How to Appoint Fire Marshals at Work: A UK Guide

Published 21 October 2026 · gribit

Fire marshal and deputy checking an exit route

If you run a workplace in the UK, the law expects you to nominate enough trained, competent people to get everyone out safely in a fire. It doesn’t use the words “fire marshal” and it doesn’t set a number. You decide how many, based on your building, your people and your risks, and you must be able to show how you decided. This guide walks through who to choose, how many, what to train them in and what to write down.

Gribit

Keep Fire Safety Records Together

Gribit helps small businesses record recurring safety checks, manage follow-ups, and store certificates and documents in one digital logbook.

Visit Gribit

TL;DR

The Fire Safety Order 2005 puts the duty on the Responsible Person (usually the employer or whoever controls the premises) to nominate competent people to carry out evacuation procedures.
There is no fixed statutory number of fire marshals. Enough means enough for your premises’ size, risk level and layout, including when people are off sick or on leave.
Choose reliable people who are present at different times, give them proper training, and name a deputy for every role.
Fire marshals handle evacuation. The fire alarm system needs its own named person, with a trained backup.
Write everything down: who was appointed, when they were trained, and the tests and drills carried out. Inspectors will ask to see it.

What the law says about fire marshals

The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 applies to most non-domestic premises in England and Wales. Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own legislation with similar aims, so check the rules for where your site is. The Order places the duty on the Responsible Person, and it requires them to nominate a sufficient number of competent people to put the evacuation procedures into effect. Article 15 of the Order covers the procedures for serious and imminent danger. A competent person is someone with enough training, experience and knowledge to help with those measures.

So the words “fire marshal” and “fire warden” are job titles, not legal terms. They mean the same thing in practice: someone you have nominated to help people leave the building and to check that the arrangements work. Some employers also use “fire officer” or “fire safety representative”. Pick one term and use it consistently in your documents.

Who is the Responsible Person?

In most workplaces it is the employer. In a shared building it can be the landlord, the managing agent or whoever has control of a given part. A pub manager, a salon owner, a village hall committee chair and an office manager can each be the Responsible Person, depending on who holds control. The Home Office’s guide for persons with duties under fire safety legislation is the official starting point if you are unsure where you sit.

The Responsible Person can delegate tasks, but not the responsibility. Local authority guidance makes the same point: the Order places ultimate responsibility on the Responsible Person, which is normally the employer. Appointing a marshal does not move the legal liability from you to them.

Does every business need one?

Some sites say all businesses must have a marshal. The more careful reading is that every business must have arrangements for evacuation, and that someone must be nominated to carry them out. In a very small premises the Responsible Person may be the only person needed, and the nomination can be themselves plus a deputy. In larger premises, the Home Office guide indicates this will usually mean appointing fire wardens. Either way, you must be able to show your reasoning.

How many fire marshals do you need?

The Order gives no ratio. You will see rules of thumb online, such as one marshal per 20 people. Treat them as a starting point, not a legal standard. What you need is enough trained people, in the right places, at all times the building is occupied.

To work it out, look at five things:

Floor area and layout. Multiple floors, long corridors, basements and mezzanines need more coverage than one open room.
Number and type of people. Customers, visitors, contractors and children are less familiar with the building than staff.
People who may need help. Wheelchair users, people with hearing or sight loss, or anyone who would struggle with stairs. Each needs a personal plan and someone assigned to it.
Fire risks. Kitchens, storage of flammables, hot work and electrical loads all raise the need for quick, confident action.
Opening hours and shift patterns. If you open evenings and weekends, you need marshals on those shifts, not only on the weekday team.

Your fire risk assessment should drive the answer. The Home Office guide says Responsible Persons can do their own assessment if they are competent, but for larger or more complex premises it advises getting a professional. The assessment should name the marshal arrangements it assumes.

Worked examples

These are illustrations of reasoning, not legal minimums.

A ten-person office on one floor. The Responsible Person nominates two people who sit in different areas, one as lead and one as deputy. Together they sweep the floor, check the toilets and meet at the assembly point.
A pub with a cellar, kitchen and upstairs function room. At least one marshal per shift, covering front of house, plus a person responsible for the kitchen and one for the upper floor when it is in use. The licensee needs a named deputy for the nights they are off.
A village hall with volunteers and hirers. The committee nominates a few trustees or regular volunteers and briefs each hirer at the start of the booking, since hirers are present when the committee is not.
A salon with three chairs and clients in gowns. Everyone on shift knows the route out. One person is named lead for the day, and the rota makes sure that person is always in.

Who to choose

A good marshal is not necessarily the most senior person. Look for:

Presence. Someone who is on site most of the time, on the shifts you need.
Calm under pressure. Someone who can give clear instructions without shouting.
Physical ability to do the job. Walking a floor, opening doors, using the stairs. If someone can’t do that, they can still do other tasks, such as checking records.
Willingness. Volunteers tend to do it better than people who were told.
Reliability. They show up to the drills and the refresher sessions.

Volunteers need to be old enough. One training provider notes that those taking a formal course should be aged 16 or over in most cases, although you should check with the provider you choose. Avoid appointing anyone you would not want to be the only marshal on shift.

Plan for absence

A marshal who is on holiday or off sick is no marshal at all. Name a deputy for every role and make sure the rota never leaves a shift uncovered. London Fire Brigade makes the same point for the person looking after the alarm system: at least one backup should be trained to cover leave, sickness and shifts. The same logic works for evacuation roles.

Deputy coverage for leave, sickness and shifts

What fire marshals actually do

The duties depend on your building, but a typical list looks like this.

Day to day

Keep an eye out for blocked exits, propped fire doors, stacked boxes and anything else that stops people leaving.
Report faults, such as a broken door closer or a covered sign, to the Responsible Person.
Know where the extinguishers, call points and assembly point are.
Help new staff and visitors learn the escape routes.

Regular tasks

Carry out or help with the weekly alarm test and the monthly emergency lighting check, if you assign these to them.
Take part in fire drills, and help arrange them.
Review the list of marshals and deputies whenever the staffing changes.

In an emergency

Raise the alarm and make sure the fire service is called.
Direct people to the nearest safe exit, and help anyone who needs assistance.
Check rooms on the way out, if safe to do so, and close doors behind them.
Take a headcount at the assembly point, and tell the fire service if anyone is missing.
Never put themselves at risk. Fire marshals are not firefighters, and using an extinguisher is only for small fires and only if they have been trained and feel safe doing it.

Training your fire marshals

Competent means trained, so book proper training for each marshal, then keep it current. Derbyshire Fire and Rescue’s guidance on safety training and drills lists topics such as how to call the fire and rescue service, arrangements for people with special needs and the dangers associated with fire. A good course covers:

How fire and smoke spread
The role and limits of a marshal
Reading your fire risk assessment and evacuation plan
Walking a route and sweeping a floor
Helping people who need assistance
Using a fire extinguisher, if you want marshals to do this
Running a roll call

Online courses are common and suit many small sites. A practical session on your own premises, even 30 minutes with the Responsible Person, adds a lot, because people learn the routes and the quirks of the building. Repeat training on a schedule you set, and after any significant change in layout, staff or procedures. Keep the certificates.

Fire marshals and the fire alarm are two separate jobs

Marshals handle people. Someone else must handle the alarm system. Buckinghamshire Fire and Rescue says commercial premises must have an allocated responsible person, who should make sure the alarm is tested weekly. It adds that systems should be serviced by a competent engineer, normally twice a year under BS 5839.

Why this matters: London Fire Brigade reports that false alarms made up 99% of commercial automatic fire alarm calls in 2023/24. When no one owns the system, faults go unreported and staff start to ignore the bell. Naming one person, and a backup, with authority to check, log and fix what the system does is among the best ways to cut this down.

In practice that gives you three groups of roles:

Role	Main job	Cover needed
Responsible Person	Legal duty, risk assessment, appointments	Named deputy if absent
Fire marshals / wardens	Evacuation, sweeps, roll call, spotting hazards	Deputies on every shift
Alarm system lead	Weekly tests, fault logging, contact with engineer	One trained backup

In a small business one person may hold more than one role. That is fine, as long as the cover is real.

The records you need to keep

Appointing marshals is only half the job. The other half is proof. The Responsible Person must keep a written record of the risk assessment and of the main fire safety arrangements. GOV.UK guidance on equipment, drills and training sets out what you are expected to check and keep. Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service also says fire safety provisions, including firefighting equipment, fire doors and escape routes, should be inspected regularly and the checks recorded.

A sensible record set for your marshals looks like this:

A list of current marshals and deputies, with start dates
Training dates and certificates for each person
The dates and results of fire drills, with notes on what went wrong
Weekly alarm test results and any faults
Monthly emergency lighting checks
Engineer service reports
Actions arising, with who is responsible and when they were closed

Signage belongs in this picture too. Marshals need to be able to point to clear exit and assembly point signs, and these need to be checked like anything else. A compliance guide to fire safety signage is useful if you are replacing or adding signs after a risk assessment.

The point of the paperwork is not box ticking. The Buckinghamshire guidance stresses that the goal is that everyone can escape safely, and that the Responsible Person carries the liability if arrangements are inadequate or if they can’t show they trained people and kept records.

Our view: paper logbooks fail at handover

We built Gribit for small businesses, and the same story comes up in pubs, shops, offices, salons and village halls. The appointment is rarely the problem. Someone is named, trained and willing. The trouble starts a year later. The marshal moves on, the deputy never really took over, the weekly alarm test gets missed in a busy week, and the logbook is in a drawer nobody can find when an inspector turns up.

Paper and spreadsheets depend on one person’s memory and tidiness. A good system should do three things for you: remind the right person when a check is due, record the result in one place so anyone covering can see the history, and keep the certificates next to the checks they relate to. That is how we think about compliance: less time managing paperwork, more time fixing the things the checks find.

Our advice is simple. When you appoint a marshal, appoint a deputy in the same breath, and put the recurring checks somewhere that does not rely on either person remembering. Then the arrangement survives holidays, sickness and staff turnover.

— Jon

Keeping the checks and records in one place

If you want the weekly tests, monthly checks, drills, training certificates and follow-up actions in a single logbook, Gribit’s Site Logbook is built for that. You schedule recurring checks such as fire alarm tests and first-aid kit inspections, record results, assign staff access, set reminders, store certificates and export records when someone asks to see them. It is £49 per year per site. You can see how it works on the Gribit site.

A step-by-step checklist to appoint your fire marshals

Confirm who the Responsible Person is for each part of the building, especially if you share it.
Read your fire risk assessment, or get one done, and note what it says about evacuation.
Work out coverage: floors, shifts, visitors and people who need assistance.
Choose marshals and deputies who are present at the right times and willing to do it.
Name an alarm system lead and a trained backup.
Book training, then run a drill on your own premises.
Write it down: names, dates, certificates, drill notes.
Set review dates, and revisit whenever staff, layout or opening hours change.

FAQ

Is it a legal requirement to have a fire marshal?

The Fire Safety Order requires the Responsible Person to nominate enough competent people to carry out evacuation procedures. The titles marshal and warden are not in the law, but in most workplaces that is what the duty means in practice. In very small premises, the Responsible Person and a deputy may be enough.

How many fire marshals does my workplace need?

There is no fixed number in law. The right number depends on your premises’ size, risk level and how people are spread through the building, and it must cover every shift and any absence. Your fire risk assessment is the place to justify it.

Can a fire marshal be held personally liable?

The legal duty sits with the Responsible Person, who carries the liability if arrangements are inadequate. A marshal should still never take risks beyond their training. If you are unsure about a specific situation, ask your local fire and rescue service or a qualified fire risk assessor.

Is a fire marshal the same as the person who looks after the fire alarm?

No. Marshals manage evacuation. The alarm needs its own named person to test it weekly, log faults and call the engineer, plus a trained backup. In a small business one person can do both, provided cover is in place.

How often should fire marshals be retrained?

The law doesn’t give a set interval. Many employers refresh training on a regular cycle and after any big change, and record the date. Agree an interval with your risk assessor and write it into your fire safety arrangements.