By building type
High-rise residential buildings of 18m+ or 7+ storeys with 2+ residential units in England fall inside the Building Safety Act 2022 occupied-buildings regime. FRA Flow keeps the FRA at the safety-case grade the BSR can ask about and the Principal Accountable Person can defend.
HRB threshold
The HRB definition for the occupied-buildings regime is a building of at least 18 metres or seven storeys, with at least two residential units. The 18 metre measurement is from the lowest finished surface of the ground adjoining the outside of the building to the floor surface of the highest finished storey containing residential units. Storeys below ground level and storeys consisting only of plant or machinery do not count toward the seven-storey threshold.
A high-rise residential building below the threshold is still a block of flats with the FSO duty and BS 9792 methodology in full. The HRB regime adds duties on top, it does not replace the underlying FRA work.
PAP duties
For an HRB, the FRA is one of the input documents the PAP's safety case rests on. The PAP registers the building with the BSR, prepares and maintains the safety case report, and complies with information and resident engagement duties. The FRA findings, reasonable measures the RP has put in place, and the action plan close-out evidence all feed into the safety case argument.
A weak FRA produces a weak safety case input. A strong FRA, with traceable evidence and a defensible methodology, produces a strong input the PAP can lean on under BSR scrutiny. The reviewer queue and the audit trail in FRA Flow are sized for this audit grade.
Evacuation strategy
The "stay put" evacuation strategy on purpose-built blocks of flats has been the established design assumption since the 1960s. For high-rise residential, the strategy still applies where compartmentation is verifiably intact. For buildings where compartmentation is in doubt (post-Grenfell external wall systems, partial cladding remediation, internal compartmentation gaps), an interim simultaneous evacuation strategy may be appropriate, often with a Waking Watch in place.
For the FRA on a high-rise residential building, the evaluation of the current evacuation strategy is one of the most important judgement calls. The assessor needs to consider what strategy the building was designed for, whether it remains appropriate given current conditions, what compensatory measures are in place if it does not, and what the action plan implications are.
External wall
The post-Grenfell ban on combustible materials in external walls (Regulation 7(2) of the Building Regulations) applies to relevant residential buildings of 11m+ from 2022 onwards. For a high-rise built before that ban, the external wall system may not meet current standards. The FRA does not by itself require remediation; it records the position so the PAP can take advice.
In FRA Flow, the external wall observation is a structured field on the assessment, distinct from the general fire safety arrangements section. The assessor records what they could verify about the construction, what remained unverifiable, and any reference to a separate external wall investigation (PAS 9980 or similar).
In FRA Flow
High-rise residential buildings are configured as HRB property records with the PAP details and the BSR registration recorded. The assessment workbench applies the audit-grade discipline by default: every observation linked to its location, every finding linked to its evidence, reviewer sign-off not optional, content hashes and timestamps on issued reports.
For PAP and building safety manager users, the portfolio view shows every HRB with current FRA status, next review date, and the position on safety-case-relevant findings. When the BSR asks for the FRA on a specific building, the evidence pack export is one click away.
FAQ
No. FRA Flow handles the FRA-shaped part of the work: BS 9792-led capture, drafting, review and sign-off. The safety case sits at a higher level and is typically managed in a separate safety case management system. FRA Flow produces the FRA component the safety case references.
For each HRB, FRA Flow keeps the full evidence chain: observations linked to locations, findings linked to evidence, reviewer sign-off, content hash, timestamp. When the BSR asks, the user can produce the FRA report PDF and the supporting evidence pack in one export.
Remediation work is a significant change that triggers a re-assessment. The FRA records the current position with any compensatory measures (Waking Watch, modified evacuation strategy) and the planned trajectory. Successive periodic reviews track the building through remediation back to a stable normal-operations position.
Observations can be tagged as originating from a resident concern, with a reference back to the original case ID in whatever resident engagement system the PAP runs. The audit trail then connects the resident-raised concern through to the FRA finding and action plan item.
Yes. Each property record carries its own dutyholder details. A managing organisation acting for multiple freeholder PAPs can run the FRA programme across the portfolio while keeping each PAP's position correctly recorded per building.
Book a 30-minute walkthrough sized for HRB portfolios and PAP/building safety manager teams.
