On 8 September 2026 the Fire Industry Association launched three regulated qualifications for fire risk assessors, awarded by FireQual and regulated by Ofqual (Fire Safety Matters):

  • Level 3 Certificate in Foundation Fire Risk Assessment, expected early 2027
  • Level 4 Certificate in Intermediate Fire Risk Assessment, available now, by assessment only for experienced assessors
  • Level 5 Certificate in Advanced Fire Risk Assessment, to follow

All three are built against BS 8674:2025, the British Standard framework for the competence of individual fire risk assessors.

That sounds like trade news. It is actually a buyer’s issue, because it gives building owners something they have never had before: a common language for asking whether the person assessing their building is the right level for it.

Why this matters now

Here is the uncomfortable starting point. Today, in England, nobody needs a licence to sell a fire risk assessment.

The Building Safety Act 2022 wrote a new article 9A into the Fire Safety Order, saying a responsible person must not appoint anyone to help with the assessment unless they are competent. It has never been switched on. The commencement notes on legislation.gov.uk bring every other part of section 156 into force from 1 October 2023 and leave that one out, and the government’s section 156 guidance says it will come “at a later date”.

Three things are now moving at once:

  1. Government has consulted on regulating the profession. MHCLG’s fire risk assessors consultation closed on 18 June 2026, answering recommendation 26 of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry. The outcome has not been published.
  2. The main certification scheme has set a deadline. BAFE SP205 Version 6 is mapped to BS 8674 and gives certificated fire risk assessment companies until 31 March 2028 to hold regulated qualifications at the level of the work they do.
  3. Those qualifications now exist. The Level 4 launched on 8 September.

So the market is sorting itself into levels over the next eighteen months, whether or not the law arrives first.

What the BS 8674 levels mean for your building

BS 8674:2025 grades individual assessors as Foundation, Intermediate or Advanced, set against the risk and complexity of the building being assessed. Broadly:

  • Foundation suits simple, low-risk premises: a small office or shop with straightforward escape.
  • Intermediate covers more complex or varied premises, such as public buildings and mid-rise residential blocks.
  • Advanced is for high-risk and complex buildings: tall residential, care and healthcare settings, sleeping risk with dependent occupants, phased evacuation.

The practical point is simple. A competent Foundation assessor is not competent for a care home. The question to ask is not “are you qualified?” but ”what level are you, and is that my building’s level?”

A qualification is not the same as certification

This is where buyers get caught.

A qualification shows an individual passed an assessment at a point in time. A third-party certification scheme audits a company’s actual assessments, year after year, against scheme rules, through a UKAS-accredited certification body. A professional register lists individuals who have had their competence reviewed by an institution.

Each is useful. None is the whole answer on its own. A qualified individual working with no audit of their output is still a single point of failure, and a certificated company still has to send someone at the right level to your building.

Six checks before you appoint anyone

  1. Ask for the assessor’s BS 8674 level, in writing, and compare it honestly with your building.
  2. Ask which qualification they hold and who awarded it. Since September 2026, “Level 4, FireQual” is a real answer.
  3. Ask whether the company is third-party certificated for fire risk assessment, and check the certificate on the scheme’s own register, not the website logo.
  4. Ask who will actually visit. The name on the proposal and the person on site should be the same.
  5. Ask for a redacted sample report for a building like yours, and check it has a prioritised action plan, not a list.
  6. Record who you appointed. Since 1 October 2023, the identity of anyone appointed to help with your assessment is part of the fire safety information you must keep and pass to any new responsible person (article 22A). In blocks of flats, residents must be told it too.

The duty stays with you either way. Our guide to what the law requires of a fire risk assessment covers the rest, and the latest enforcement figures show what an unsuitable one costs.

How Gemini AMPM can help

We do not carry out fire risk assessments ourselves, and we think that is the right way round. The person who judges your building should not be the company that is paid to fix it.

What we do is two things either side of the assessment. If you need an assessor, we can recommend independent assessors we have worked alongside for years, and we would encourage you to put them through the six checks above like anyone else. And once the assessment is done, we close its findings: fire alarm remedial works, fire doors, fire stopping and the maintenance records that prove the actions stayed closed.

If you already hold an assessment and are not sure it fits your building, send it to us for a free second-opinion review. If your action plan has been sitting open, or you want an introduction to an assessor, get in touch.