common on many development projects — the architect has typically been designing for several months without fire engineering input. The fire strategy report produced at this stage often identifies issues that the design has not addressed:

• Escape routes that exceed maximum travel distances without compensating measures
• Compartmentation gaps where the structural design has not allowed for fire-rated construction
• Facade specifications that include combustible materials
• Service penetrations through compartment walls with no fire stopping design
• Structural fire protection that does not meet requirements for the building height and occupancy

Each of these issues requires design changes. At building control stage, design changes require the architect, structural engineer and possibly the M&E engineer to revise their designs, drawings and specifications. The cost of those revisions, and the programme delay while they are made and resubmitted to building control, is typically multiple times the cost of the fire engineering input that would have prevented them.

The Gateway 2 Multiplier

For higher-risk buildings, the stakes are even higher. A design that reaches Gateway 2 with unresolved fire engineering issues will be rejected by the Building Safety Regulator. The delay while the design is revised, the fire strategy updated, and a fresh Gateway 2 submission prepared can add months to the programme. On a higher-risk residential development with significant financing costs, months of programme delay cost substantial money.

What Early Fire Strategy Input Costs

A RIBA Stage 1 or 2 fire engineering review typically costs a few thousand pounds for most project types. A fire strategy produced at RIBA Stage 3 alongside the detailed design costs more — perhaps ten to thirty thousand pounds depending on complexity — but is still a fraction of the cost of late-stage redesign. The fee for fire engineering services is among the smallest professional fees on any significant development project and one of the highest in terms of risk management value.