Fire-stopping is the single most common compliance failure on commercial fit-out handovers — and the single highest-risk. FIRAS third-party certification is the market-standard evidence of compliant installation. This guide explains what FIRAS covers, when it's required, and how to ensure it's done.
A commercial building is divided into fire compartments — zones separated by walls, floors and ceilings rated to contain fire for 30, 60 or 90 minutes. Fire compartments limit fire spread, give occupants evacuation time, and protect escape routes.
Whenever a service (cable, pipe, duct) passes through a compartment boundary, the compartment rating is broken. Fire-stopping is the material used to seal those penetrations back to rating — typically intumescent mastic, fire pillows, foam, or collar systems.
Every commercial fit-out creates new service penetrations — electrical containment, data cabling, M&E routing, sprinkler branches, speaker cabling. Each penetration must be fire-stopped to maintain the building's fire strategy.
When fire-stopping is missed or done badly, the consequence isn't an aesthetic failure — it's a Category A safety breach. In 2019 the Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 1 report specifically highlighted fire-stopping failures in cable penetrations and service risers as contributors to fire spread.
Post-Grenfell, building owners, landlords and insurers treat FIRAS certification as a minimum evidence threshold.
FIRAS (Fire Installation Resistance Accreditation Scheme) is a third-party certification scheme run by Warringtonfire. FIRAS-registered installers are independently audited on:
A FIRAS certificate is issued per project, listing every fire-stopping location, the product used, the rating achieved, and the installer identity. The certificate goes in the building's golden thread under the Building Safety Act 2022.
FIRAS certification is not currently a statutory requirement on every project — but it is:
The most frequent defects we see on retrospective surveys:
The number-one failure. Cat 6A cable trays pass through floor slabs with mineral wool stuffed into the void — unrated, uncertified.
Partitions meeting a ceiling grid need fire-stopping at the slab-to-partition junction above the ceiling void. Commonly missed on quick fit-outs.
Plastic sprinkler pipes passing through compartment walls need intumescent collars — not just sealant.
Cable trays, basket and conduit penetrations treated as 'too small to matter' — they aren't.
Pre-existing building compartmentation often already fails. Fit-out alterations expose the pre-existing failures.
Every commercial fit-out, refurbishment and dilapidations project we deliver includes FIRAS-certified fire-stopping. Our in-house fire-stopping team holds active FIRAS registration; all penetrations are logged, photographed and certified. Certificates issued at handover go into the H&S file.
See: Office Refurbishment, Office Fit-Out, Dilapidations.
If any compartment boundary is penetrated, yes. Even a single data-cable penetration through a 60-minute wall requires certified fire-stopping. The size of the fit-out is irrelevant.
The primary exposure sits with the duty-holder (building owner / principal contractor) at time of installation, plus subsequent duty-holders who failed to maintain. Insurance response depends on evidence of compliant installation — which is precisely what FIRAS certification provides.
Yes — increasingly common at lease renewal or building-sale diligence. Non-compliant legacy fit-outs are frequently discovered and must be remediated.
Measured survey and fixed-price quote within 10 working days.