BIM IN ASSET MANAGEMENT MONTHLY FORUM 18-06-2025
RICHARD FREER One of the things we pride ourselves on and one of the great values of BIM4Housing and BIM In Asset Management is people are open. You’ve got competitors sharing things with each other. It’s a very open, very transparent get together, a cat can look at a king, they guy who’s installing the fire doors in a building can be figuratively sitting next to the guy or woman who owns the building and talking at obviously an equal level. Now, the only problem with that is that occasionally sometimes someone over speaks.
And when they do that they’ve maybe said something they shouldn’t really have said, or wouldn’t want on the record. We can delete it. We can edit the highpoints and the video before it goes public. Likewise, someone might say right, can you turn it off because I’m going to tell you something, but I don’t want it recorded which we’ll stop the recording. We can’t do that with people’s AI note takers. So, from the end of this meeting we are blocking all AI note takers, for that reason. We’ve left them on for today, but this will be the last day.
OK, the drop-in centre. Five days a week, Monday to Friday, 8.30 in the morning until 9 o’clock, George or I will be online for anyone to drop in who’s got something that they want to talk about. Something they want to boast about, something that they’re a bit not sure about and they want a bit of advice. And there’s a good chance there’ll be somebody else on that call who if they can’t give them advice, can point them in the right direction. And within reason, we can also help you find someone or put you in touch with somebody who can put you in touch with somebody who can sort out that issue.
So, if you’ve got something that’s going really well or something you want to boast about, something you’ve got an issue about, or you just want to have a chat with a coffee for half an hour before you actually get cracking. Then 8.30-9am, Monday to Friday starting next Monday, Jiss will put a link in the chat right now which will be the same link that you cause any day, it’s the BIMinAM drop-in. So, anybody who wants to pop in and see what’s going on, please do so, we look forward to having a chat with you. George, do you want to add anything to that?
GEORGE STEVENSON Yeah, I was also going to say that if you know people that you think could contribute or would be interested in what we’re doing, then please feel free to pass it on to them as well. Because what we’re trying to do is to increase awareness in the industry.
Just before I go into the poll, I’m just going to mention that we’re getting attention. So, that’s what we had last year from MHCLG. And this is something that I got just recently from Tim Galloway at the HSE. So, as a community we’re being recognised and also one of the main publications Atom, that does Digital Construction week, they do BIM Plus, they do construction management. Richard and I had an hour and a half conversation interview with one of the main journalists Denise Chevin on Friday, and she’s very interested in what we’re doing as a community. So, there’s something that’s going to be coming out in the next couple of weeks that explains what we’re doing.
The poll itself, if you’ve not received a copy of the poll, of the survey, please put you’d like a copy of the survey in the chat. I know that we’ve emailed it out to some people, but not everybody’s got it, not everybody finds it. And when you see the results I think you’ll be interested. For a start, 92% of people said that they were not confident that they would receive accurate and complete fire safety information at the end of their projects. Now, I think that’s an amazing percentage statistic and one that really should bother us. And I think most of the people on this call…well, this was the result of the last meeting. 72% were not confident that the health & safety and O&M information is accurate and being updated with any changes. So again, that’s quite a shocking, if not surprising, statistic. This is a very interesting one.
The whole point about the fire & emergency file is that it’s not simply something that’s handed over at the end of the construction period, by law it’s got to be kept up-to-date. And I don’t know whether there’s adequate provision in place within organisations to do that, including keeping up-to-date, for example, drawings that are in the secure information box. And we’re getting a lot of examples now fed back to us of situations where people have looked in the secure information box, that the floor plans aren’t correct.
And this is possibly the main cause of it, and that is that 89% believe that their CEO or FD, in other words the people that are controlling the purse strings, aren’t aware of their duties under the Building Safety Act. So, if you want a copy of that survey please put ‘survey’ or ‘copy’ into the chat. This has been a very useful thing for us to get feedback and results from people at the coalface, what their real experience is. So, we’re going to ask you to do another survey now.
RICHARD FREER Jiss will put a link into the chat which will be a link to the poll, and we ask you all to participate because it really is valuable.
GEORGE STEVENSON It is anonymous, but the value of it is coming from people who in my view, you’re the top 5% in the industry who are aware of the new regs and how to address them.
RICHARD FREER Question 1, have you experienced FM contractors closing off reactive calls that we’re not actually completed? Yes, or no.
GEORGE STEVENSON We’ve had quite a few reports of that happening, so that’s why we’re asking the question.
RICHARD FREER Question 2, should the completion of outstanding actions from fire risk assessments and reactive calls be overseen by the responsible person? Yes, or no.
GEORGE STEVENSON The point is, if people just say we’ve had a fire risk assessment done, the fire risk assessment might actually say that there is a huge number of things that need to be done. And therefore, unless people actually action things, what’s the point of having the fire risk assessment? It’s not really we’ve had a fire risk assessment done. I think everybody understands that, but I’m just making that observation.
RICHARD FREER Number 3, how easy is it to use and update the fire stopping records delivered by construction? Easy, difficult, impossible. Number 4, should the responsible person have a record of which safety critical assets have not been inspected? Yes, or no. Number 5, should the responsible person know which individual assets protect each compartment and their inspection history?
GEORGE STEVENSON This is part of the Golden Thread, that systems of systems.
RICHARD FREER Number 6, should handover information include the location space reference for each asset, especially MEP? Yes, or no. Number 7, are you asked to report on embodied carbon? Yes, or no. Number 8, are you asked to report on operational carbon? Yes, or no. Number 9, are you using AI or Large Language Models to check the completeness of handover information (in particular the fire & emergency file)? Number 10, should the responsible person know where all of the penetration seals are and what product material was used? Yes, or no. Number 11, what is the life expectancy of a penetration seal? 10 years, 25 years, 50 years, 100 years.
Should the fire risk assessment include inspection of penetration and fire stopping? Yes, or no. How frequently should penetration seals be checked? Weekly, monthly, three-monthly, six-monthly, yearly. And the last one, should fire risk assessments include checking above ceilings and in risers? Yes, or no. If anybody has got any interest in getting involved going through and looking at these issues in greater detail. And the ramifications of the answers to this poll, if you could put into the chat ‘action’ and we’ll be in touch with you to join that action group on these issues. OK, we’re going to have a roundup of what we’ve been doing.
GEORGE STEVENSON (shares screen). In terms of what we’ve been doing recently, we’ve now got a new version of the fire door and inspection guidance that we’ve been producing which was developed originally with the NHS. So, what we’re asking people to do is to peer review this because this is a new version of the fire door inspection. And it’s a really good document and it goes into significant detail. So, if people are interested in doing a peer review of fire doors, could you put ‘fire door review’ in the chat. The objective of this is to really get something that we can then feed in to people so that we’re upping the game of people.
What we’ve also got is one for fire doors, fire stopping and cavity barriers. So again, we’d like people that have an interest in any of those asset types, if you’d like to be part of the peer review before the thing is published, please put ‘dampers and fire stopping’ in the chat. What we’ve also been doing, the whole point about this is to upskill the industry, so we’ve working with the Supply Chain Sustainability School which is an organisation that provides free training to SMEs. It’s funded by most of the big corporations and many of you are possibly working for organisations that fund and support the Supply Chain Sustainability School.
But what we’re doing, we’re using this to actually provide training, that’s the plan. And we’re doing this on the back of the various different groups that we’ve got working. So, for example, we’ve got the digital asset capture group and if you’re part of that digital asset capture group, that’s great, you’ll hopefully see your name here. But if you aren’t part of it at the moment and you want to be part of any of these groups, if you could put ‘DAC, for example, digital asset capture. This is the same as 360s, so we talk about both. We’ve also got a really big group which is excellent on digital handover, and that’s something that we want to build on.
So again, if you see your name here that’s fine, but if you’re not sure whether you’re actually in the group then put ‘digital handover’ in the chat. PFI handback and room data sheets is an area that we’ve had a number of conversations on and Matt Wilkie is going to be leading on that. And we’ve got a group there interested in that, so if you’re interested in any of those areas please put in either ‘ADB’ or ‘PFI’ and we can then bring you into that group. We got a tremendous response to people wanting to be part of the WhatsApp community, which is part of the drop-in in the mornings. But not everybody has given us their WhatsApp number. So, if you haven’t given us your WhatsApp number let us have your WhatsApp number, that would be fantastic.
And this is the Golden Thread group, I’m going to talk about the Golden Thread Taskforce now, but this is another group that’s very active. And actually, a lot of the things that we’ve been talking about with digital handover are actually being satisfied by the Golden Thread group. So, if you want to be part of the Golden Thread group put that in the chat. This next one was very popular, the Miro board. The Miro board was something that was created by a group of us in BIM4Housing in a common way interpreting the new regulations, because everybody has got a different interpretation of what the regulations require us to do.
So, the Miro board was set up for the team to actually bring that together and it’s a fantastic resource. So, if you want access to the Miro board these are the people that have already registered for the Miro board. And you can go on there and find information. Importantly you can ask for information as well and one of the other members of the team will probably be able to help you. We did a session at Digital Construction Week at Excel two weeks ago. Which was an absolute sell out, we had about 60-70 people in the audience. And the topic that engaged people was why aren’t FMs using the BIM models that are being handed over and how can we improve adoption.
We had Pencho Studenkov from Places For People, Matt Wilkie who’s an expert in asset management and also Nathan Cubley from OpenSpace. And basically we had a really good session focusing on Regulation 38. And then we started looking at how we’re operating that, to really communicate the principle of if we’ve got a fire in a kitchen how do we prevent smoke from spreading? Largely, it’s compartmentation and the point is, the whole point about the Golden Thread, for example, is to make sure that all of the assets that go to make up a compartment wall are valid and working.
And the challenge with that, and it’s great, we’re getting lots and lots of the Golden Thread being handed over at completion, but how do we tie them all together? How do we tie together the BIM models, the floor plans which are often separate drawings? And then how do we ensure that inspections that are being done are actually going to pick up the same asset. And therefore if you’ve got other really good software applications being used, they need to refer back to the same asset. So, what we’re therefore doing is we’re now using this to say OK, the handover information may be perfect for handover.
And this is from a live job that we’ve been doing with Places For People, the fire stopping contractors used an application called Boris and really good records of what they’ve installed. They’ve barcoded every single fire stop and you’d think that was fantastic. The challenge is that what they then do is they put a single pin down on every single floor on an image of a floor plan. And therefore if you want to see a number of different fire stopping elements, you’ve got to look at a number of different drawings. And actually there’s 1,500 drawings, so they FM I don’t think stands a chance, they’ve got to open up dozens of drawings to see what’s there.
So, what we’ve done in this particular case, we’ve used a combination of data engineering and AI to scan through the fire stopping report and extract from that the locations of all of the fire stopping assets. Now, the contractor did a really good job because everyone has got a unique ID, so we can use that. And what we then did was we picked up that unique ID and we’ve used that, including the coordinate information, to actually generate an interactive plan. So, what this is doing here, every single fire stop is then presented on a single floor plan You can also overlay the fire doors and the other safety critical assets, but importantly you can move from fire stop to fire stop to actually find out what the report is. And it can also pull out the information from the PDF.
So, we’re turning the PDF into machine-readable data and we’re doing that by data engineering. We’ve actually got a group within BIM In Asset Management who’ve signed up to be part of the data engineering bit. So, there’s some very smart people in here who are probably using a lot of tools to extract information, so what we’re doing is bringing these together with people that want to learn and we can then go from there. So, if you’re interested in data engineering then put ‘data engineering’ in the chat and we’ll include you in our work in this area.
The other thing that we did at Digital Construction Week was spoke to a lot of the other software companies that were exhibiting there. And all of those have agreed that they’re very keen to work with us within BIM In Asset Management. Importantly, some of them are competitors, but they’re willing to work collaboratively. So they’re willing to share what they’re doing with us and you, so I think that’s a really positive sign. The other thing since the last forum meeting, a couple of us went to the Laing O’Rourke factory for the Buildoffsite alliance.
And we went through and had a tour of the factory which was fantastic. And I’ve been asked to speak at the housing conference next week at the National Door Summit. So, broadly, that’s what we’ve been doing over this last month or so.
RICHARD FREER Has anybody got any queries or questions or comments?
ANDREW COULDRIDGE Very interesting, lots of good information on these sessions. One thing that worries me having recently taken handover of two large residential developments is the Asite information obviously being the developers single source of information. For me, it becomes and issue, I have flagged it internally and with the developer as unfortunately they create a Wetransfer link from Asite which means we can’t get access to it for their information directly, they do a Wetransfer, And obviously once we do that we then cease with the single source of information.
We then have copied, we’ve got our own controlled copies and then internally that gets copied. So, that’s my big concern at the moment. it’s good to see Asite on your last slide in regards to engagement with companies, Asite was on it, which is great to see. I do know that the developer, and they’re a large house builder, are listening. But they are, in my opinion, considerably behind the times and it would be good to see a lot of representation from house builders on these calls. Because I think that even with my limited experience I’m probably further ahead of the curve than they are.
GEORGE STEVENSON I think one of he concerns that people have got is whether the information that’s being collected during the design and construction period, by sharing that with you Andrew, is whether they’re leaving themselves open to claims. And part of the challenge with that is a matter or trust. The fact is, this is part of the awareness process, they think that by not telling you something that they are protecting themselves.
But actually, they’re probably increasing their risk because the whole point about the legislation is that they are responsible for making sure that you as a client, as a responsible person has got the information that you need. So therefore, if they don’t provide it to you in a way that you can consume, then they’re not really satisfying their obligations. And that’s why we as a group can help with that because we can help articulate to the community, to the client community as well, that they’re not actually benefitting themselves in keeping it quiet. Does that make sense?
ANDREW COULDRIDGE It does make sense. I think they’re very aware, I just think they’re under huge amounts of pressure to handover, to occupy. We start talking, we start getting into generating revenue streams and unfortunately what tends to happen I’m finding is whilst it’s a deliverable of the management agreement that the PAP or the ManCo or the resident directors or the RMC in this case is responsible for providing all of the Golden Thread information. That it’s actually something that they’re questioning, not because they don’t want to do it, it’s because they don’t know what it is that they’ve got to do. And again, I refer to two major house builders.
I looked at a management agreement last week in preparation for a presentation and it clearly stated that the developer would not be handing over documentation to any third-party. Now, what comes to mind at that point is what are they going to do when they hand over the freehold interest to a set of resident directors? What do resident directors do in that situation? Do they have access into Asite (as an example)? Or do we in the meantime have to provide a system of our own that can be transferred over?
And again moving ahead, if a managing agent ceases contract and another agent comes in, how is that information transferred? And what links are there to what might a single source of information? Because I think that we lost single source of information transfer of information at the point that we take handover, because we’re not all aligned on the same systems.
GEORGE STEVENSON I agree, and one of the things that we’re very keen to try and execute here is have a common voice to overcome some of these things. For example, what you’ve just said there, the concern that people have got. We’re finding that when we’re doing audits of handover information, we’re getting a load of drawings and documents that aren’t final construction, they’re not as-builts. Now, the legislation says that things need to be as-built information, but in many cases they’re not.
And theres an argument to say for construction, I’ve heard this argument, for construction is adequate. But what we’re finding is that the information that we’re being handed over on behalf of clients, it includes stuff that is even rejected. So, the quality of the way in which they’re using, this isn’t a reflection on Asite or 4P or Aconex or any other system. It’s down to the fact that they’re not using the systems properly and they’re not allocating that particular classification.
So, one of the things that we are doing within the group is coming up with means of classifying and structuring O&M information and health & safety files in a way that is standardised. So, part of the exercise, if you’re interested in that workstream standardised fire safety manuals, for example, please put that in because one of our colleagues here Mandeep is coordinating that.
RICHARD FREER George, do you want to do the Golden Thread Taskforce?
GEORGE STEVENSON (shares screen). We’ve got a really strong group now, we’ve had the first sort of session. And one of the things that we’re trying to do is to make it so that people can understand why we’re doing the Golden Thread. So, we produced a video which if you do the one-to-one with me I’ll share with you the video that basically explains why we’re doing it. And I think a lot of people in the housing sector recognise that the Gateways are a real issue at the moment. And this came from Bureau Veritas. Such an enormous number of fire safety rejections are because the fire safety information wasn’t right. And I think that everybody that’s involved in asset management will recognise this where they have to do surveys of brand new buildings to produce the asset lists.
So, one of the things that we’ve been doing with the Golden Thread Taskforce, the development group in BIM4Housing, they were going to standardise their information requirements individually, and they’ve now agreed that they want to do that collectively. And that’s going to make it a lot easier for supply chains so that Peabody and Places For People, they’re all asking for the same information from their supply chain. It also means that if we can get that information in a more standardised way, then we can use more automated process. And also make it easier to populate other systems. So, that’s what Mandeep is working on, so if you put ‘standardise’ into the chat then we can pick up on that.
In terms of the Golden Thread, what we’re encouraging people to do is do collaborations. So for example, this is one that you’ve seen before, this is checking the information that’s in the secure information box. We’re using 360 photography to check that, for example, you see there’s a doorway there that isn’t indicated on the plan from the fire brigade’s secure information box. Now, that could be very, very dangerous for the fire fighters and therefore we need to make sure that that type of thing is picked up and corrected. And part of the issue is that it’s not clear which is the right floor plan. I think everybody has probably experienced this as well, there’s different versions of that.
So, what we’re doing here is we’re making it so that we can then go from that and take 360 photos. Also, we’re moving in to other areas. This is Carolyn Flynn from CBRE, this is something that Carolyn and I did in Leeds. This is largely my incompetence here of being able to do 360s, but if I can do it anybody can. And Carolyn was helping me, she’s got some experience of this so she took over from me.
CAROLYN FLYNN I’m from CBRE asset managers. I invited George over onto site for the day on one of our sites. The particular site that we went to has got 6 plant rooms, so it was quite helpful to go through each one because it helped us to show what each plant room holds. Bear in mind that I’m on a contract that’s national, the head office being in London and not everybody being able to get round to our sites. So, this helped us. What I want to bring in with the 360 is to help our client when I’m talking assets to them to say look, this is what’s in the plant room and this is what we need to work on or what needs remedial work done to it.
At the same time it also helps me when I move from site to site to know oh yes, this one this site and this is on this site, and this has got this. And it goes back into the whole labelling that George and his data team do behind the scenes for us. At the moment we’re concentrating on the plant rooms because obviously GDPR in public areas, it’s in the healthcare so we’re not really doing to the wards. But eventually we’d like to get round into doing the fire doors and just identifying our various fire doors and move along. Overall, it was an enjoyable day, George, we learnt, didn’t we?
GEORGE STEVENSON That’s exactly right, we had a great session together, I learnt a hell of a lot. I’d also like to say that if anybody else wants to either borrow a camera or to work with us on this to cary out something on their buildings we’re very happy to help. So, if you want to do a pilot of the 360s put ‘pilot’ into the chat and we’ll come back to you. I know we’re making you work a bit on this, but at the end of the day we’re an action based group, rather than a talking shop.
ANDREW COULDRIDGE Just referencing a couple of earlier slides in regards to the floor plans in the property information boxes. Recently taken handover at site, opened the property information box laminated floor plans. You would need a magnifying glass because it is a full floor plan of the entire development. And I asked the question, if I am a fire officer and I’m onsite and I’m in a hurry, am I going to read that? And the answer would be no. And am I going to give it any time? Again, i think the answer would be no. he feedback that I got was that they would just break the doors down anyway.
So, I wanted to question the value of those, I get it, is it just a compliance thing? Is it meant to provide information? As I anticipate that it should be. But more importantly, is it something that should be of a particular scale for a particular area? Or is it acceptable to have a floor plan that you can’t read?
GEORGE STEVENSON I would say most definitely not. And in fact there are good examples within the National Fire Chiefs Council’s FIA examples. I think that what we need to do is to make sure that the information is…I understand the issue because obviously if you’ve got something like a large complex, then you can have an image that you can’t actually read. But maybe that’s what we need to work on together, Andrew.
ANDREW COULDRIDGE Well, I think the question was just it add any value? And I think the answer to that is no, it doesn't. But it ticks a box.
GEORGE STEVENSON It doesn’t add value if it’s not readable, I agree. But that doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be a floor plan.
ANDREW COULDRIDGE No, but again, having a floor plan ticks a box, but if it adds no value.
GEORGE STEVENSON Well, in that particular case I can assure you that the fire brigade told me that that was a particularly dangerous situation because in that particular example…Paul Womack, are you on the call? Paul is a former fire fighter and in fact he was involved in that one. When we discussed that, I’ve discussed it subsequently on a confidential basis with the fire services and they said absolutely, that would create real danger for their fire fighters when they arrive. Because it suggests that’s a closed off area, but it isn’t.
PAUL WOMACK Yeah, the officer in charge will direct the crews at where they’re going in the building, and the office in charge will be monitoring using the plans. So, understanding exactly where they are because they’re in comms with radios: third door on the right, fifth door on the left etc. And what I used to do with fire response teams, we had two sets of plans and we chose the room, detailed the room where the fire was and then put a pencil hole through all of the sheets, so that we’d get a better understanding of not only where the fire could spread horizontally and vertically, and also use it for water.
So when any fire crews were putting lots of water on a fire, the crews would understand what equipment etc could be potentially below for salvage works. So, just producing these plans is just a starting point and when I was in hospitals we used those plans to develop where we needed to put salvage in operation. So, they are used, but as you’ve hit on, they’ve got to be fit for purpose. So, it could have to be designed that you’d have the different floor, plans, but then you’d have separate plans for each zone.
GEORGE STEVENSON I think Andrew that you’ve hit the nail on the head and that is that whoever is producing something needs to think about who’s going to consume it. And have responsibility for making sure that whatever is being produced isn’t just a tick in the box, it’s actually intended to…they’ve got to take responsibility for the fact that the information is adequate. And that’s exactly the challenge that I think we’ve got with the fire stopping, for example. The example that I’ve given you there with the fire stopping, the fire stopping contractors done exactly what the construction teams need, but it actually doesn’t help the asset managers.
PIERRE VENTER We’ve got technology we’ve got to enable us to do various things. So, exactly like these fire issues, it goes back to drafting. You need to be able to show the information at the appropriate scale. We also need to make sure that the strategy is in there that when it gets updated it is cascaded to all of the various parties, particularly the life safety, fire safety etc. But there are technologies available right now which are under development that are opening up that effectively the model is boundless. And because it’s digital it gives you the capability and method would be from a fire officer’s point of view, is heads up display.
What do you do when you run into a building that’s full of smoke and you can’t see anything? Is that that object could in fact be going bright blue, or bright green, to say this is the fire escape lift or access gate. You can’t see it in real terms, but it can actually show you where you’re going. And that’s the kind of sanity that we should be actually looking at, is using the technology to enable us to do the things better. It’s how it gets sourced and how it gets stored and made accessible, that’s the bigger problem on a national and international thing.
NEIL BAILEY I agree about the plans being printed out and not readable, but you can have waterproof plans, we’ve used those in the past. It’s printed on special material, so you can do them full size and then you can fold them up and put them in the box ready for the fire service. So, rather than laminating A3s, you can use these plans that are designed for site work really, they’re very durable and you just fold them up. Maybe that could be something that’s specified when they want to have this information delivered.
RICHARD FREER So, if you want to join the Golden Thread Taskforce put ‘Taskforce’ in the chat.
CHRISTINE MILLING It’s going back to Andrew’s comment about handover information, what you get downstream and stuff. And again it almost seems to me that it would be better that the building owner/operator should actually hold the system where all of the data gets collated and then they’d give permission to either the managing agent to give out permission to all of the subcontractors when they have to supply data. That way the data is always in ownership of a person who’s going to operate the building and you’ve got various stages to curate the data or build up these different models as you go along.
Because essentially you’re setting out the standards from the offset, so that when data gets collected the have stuff to work from that they’ll fill in the details, the relevant assets. Whereas if you’re actually trying to push your data up to who’s going to operate the system and say here you are at handover, you may or may not have it. Then you’re always going to have everyone using their own particular system, their own reference points. But if you do it the other way around, because that is ultimately the goal, you can sort of get the uniformity built in upfront.
RICHARD FREER I will whisk through the results of the survey. Have you experienced FM contractors closing off reactive calls that were actually not completed? 63% saying yes you have. Should the completion of outstanding actions from fire risk assessments and reactive calls be overseen by the responsible person? 96% say yes. How easy is it to use and update the fire stopping records delivered by construction? Easy, difficult, impossible. 80 something % say difficult. Number 4, should the responsible person have a record of which safety critical assets have not been inspected? That’s unanimous, 100% yes.
Should the responsible person know which individual assets protect each compartment and their inspection history? 96% yes on that one. Are you asked to report on embodied carbon? 70% is no, 30% yes. Are you asked to report on operational carbon? The same thing, 70% yes, 30% no. Are you using AI or Large Language Models to check the completeness of handover information? In particular, the fire & emergency file. 94% no, 6% yes.
Can I just say, the action group workstream that I spoke about earlier on. A big focus on that will be on the use of AI and Large Language Models and what we can do to use them more and make them more appropriate. So, if you want to join that action group, put ‘action’ in the chat.
GEORGE STEVENSON Part of the reason for that also, we’re taking information from other projects. I was talking with somebody last week who’s working on NEOM which is the huge thing in Saudi Arabia. And part of the thing that they’re doing is exactly that. So, we’re tapping in to lots of other people that are doing things and we can bring that to the table. So, if you’re interested please let us know and we can include you.
RICHARD FREER Not just you obviously, if there’s anybody else that you know or people you’re working with who you think would be interested and would like to input and learn, please let them know about what we’re doing and the various groups that we’ve got. OK, should the responsible person know where all of the penetration seals are and what products material were used? 92% say yes, 8% say no. What is the life expectancy of a penetration seal? The majority 57% say 25 years. Then we’ve got 10 years and a couple for 50 years and a couple for 100 years, that’s quite a disparity. What’s the correct answer?
GEORGE STEVENSON I don’t know the correct answer. It will almost certainly be one of these it depends, because there’s different types of penetration seal and also it depends on where it is and all of the rest of it. But I think the critical thing is it’s not permanent. In other words, at some stage that penetration seal is going to need to be…
PENCHO STUDENKOV I just want to say from the Regulation 38 point of view when we undertake a Regulation 38 review, those materials come with warranty. And when it’s installed correctly there should be specified years of warranty under the normal standard conditions. However, each year they need to be checked.
GEORGE STEVENSON But at some stage, Pencho, some of them will need to be replaced and I think people need to be able to plan for that. Paul Sheedy was saying to me on one of these events a couple of months ago about replacing glazing panels. And that the seals around the glazing panels on high-rise blocks on offices are probably 25 years and that’s not very long.
PENCHO STUDENKOV Most of the fire stopping life expectancy is between 50 and 25 years, that’s correct.
RICHARD FREER OK question 12, should fire risk assessment include inspection of penetration seals and fire stopping? 100% yes. How frequently should penetration seals be checked? Our majority is yearly, with a few going for weekly, monthly, 3-monthly, 6-monthly. So how often, Pencho, should they be checked?
PENCHO STUDENKOV As part of the risk assessment, in my view. The fire risk assessment should undertake obviously a sample inspections of the fire stopping checks. That should be annual.
RICHARD FREER Should fire risk assessments include checking above ceilings and in risers? We’ve got almost 100% yes. OK, so that’s our poll results for this week.
SYPRIAN A PITKIN Just a comment on that last statement. I think I’ve seen it going around on social media LinkedIn. Basically if you are going to say yes they need to check. Remember we have four different types of fire risk assessment. What we need to do then in order for saying that if you’re going to be checking fire stopping then we’d have to change the parameter, the requirement standard, for Type 1, Type 3 and Type 4 in that sense.
Because obviously all of the types have a minimum requirement and standard of what needs to be checked. So when you start doing that parameter, if you need to check everything then you would need to say should we be looking at changing the standards for Type 1? the minimum standard and minimum requirement needed for Type 1 and then the same thing for Type 3 and Type 4.
PENCHO STUDENKOV I just want to say that a visual inspection of the riser within let’s say Type 2 or Type 4, regardless of that a visual inspection can be undertaken. We’re not talking about an intrusive inspection where you need to open up architraves to see actually the fire stopping around the door frame. We’re just talking about a visual inspection in the risers or cupboards which could be undertaken within that limit of the scope of the inspection which could be Type 1 to 4 regardless.
SYPRIAN A PITKIN Well, the question says fire stopping, it’s what it is, fire stopping is not only in risers. It’s a standard thing to open and check risers Type 1, but the question is should fire stopping be checked? Fire stopping is not restricted to risers, so when you ask a question like that you have to look on it on all, it’s what the question is directly, should fire stopping be checked? So, you can’t just say looking in risers, fire stopping is not restricted to risers.
PENCHO STUDENKOV I think the guidance is quite clear on the scope of the inspection 1 to 4. So, the fire stopping appears in every type of inspection, it’s just in different stages and different intrusiveness.
SYPRIAN A PITKIN Yeah, it’s just how the question is asked, fire stopping is fire stopping, it’s not restricted. It didn’t say should fire stopping be checked in areas that can be accessed, for example, the risers. It’s should fire stopping be checked.
RICHARD FREER I understand where you’re coming from, what you say is the question was actually not specific enough.
GEORGE STEVENSON I composed the question in that way intentionally. The reason for that, Syprian, is that if we as lay people, you’re an expert and Pencho is an expert, but let’s say that I’m an FM and I procure somebody to do a fire risk assessment. I might think that somebody is checking the compartmentation. I might think that they’re checking the penetration seals above the ceiling.
Now, the fact that it may not be common practice because for procurement reasons, and I understand the issue with obviously cost and all of the rest of it. But I think what we need to do is if the penetration seal is an important fire protection measure, therefore we need to make sure that it is there. If the fire risk assessment isn’t doing it and the FM isn’t doing it, who is doing it?
SYPRIAN A PITKIN I see your point.
GEORGE STEVENSON So therefore I think possibly, and you know much more about this than I, but maybe a Type 3 or something like that should include, it’s not a destructive or and intrusive survey just to look above a ceiling. But I absolutely agree with you that we need to make sure that whatever the cost of that fire risk assessment is needs to reflect what people are actually doing for it.
BARRY BASSNETT It was just to talk about 360 imagery and some of the tricks. And also to promote this masterclass that we’re doing Friday. (shares screen). This is a plant room in a data centre that I’ve been working on and basically…this is the level of detail that we can get from the 360s and that’s what we’re going to be highlighting next week. But that’s not the real issue, the real issue is what happens in, say, the roof because although these cameras are great, quite often these are poorly lit. And I wanted to show you an example of this. It’s a roof space, a black box with some triangles on.
This is my photo editing thing, but quite often when you’re doing plant rooms and 360 the lighting is not very good for these 360s. So, what we’re going to be showing in the master class is how we can do this. That would be the normal lighting and this is when we’ve done a bit of fiddling about. This is a really simple way of using 360 imagery without lighting to see all of the details that are normally hidden. So, that’s what we’re going to be showing at the master class next week, a workflow for how to do that. That’s what it looked like before and that’s what it looks like after and if I zoom in you’ll see the level of detail that we can see from this.
Now, these are all 360 imagery that you can then use and tag in whatever software that you choose to do it. Obviously there’s one or two systems out there which are ideally suited for this. But the challenge when you’re using 360 imagery is just the lighting in the building. And some of the cameras are very good at using them and some aren’t, so we’re going to show you how you can get around this problem.
RICHARD FREER That’s next Friday the 27th at 11am, if anyone wants to come along put ‘master class’ in the chat and we’ll get invites out to you and Barry will be showing you all the tricks of the trade for 360.
GEORGE STEVENSON Vic Finn from Wythenshawe, could you just explain what you’ve been doing with 360s?
VICTORIA FINN When we started to think about we’re going to have to capture assets, but also we’ve got to deliver a building safety case both to the Regulator, information also to the fire service and we’ve got to provide our residents with information on fire safety as well. We came up with the idea of doing the 360s for each block. I know I’ve sent you a link, George, for you to have a look at it. What we decided to do initially was think about the resident and how we can provide that information. But also the fire service and colleagues as well, in as different and many ways as we can in an understandable format.
So we thought a 360 walkthrough for each block is probably going to be that format. We also put avatars on that you could pick languages from. So it introduces the block, it says what we’re trying to do to that block and it gives you directional arrows to go through so you can do a walkthrough of the block. And we also put hotspots on the walls so you can see your fire risk assessments, you’re plans where the PIB boxes, where all of your essential firefighting equipment is. So, the idea was initially we get that setup and we’ve got a resident friendly format, we’ve also got a format that we can look into the PIBs information that we might be able to share with the fire service.
So, it was a way of getting something that we could either lockdown, or choose what we’re going to share that information on and who with. But also it’s a format that residents can completely understand and they can have a look into some areas that they probably wouldn’t be able to go into normally, wondering what’s in there as well. And it gives a good overview, it goes onto the roof, it goes onto all areas of the roof and where the permits areas would be. And it’s also for colleagues, it tells you where permits are required to access those areas. So, we’ve been doing that 360 for a while now and what we’ve done is in the blocks we’ve put that on the digital screens so that people can access them there as well.
GEORGE STEVENSON I think that’s brilliant. Vic, you’ve done that yourself?
VICTORIA FINN Yes, well, we had somebody come in and do us a website that we’ve got our own website address, so we’ve done it on that and that’s just a different format of doing it. But it was to enable us to actually a QR code to it so residents can go in as well.
GEORGE STEVENSON What I meant was, you’re taking you own 360s.
VICTORIA FINN Yeah, well, via somebody else doing them for us.
GEORGE STEVENSON What obviously we’re trying to do is get to a situation where like Paul Womack, the 360s are simple to use. I think it’s a really good thing if the building safety managers can take their own 360s because then it’s not a one off thing, it’s something that you can do. I suspect that you probably visit most of your sites on a reasonably regular basis, do you?
VICTORIA FINN Yes, we’re quite lucky really, we’ve got all of our blocks in close proximity. So yeah, we’re there every week visiting the blocks.
GEORGE STEVENSON So the principle idea of this that we’re trying to get to is if you go and see something that’s changed or see something that potentially you need to share with colleagues, then taking a new 360 is a really good way of doing that because you’ve then got something that you can share. Paul Booth from the NHS is also part of the Golden Thread Taskforce and he’s gone and bought a camera and he’s been doing it around his sites. He's got about 80 sites, some of which are quite small, but some are hospitals. And what he’s doing there, he’s taking the 360s and he’s now sharing those with us so that we can then see how we can use that to turn it into asset information for him.
The other thing I would say is what would be really helpful, what Vic is doing there and also the rest of you, if you could give some thought as to what information you actually want to get from your fire & emergency file, for example. What sort of day to day problems are you encountering that would be made easier if you had access to certain information? So that when you’re going in to the health & safety file or the O&Ms, if we can actually identify what the problem is that you’re actually trying to get the information for. What we can do is make sure that the information is structured in a way that you can find it easily. This is the sort of thing that Neil Bailey at Total Documentation is a master at.
So, if we can get some sort of standard scenarios like that, what we can also do is feed that into the AI. Because if we can actually identify what information, what documents are actually going to make it easier for you to do certain checks. It means that we can then create intelligent links for those particular information sets. it also enables us to turn some of the information that’s in documents into machine-readable information so that we can actually then utilise it in different ways and present it differently. So, if you’re interested in that area, did we have an AI one, Richard?
RICHARD FREER The AI, we’re going to use action as the primary focus on AI. So again, if you’re interested in that area of things join the action group, put ‘action’ in the chat.
GEORGE STEVENSON Part of the issue here is, for example, working with Pencho who’s a fire engineer at Places For People, but he’s got colleagues that want quite different information. He’s got people on compliance or people on asset management, all of whom need slightly different information. So, if we can understand what each of them needs information for, what problem is it that they’re trying to solve? Therefore we can curate the information that’s needed. So, going back to what Andrew Couldridge was saying earlier. Some of that information may be in Asite or 4projects or whatever, bu if we understand what it is that can be then curated to it becomes immediately and easily accessible.
RICHARD FREER Let’s have a quick recap of where we are. Anybody who wants to see or get involved with the Miro board put ‘Miro’ in the chat. Remember that Jiss posted at the top when we first came into the meeting the hotlink to our 30 minute 8.30-9am every morning, Monday to Friday drop-in centre. So, make sure that you’ve got a note of that and if you’ve got anything interesting or exciting, or a query or you just want to pop in for a quick chat, join us then. We’ve got action which is partially on the polls, but primarily on AI kind of things. If you want to join the action group put ‘action’ in the chat.
We’ve got the Golden Thread Taskforce, if you’re interested in joining the Taskforce that covers many things, mostly digital asset capture, get involved in that, put ‘Taskforce’ in the chat. If you want to get involved in DAC and 360 photography, to learn more or give us your experience. We’re always very pleased to get live action experiences from people because this is the real stuff, it’s not theoretical. In that case put ‘DAC’ in the chat. And then if you really want to learn all of the good stuff on 360 photography then you must join Barry next Friday the 27th at 11am for the DAC masterclass, put ‘masterclass’ in the chat.
GEORGE STEVENSON I’ve got one other question. We’re already working closely with OpenSpace. Now, what OpenSpace do, they’re one of the many companies that do construction documentation by walking the site with cameras and it captures 360s of the design and construction process. So what that means is from an asset management point of view they’re capturing information about what is behind ceilings before they get closed out.
We’re now moving on the next level of collaboration with them where we’re doing some integration with them about how we can access some AI tools that they’ve been building as well. And we’re also working with Multivista who do a lot with fire stopping and similar types of things. Now, the reason that I’m mentioning this is if we can then look, if you’re aware of any projects that you’re working on where they’ve used either OpenSpace or Oculo or Buildots or one of the other applications that they’ve used it during design and construction.
Then if you want us to we could probably make a connection there to get you access to the 360s, subject to the construction company or the client giving permission. It’s a delicate area, because everybody is a bit concerned about the potential risk on this, but I think that we’ve got a pretty good argument on that. So, if you’ve got something where they’re using that, if you let us know then we can probably bridge that gap for you.
RICHARD FREER Absolutely, it’s all about collaboration. OK, one thing I didn’t remind, the one-to-ones with George. A quick 15-minute chat to see where we are, to see where you are and how we can develop that relationship further. So put ‘one-to-one’ in the chat.
GEORGE STEVENSON Just talking about collaboration sparked a thought. I sent a note out to a few people earlier in the week because we as Active Plan are about to start, and it’s also a number of members of the Taskforce, we’re about to start a commission for one of the London authorities on a 1970s area where we’re doing a complete scan to BIM. I’m cautious of calling it scan to BIM because actually it’s probably scan to 3D.But what we’re also doing is going the next stage and doing checking fire assets and things like that.
So, what we’re planning to do going forward is look at this as something that we’re going to be bringing to the task group. So, there may be some opportunities for some of the members of the task group to help us on that. But if there are any clients on here that are thinking of doing the same sort of thing, in other words using laser scanning to create models of existing buildings that they’ll then want to use from a fire safety and a building safety point of view, let us know because we might be able to glue those things together. And you can learn from us when we’re going through and finding different ways of doing things, and we can learn from you. So, if you’ve got anything, let us know.
RICHARD FREER OK, we don’t hold meetings in the last part of July or August and into early September for obvious reasons. But we are squeezing one more forum meeting, I it’s the 17th of July, so you’ll be getting invites to that. A fantastic meeting, thanks for coming and we’ll see you all soon.
CHAT
Mark Keeble (External) Wednesday 11:14 am
For HRB, actions from the FRA should be captured and triaged within the building safety case, per the processes defined in the organization's Safety Management System.
Christine Milling (Unverified) Wednesday 11:14 am
What do you mean by 'Responsible Person'. With some of these questions, wouldn't the Responsible person delegate
Syprian A Pitkin (External) Wednesday 11:17 am
14.Should Fire Risk assessments include checking above ceilings and in risers: -
This is not a yes or no question. There are 4 types of FRA carried out and this is dependent on which is required.
I answered on the basis of what my opinion of minimum standard should be
Still difficult to answer on the minimum standard unless you are going to do away fully with Type 1-4 or change the minimum requirement and standard for a Type 1, which will incorporate a Type 3 and Type 4
Dan O'Gorman (External) Wednesday 11:22 am
George please share the link to the Fire Door Checklist you are now sharing as this is of interest in an Irish context too, particularly in Healthcare and the NHS equivalent HSE
Mark Austin (External) Wednesday 11:34 am
We have worked with ASITE information and API's
Pierre Venter (External) Wednesday 11:39 am
The bigger question is Who owns the Data! Many times the Owner is the correct party, but they are not managing, nurturing the data.
Make the Handover a clear, managed, and accountable process with an audit, based on a National Standard, of Classification, Naming etc.
Dan O'Gorman (External) Wednesday 11:40 am
The EU is tackling this problem regarding the non transfer of Single Source of Information and thus the continuation of the Golden Thread under the Building Passport The main EU initiative behind the roll-out and handover of the Building Passport (also commonly called the Digital Building Logbook or Building Renovation Passport) is the revised Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD).
Pierre Venter (External) Wednesday 11:44 am
Where is that data to be accessed? If it goes into a non-public platform, it "disappears". To solve that, place it on a Public Platform. You can manage the access. Access must make people Accountable for their use of the data.
Dan O'Gorman (External) Wednesday 11:49 am
The main EU initiative behind the roll-out and handover of the Building Passport (also commonly called the Digital Building Logbook or Building Renovation Passport) is the revised Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD).
- As part of the 2021 recast of the EPBD, the European Commission required Member States to set up Digital Building Logbooks by 2026, linking national energy performance databases and creating a federated digital network researchgate.net+5journal-buildingscities.org+5bpie.eu+5.
- In parallel, the revision introduced Building Renovation Passports (BRPs), designed to provide building owners with long-term energy renovation roadmaps; Member States are mandated to establish BRP schemes with a common framework by 29 May 2026 globalabc.org+1revalu.io+1.
- These tools build on existing Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs), with BRPs envisioned as complementary instruments embedded in a broader sustainable and circular economy strategy bpie.eu+9journal-buildingscities.org+9revalu.io+9.
Bottom line: The EPBD is the legal backbone enabling the handover and ongoing management of Building Passports—mandating their creation and connection across EU nations to support long-term renovation, data continuity, and lifecycle decision-making.
Dave Williams (External) Wednesday 11:49 am
Can't speak for other areas of the country but we supply the fire plans to the fire brigade in electronic format also
Chun Qing Li (External) Wednesday 11:49 am
or 2D Floor Plan come from 3D Digital Twin
Asha Landa (Unverified) Wednesday 11:50 am
There is FIB guidance which outlines sizes and scale. Ours also had to approved by the fire service and we had consultation with them to outline what information they required.
Nikki Barrow (Unverified) Wednesday 12:05 pm
Penetration seals, when properly installed and maintained, can be expected to last for at least 25 years, with some systems potentially lasting much longer, a general guideline is to inspect them at least annually, and potentially more often depending on the environment and usage.
Chun Qing Li (External)mWednesday 12:29 pm
we use 3d point cloud and then KREODx software for DfMA