Easing the summer pressure: a smarter approach to passive fire safety in student accommodation

For building managers, facilities teams, and procurement leads, this is one of the most pressurised periods of the year. Hundreds of thousands of students (c.500,000 in 2023) arrive expecting a safe, comfortable, and welcoming home from day one.

At Checkmate Fire, we’ve seen first-hand the challenges this creates. This past summer, our teams have been busy delivering retrospective fire strategies, remediating and installing fire doors, undertaking firestopping, inspecting compartmentation, and more—all with the same objective: making sure buildings are safe, compliant, and ready to welcome students.

But does it have to be this way—every summer, all at once?

The Seasonal Challenge. Student accommodation is a unique environment.

Universities and PBSA providers alike want the student journey to start positively, and rightly so. From welcoming new arrivals through digital apps to investing in refreshed facilities, the focus is on creating an exceptional first impression.

For building managers and budget holders, this means balancing multiple contractors, upgrades, and refurbishments in an incredibly narrow window. Summer becomes a bottleneck where procurement, design, and delivery collide—adding stress, cost, and complexity.

To make matters harder, occupancy rates often exceed 95%. Many institutions use available space in summer for visiting students or even short-term lets. This leaves less access time for major works, making the traditional summer-only approach less viable each year.

Budgets and Planning Realities – a summer bottleneck. Budget pressures compound the problem.

Universities alone reported a sector-wide expenditure of £48.9bn against £43.9bn income in 2022/23. Fire safety cannot be treated as optional, but it often requires multi-year planning and careful prioritisation.

Budgets & timescales mean fire safety works are crammed into the same tight window as other refurbishments. This approach not only strains resources but can also push costs up—whilst Checkmate Fire have wealth of talent within its teams, the industry labour markets are at their highest demand in summer, and finding skilled passive fire technicians can become both costly and risky. 

The Year-Round Solution. The good news is: it doesn’t have to be this way.

At Checkmate, we’re working with more PBSA and university clients to spread fire safety works consistently across the year, easing pressure on summer and delivering safer outcomes sooner.

• Stronger supply chains – With over 300 highly trained technicians, we ensure capacity and competency are available year-round, not just in peak season.

• Remediation first – Our remediation vs replacement rate of over 80% reduces disruption, saves costs, and speeds up delivery.

• Minimal disruption – From flexible scheduling around exams, to smaller work teams, to clear noise and floor management strategies, our approach is built around respecting that we are working in people’s homes.

• Effective communication – Dedicated site managers provide a clear line of communication, change control, and look-ahead planning to keep everything on track.

The results speak for themselves. This year we protected more than 10,000 students. In one major programme of fire door remediation and replacement across six buildings, we delivered works without a single student complaint. Our clients consistently rate us highly, with an average NPS of 65 (excellent) in the education sector over the past 12 months. Reputationally, this keeps our clients in check with their student commitments.

What’s Next for Passive Fire Safety

With regulatory changes such as BSR requirements and Gateway 2 approvals, the trend is clear: more fire safety works will need to be delivered year-round.

Spreading projects beyond the summer window not only avoids cost inflation and resource pressure, but also ensures compliance is achieved earlier—keeping students safe and buildings protected.

Partnering with Checkmate Fire

Whether you manage PBSA, university-owned accommodation, or a mixed portfolio, Checkmate can help you plan, prioritise, and deliver passive fire safety works without being tied to the summer crunch.

However you source your passive fire protection, Checkmate Fire provides the expertise and compliant procurement routes you need to keep students safe.  If you need help with Gateway 2 applications or getting prepared with updated fire strategies, fire door and compartmentation surveys, our team are here to help.

If you’d like to ease seasonal pressures, optimise budgets, and safeguard your buildings with confidence, the time to consider this is now!  

Contact Gavin Slattery, Chief Development Officer on 07827 891365, or at info@checkmatefire.com

Checkmate Fire – Protecting Students, Saving Lives.