FOCUS
A small cost Sprinkler provision is probably a small price
to pay when considered against the true cost of fires to businesses, argues Iain Cox
fi res in commercial warehouses. The cost of fi re can be broadly broken down into three areas: costs in anticipation, costs as a consequence and costs as a response. By understanding these costs to the economy as a whole, the cost of installing fi re sprinklers represents a small fraction of the overall cost of fi re to the economy. ‘Costs in anticipation’ refers to the costs
O
of structural and passive fire protection, and of prevention measures taken to prevent or mitigate damage caused by fires. ‘Costs as a consequence’ are the costs incurred due to exposure of a property, an individual or the environment to a fire and its products, and these costs are borne by a range of victims from individuals to private fi rms and society. Finally, ‘costs in response’ are the costs of extinguishing and clearing up in the event of a fi re, with society bearing the majority of these. Yet the costs of fires in industrial and
commercial buildings go far beyond the costs and impacts on individual businesses
52 MAY 2020
www.frmjournal.com
VER THE past five years, the British economy has lost £1bn in GDP and 5,000 full time jobs through preventable
and insured costs. Fires are the cause of significant economic, environmental and community costs, which are ultimately borne by the taxpayer.
Trail of disruption
Fire can ruin a business and change things in an instant. And sadly it is a grim fact that, in the worst case scenario, the effect of a fire is the closure of a business. This is not uncommon. It can prove impossible for small businesses and some medium sized ones to recover from the effect of fire, while evidence shows that larger businesses often choose to consolidate operations in other sites following the loss of a site to fi re.
In these instances, both productivity and
jobs are affected. In either case, the resulting fi re has an impact on a number of businesses within the supply chain. Companies supplying the fire damaged business will lose business temporarily or even permanently; businesses which depend upon products or services from it have to fi nd other means of supply; and
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60
