Wet and Dry Riser Servicing in London
Book a free survey and get a fixed price in writing. No survey fee, no travel charge, and an emergency line that answers outside working hours.
- 66 miles from our yard in Kettering
- ISO 9001 certified and LPCB approved
- Covering EC1 to EC4, WC1, WC2, E1, SE1
London: photograph by The wub, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons.
What we do in London
Designed, installed, tested and certified by us. Nothing subcontracted, and the same standard whatever the postcode.
Design and installation
New systems, extensions and upgrades, designed, installed and commissioned.
Fire sprinkler system design and installation
Sprinkler servicing
The full BS EN 12845 routine, from the weekly gauge and alarm check to the annual service.
Fire sprinkler servicing and maintenance
Sprinkler tanks
The water supply behind the system, inspected, cleaned and replaced when it is past it.
Sprinkler tank service, maintenance and replacement
Fire pumps
Electric and diesel sets proved under flow, not just started and signed off.
Fire pump servicing, testing and maintenance
24/7 emergency
A leak, a failed pump or a discharged head, answered out of hours.
Emergency sprinkler and riser repair
Dry risers
Six-monthly inspection and the annual pressure test, with the certificate your fire risk assessment asks for.
Dry riser testing and servicing
Wet risers
Charged risers, their pumps and their tanks, tested together because they only work together.
Wet riser servicing, testing and pump maintenanceWhat this costs, and what moves the price Wet, dry, pre-action and deluge explained
Fire protection in London
The deepest riser stock in the country. Central London is the densest concentration of tall buildings in the country, which makes it the densest concentration of dry and wet risers, and the place where the consequences of a failed test are most immediate.
Where we tend to end up: the Square Mile, Farringdon and Clerkenwell, and the mixed-use towers and podium car parks around Southwark and Bankside.
Wet risers are required above 50 metres and carry pumps, tanks and level alarms, so the servicing is materially more involved than a dry riser. Above 18 metres a dry riser is the minimum, and both are tested annually at pressure.
Buildings this applies to
- High-rise residential and mixed-use towers
- Commercial offices and headquarters buildings
- Hotels and hospitality
- Basement and podium car parks
What is actually built in London
London holds the deepest riser stock in the country. That is the plainest way to put it. The densest concentration of tall buildings anywhere in the UK is also the densest concentration of dry and wet risers, and the place where a failed test has the most immediate consequences.
Above 50 metres a wet riser is required, and a wet riser is a different proposition from a dry one. It is permanently charged, and it comes with pumps, a break tank and level alarms. All of it has to be proved together, because a riser with a sound pipe and a pump that will not reach duty is not a working riser. That is why wet riser servicing, and not sprinklers, leads the services on this page.
Below the towers sit basement and podium car parks, which carry their own considerations, and above them commercial headquarters buildings, hotels and mixed-use floors stacked on top of each other. Few buildings here are one thing, and the fire strategy is usually the only document that explains how the parts relate.
Why this matters in London
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A wet riser is a system, not a pipe
Riser, pump, break tank and alarms have to be tested as one thing. Proving them one at a time proves nothing about whether they work together, and working together is the only state that matters at the moment of use.
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Height decides which standard applies
Under BS 9990 a dry riser is the minimum above 18 metres; a wet riser is required above 50. A building that has been extended or reclassified can move across that line on paper, and the servicing obligation moves with it.
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Access is the real constraint in the City
Parking, permits, goods lifts, building management approval and out-of-hours working are the things that actually shape a central London visit. We plan them before the day, because discovering them on the day is how a test gets abandoned half done.
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Basement and podium car parks sit under occupied floors
A car park beneath a residential or commercial building puts a high fire load directly under people. That is a specific design case rather than an ordinary one, and worth surveying as its own problem rather than as part of the building above.
The systems London actually has
Wet riser servicing, dry riser testing and fire pump work, in that order, which is unlike anywhere else on our list. Sprinkler servicing exists here but the risers and the pumps behind them are what central London actually needs.
Getting there: Roughly seventy-five miles, and a planned job every time. Access, parking and out-of-hours working are more involved in the City than anywhere else we work, and all of it goes in the written quotation rather than appearing later on an invoice.
Not sure which standard your London building is held to?
It is a survey question rather than a paperwork one, and the survey is free. We read the building and the policy rather than assuming from the postcode.
The work, not the town
These are our own jobs rather than stock photographs. We have not claimed any of them were taken in London, because that is not something we would be able to show you.
All 52 photographsWorth reading before you ring
London questions, answered
What is the difference between a wet and a dry riser in our building?
Height. Above 18 metres a dry riser is the minimum, and above 50 metres a wet riser is required, which is permanently charged and carries pumps, tanks and level alarms. That makes the servicing materially more involved and it is why the two are priced differently.
Is central London more expensive to work in?
Somewhat, and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise. Access, parking and out-of-hours working cost more in the City than they do in Kettering. It is not a large uplift and it goes in the written quotation rather than appearing on the invoice.
Is the price different because we are in London?
We price the building and the work, not the postcode. Central London is the one place that carries an uplift, and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise: at 66 miles it is a planned day, and access, parking and out-of-hours working genuinely cost more in the City than they do in Kettering. It is not large, and it goes in the written quotation rather than appearing on the invoice.
Want a price for this building?
An engineer walks the plant room, counts what is actually there and writes it up. The survey is free, the figure is firm, and it holds for thirty days. No obligation either way.
Where London is on our patch
66 miles from our yard in Kettering, inside the ring we are in most weeks.
Towns near London
We cover all of England from our base in Kettering, so if your building is between two of these it makes no difference to us. Distances are straight-line, from London.
Approved, and audited on a schedule.
Two certifications, and the first one is the reason we could apply for the second. ISO 9001 is a precondition for LPCB approval, so this is a sequence rather than a collection.
ISO 9001:2015
Certified by BRE Global, accredited by UKAS
An audited quality management system. It means the way a job is planned, recorded and signed off is itself inspected by somebody independent, on a schedule.
LPCB approved
Loss Prevention Certification Board
The approval UK insurers look for on sprinkler work. A system installed by an LPCB approved contractor counts as genuine risk mitigation on your policy; one installed by anybody else may not.
Working to BS EN 12845, BS 9251 and BS 9990. If your insurer or fire risk assessor wants the certificates themselves, ring us and we will send them over.
Tell us the building. We will tell you what it is due.
No survey fee to find out where you stand. Describe the site and we will tell you which intervals apply and what the visit involves.