Charging for fire and rescue services attending false alarms could have a serious impact on fire safety in England and Wales, a leading fire systems company has warned.

The warning from ADT Fire & Security follows a similar one made by the Fire Industry Association in February, when it said charging for alarms may have “serious repercussions” for fire safety.

A proposal contained in the Localism Bill currently going through parliament would give fire and rescue authorities the power to charge for attending false alarms at non-domestic premises.

If alarm receiving centres (ARCs) were landed with the charges, says ADT, they may refuse to pay and decide they no longer want to be involved in what may be seen as an inconsistent approach to policy implementation by individual brigades. The result could be a dilution of fire safety cover to UK business.

"In 2010, the Chief Fire Officers Association developed a policy for the reduction of false alarms and unwanted fire signals," said Peter Lackey, ADT’s fire product marketing manager. "However this has not been widely adopted by individual fire and rescue services. Instead, should the Localism Bill get the go ahead, we need to consider the serious impact in terms of fire safety if people decide to turn fire detection systems and alarms off, because they do not want to run the risk of a fine."

In March, the FIA made a submission to the House of Commons committee considering the Bill. It said that charging for attending false alarms was a bad idea, as systems would be disconnected and life safety threatened. If, however, the charging provision went ahead, then any charges should be levied on the building owner or manager (‘responsible person’) rather than ARCs. If that was not contractually possible, then action should be taken under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order to force the responsible person to take remedial action.

The FIA submission went on to say that if charges were passed onto the ARC this could lead to “a disaster for fire safety”.

While acknowledging that false alarms and unwanted fire signals from some automatic fire detection systems can be a major problem, ADT believes this should be addressed by good system design, installation and maintenance.