Fire door inspection checklist: the eight-point check explained

Why fire doors are inspected as a register, not an afterthought

Fire doors are the single most common compartmentation deficiency found in UK buildings, and they carry their own legal weight: Article 17 of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 requires fire-resisting doors to be maintained in efficient working order and good repair, and the Fire Safety Act 2021 put flat entrance doors squarely within the responsible person’s duties. A proper survey therefore treats doors as a register — every door identified by reference, building and level — so that nothing is missed, follow-up surveys are comparable, and the report can state exactly how many doors were inspected, passed and failed.

The eight-point health check

Each door on the register gets the same disciplined sequence of checks. A door fails the inspection if any single check fails or if its fire rating is insufficient for the location:

• Door and frame condition — damage, warping, delamination, unauthorised alterations, and that the leaf is compatible with the frame.
• Hinges — minimum three per leaf on most fire doors, CE/UKCA-marked to BS EN 1935, firmly fixed with no missing screws or metal fatigue.
• Gaps — measured with a gauge: the gap between leaf and frame at the top and both sides should typically be 3mm (commonly quoted as 2–4mm), and the threshold gap small enough for the smoke control strategy — often up to 8mm where only fire resistance is required, but nearer 3mm where cold smoke sealing matters.
• Intumescent and smoke seals — present, continuous, correctly sized, not painted over or damaged.
• Self-closing device — closes the door fully onto the latch from any angle, including from a 75mm hold-open test; closers to BS EN 1154 on modern installations.
• Lockset and latch — engages properly, holds the door in the closed position, no free-swinging leaves where self-closing is required.
• Glazing — fire-rated glass, intact beading and seals, no replacement with ordinary glass.
• Signage — "Fire door keep shut" (or the appropriate variant) on the correct faces, per BS 5499 conventions.

Ratings and certification: is it even the right door?

The eight checks tell you about condition; the survey also has to answer whether the door is adequate for its location. That means recording the FD rating the location requires (FD30, FD60, FD90 or FD120 — with an "S" suffix where smoke control is needed) and the rating the installed door actually provides. Evidence comes from certification labels or plugs (BWF-Certifire, Q-Mark and similar schemes), data plates, or — for older doors — a judgement that the door is a "notional" fire door of traditional solid construction. Fire resistance itself is established by test to BS 476-22 or BS EN 1634-1.

A door in perfect condition still fails the survey if it is, say, a nominal 20-minute door guarding a protected stairway that needs FD30S. Recording "certified", "sufficient rating" and "notional" as separate fields keeps that reasoning explicit in the report.

Recording it: photographs, measurements and remedials

For a defensible report every failed check needs three things: a comment describing the defect, a photograph, and a recommended remedial action — from re-fixing a closer to full leaf replacement. Gap measurements should be recorded as numbers, not impressions. Access matters too: where a door could not be inspected (locked plant room, no access to a flat), the report should say so explicitly rather than leaving a silent gap in the register.

This is exactly the workflow AssessHub’s fire door inspection module structures: a door register grouped by building and level, the eight-point check with per-check photos and millimetre gap fields, automatic pass/fail per door, and a branded PDF report with a health-check matrix, per-door detail and the relevant UK legislation appendices — plus a CSV export of the full register.

Frequently asked questions