Most people have had a nightmare at some point in their life about their home burning down and losing everything they own. While that situation is potentially devastating, an equally damaging but sometimes overlooked danger is the possibility of fire in an office building. Nobody lives in an office building, but it is where all your equipment and important documents are housed, and losing any of those would be very damaging to you and your employees.
As a fire door service in McDonough, GA, we welcome the opportunity to teach businesses about the importance of office building safety, and we take our jobs very seriously. Virtually every office building follows the basic requirements of having fire exits, fire doors and fire extinguishers on hand, but there’s a whole lot more to office fire safety than that. From your fire door service in McDonough, GA, here are a few tips to help maximize your office building’s fire safety.
- Fire doors: Fire doors are a requirement in most office buildings, but merely having one is not enough to ensure that it serves as an effective fire exit. You should have your fire door regularly maintained to make sure that it is easy to open in the event of an emergency, and you should also consider installing even more fire doors than building regulations require. Also make sure all fire exits are very clearly marked, and update employees on any changes or additions.
- Security: Arson is one of the number one causes of fires in office buildings, and it often happens after everyone has gone home for the day. To reduce the risk of arsonists getting into or otherwise accessing your office building, consider beefing up your building’s security alarm system. You should also make sure all alleys and other areas surrounding your office building are well lit and protected.
- Cleaning: When a fire occurs, the goal is to contain and eliminate the fire as quickly as possible. Fire feeds on clutter, and cluttered offices and hallways will make it easier for the fire to spread. To avoid this problem, keep your office as tidy as possible, and ask your janitors to give special attention to stairways, hallways, lobbies and other common areas.
- Smoking: If you can have an absolute no-smoking rule in your place of business, that is the ideal policy for both fire safety and general public health. However, if your office building does allow smoking in designated areas, take special care to enforce the restrictions, and encourage smokers to not flick their ash onto the floor, into garbage bins or anywhere other than into an ashtray. Install a few permanent ashtrays that cannot fall onto the ground to curb the risk of an accidental fire.
- Wires: Finally, those concerned with fire safety in their office building should keep an eye on and consider replacing any old wiring. Electrical problems are another common cause of fires in office buildings, but they can be avoided with proper care.
If you want to bolster your office building’s fire safety, we hope you will contact Affordable Dock & Door, your McDonough, GA fire safety service, for more advice.