COMPARTMENTATION
The protection you can't see, verified.
Compartmentation is what stops fire and smoke spreading between flats, floors and escape routes. It's also where buildings hide their worst surprises, behind ceilings, in risers, above service penetrations. We survey it properly and tell you what's actually there.
When to use this
Sound like your situation?
THE PROBLEM
What's behind the wall is what matters
Compartmentation fails quietly. A breached riser, an unsealed service penetration, a missing fire stop above a ceiling void, none of it shows from the corridor, but any of it can let fire and smoke move through a building that looked compliant on paper.
The problem is that surveys often stop at what's visible. You get reassurance about the parts that were easy to reach, and silence about the parts that actually carry the risk.
WHAT WE DO
Surveyed to the right depth, sealed by the right people
Compartmentation surveys
Structured surveys of walls, floors, risers and voids, scoped to the building's actual risk rather than just what's visible.
Intrusive investigation
Where it counts, we open up ceilings, risers and service voids to verify what's genuinely behind them.
Service penetration checks
The pipes, cables and ducts that breach compartment lines, checked and properly fire-stopped.
Remediation oversight
We commission competent contractors to put right what's found, then review the work against standard.
Clear, prioritised findings
Findings you can act on, ranked by risk, not a flat list of every minor observation.
Tied to your FRA
Compartmentation findings feed straight into your wider action plan, so nothing sits in isolation.
INTRUSIVE WHERE IT COUNTS
As deep as the building needs
We scope the survey to the building's real risk, not just what's convenient to inspect. Where it matters, that means intrusive investigation, opening up ceilings, risers and voids to verify what's genuinely behind them rather than assuming.
Then we commission competent contractors to put right what's found, and we review their work so the remediation actually achieves compartmentation rather than just looking the part.
A single building survey or a portfolio-wide programme. We take on both.
PROOF
What this looks like in practice
Commercial estate · Risers
Years of clean assessments, and the building's main risers had never been opened.
The landlord had been assessing the common areas for years with no compartmentation issues flagged. The main risers ran inside each tenant's demise, behind their front doors, so nobody had been checking them. Inside, the compartmentation was old and damaged, punctured by years of tenants' own data and alarm cabling. We untangled responsibility with every tenant, logged the risers as the landlord's demise, and put an action plan in to reinstate the compartment lines.
See the full case →RELATED SERVICES
What often comes with this
Often paired with
Fire door governance
Compartmentation and fire doors work together. A breached wall and a broken door are the same problem twice.
See fire door governance →Often paired with
Fire risk assessments
Compartmentation findings should feed straight into the FRA, not sit in a separate report nobody reads.
See fire risk assessments →Compartmentation flagged, but no one's told you where or how bad?
We'll scope a proper review, intrusive where it needs to be, and tell you what actually matters.