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How your home meets health and safety laws

Everything you need to know about how we make sure your home meets health and safety laws.

We must make sure that your home meets the standards set out in various health and safety laws, and also help ensure that you and those living in your home are safe and feel safe. To do this, we carry out regular inspections and checks in your home as follows:

Checks that may need to happen once a year

Gas safety check

Needed where your home has gas appliances such as a boiler or hob. This involves a Gas Safe Engineer checking the gas appliances in your home, like boilers, cookers, ovens and water heaters are safe and working properly.

Sprinkler inspections (where installed)

This involves a qualified engineer inspecting the age and condition of sprinkler systems.

Thermostatic mixing valve inspections (where installed)

This involves a qualified engineer carrying out a test to see that the thermostatic mixing valves on the taps in your home are working properly and delivering safe water temperatures.

Flat entrance door inspections (for buildings 11m or taller only and where we manage the building)

This involves a qualified person carrying out a visual inspection of each fire-resisting door, including checking the fire-resisting qualities of the fire door hinges and all door hardware.

Checks that may need to happen once every five years

Electrical installation inspections

This involves a qualified electrician carrying out a detailed inspection of the electrical system in your home to check all the electrics are safe and working properly.

Legionella assessment and periodic temperature checks (where applicable)

This involves a qualified engineer carrying out an assessment to help identify potential risk factors of legionella within the water systems in your home. Some water systems require a more frequent review. For example, buildings that have communal water tanks supplying water to multiple homes may be higher at risk of legionella than those that are individually fed by combi boilers and have no water storage.

Fire safety checks

To keep you safe, we have a duty to provide smoke and carbon monoxide alarms and replace them if you report them as faulty (by contacting our customer service centre).

We also inspect these as part of your five-yearly electrical installation inspection.

In buildings managed by us, for homes that share an entrance with at least one other property, we will attempt to check that linked fire alarms are working properly at least once a year.

We also review fire risk assessments every 1-5 years depending on the property.

We’re also legally obliged to share fire safety information with you once a year with guidance on what to do in the event of a fire and tips on what to do to prevent a fire from occurring.

You can find lots of useful and important fire safety information in our booklet (PDF).

Your responsibilities

You have a duty to let L&Q or one of our representatives into your home to allow us to carry out any repairs, inspections or checks.

If you don’t, we may have to take action to gain access, which could include going through court if necessary, putting your tenancy at risk.

You should be careful not to interfere with any fire safety systems provided for your safety, and let us know as soon as possible if you notice any systems, like fire doors or fire alarms in your home or in communal areas, are faulty so that we can repair them as soon as possible.

Please also follow our building safety advice (PDF) to avoid putting your home or building at risk of fire.

You can learn more about health and safety standards for rented homes on Shelter’s website.

The shared parts and structure of your building

In buildings managed by L&Q, we must make sure that the shared parts and structure of your building meet the standards set out in various health and safety laws, but also to help ensure that you and those living in your home are safe and feel safe.

The three most common assessments and checks that we must carry out (if applicable) are as follows:

Fire risk assessment

We review fire risk assessments covering the shared parts and structure of your building.

In these assessments, we check the risk to residents from fire, taking into account existing fire safety measures and determine whether additional measures are necessary.

We do these every 1-5 years depending on the size of the building.

Annual flat entrance door inspections (for buildings 11m or taller only)

This involves a qualified person carrying out a visual inspection of the flat entrance fire-resisting door, including checking the door self-closes effectively and fits correctly in the frame.

Asbestos check

In buildings constructed in 1999 or before, we must check that the shared parts and structure of your building are free from asbestos.

This involves us checking if the shared parts of your building contain asbestos, and if so, where it is, and what condition is it in, to assess the risk and to make a plan to manage the risk and act on it.

If we need to carry out any work as a result of a fire risk assessment or asbestos check in areas that we’re responsible for, like replacing communal doors or materials in the structure of your building, these are usually covered by the service charge you pay.