Inspections
What Fire Protection Documentation to Keep On Site
A meaningful share of inspection findings are not equipment problems at all. The extinguishers were serviced. The emergency lights were tested. Nobody can produce the paperwork.
From an inspector’s position, undocumented work and work that never happened look identical, and they have to treat them the same way.
What to keep
- Fire extinguisher service reports, plus your monthly visual check log
- Emergency and exit lighting test records — monthly functional and annual duration
- Kitchen suppression inspection reports and certification
- Hood and duct cleaning records for commercial kitchens
- Fire alarm inspection and testing records where you have a system
- Sprinkler inspection, testing, and maintenance records where applicable
- Any correction documentation from previous inspections
- Staff training records if your occupancy or jurisdiction requires them
Where to keep it
One binder, one place, known to more than one person. The most common failure is not that records do not exist — it is that they live in an email account belonging to a manager who left.
- Keep a physical binder on site, near the office or the panel.
- Keep a digital copy somewhere that is not one person’s inbox.
- Make sure at least two people know where both live.
- Add new reports the day they arrive, not at the end of the quarter.
How long to hold records
Retention requirements vary by standard, occupancy, and jurisdiction. As a practical rule, keep the current cycle plus prior years available on site, and keep older records archived rather than discarded.
There is a second reason beyond inspections. Fire protection documentation becomes very interesting to an insurer after a claim, and a complete history is a considerably better position than a partial one.
If your records are already a mess
This is extremely common, especially in buildings that have changed hands or gone through management turnover. It is fixable.
- Inventory what equipment you physically have, room by room.
- Photograph every service tag — that gives you dates for most items immediately.
- Request copies from whoever serviced them previously; most companies keep records.
- Get anything undocumented inspected now, which resets the clock with a clean record.
- Start the binder from that point forward.
An assessment does most of this in one visit, and the inventory it produces is the backbone of the binder going forward.
Common questions
Is a digital copy acceptable?
Generally yes, and it is good practice to have one. Keep a physical copy on site as well — inspectors ask on the spot and network access is not always convenient in a stockroom.
Our previous vendor has our records. Can we get them?
Usually. Service companies typically keep records of work performed and will provide copies on request. If you are changing vendors, ask for them during the transition rather than afterward.
Do we need to keep the monthly extinguisher log?
Yes. The monthly visual check is a requirement placed on you, and the log is the evidence you performed it. Initialing the tag is common, but a written or digital log is better.