Research and analysis

Trends in fire false alarms and fire false alarm policies

Incident data analysis and survey of FRSs’ policies and responses to fire-false alarms (including physical attendance).

Applies to England

Documents

Details

The research analysed Home Office Incident Recording System data (1999/00 to 2017/18) to explore trends in fire false alarms and, in collaboration with the NFCC, surveyed all FRSs to gather information about their responses to fire-false alarms.

Long-term downwards trends in fire false alarms have been largely driven by declines in fire false alarms due to apparatus, and as these types of incidents make up the largest proportion of fire false alarms, there may still be scope for further sizable reductions. The number of FRSs using policies and education targeting fire false alarms has increased over time, and FRSs that implemented policies attended fewer false alarms. As such, there is reasonable evidence that these policies have contributed to the decline.

Updates to this page

Published 24 November 2022

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