My daughter is at university in Birmingham and has been allocated accomodation in halls operated by a private company called "unite". The fire regulations are causing me some concern; in the event of a fire the fire alarm will trigger.  The students have to determine themselves if it is a serious fire and dial an 0845 number within 4 minuites to stop the fire brigade attending.  If the fire brigade attend and the fire alarm has been triggered by, say burnt toast, they will be fined £100 for a false call out.  This pre-supposes that 1) the students have a mobile phone 2) it is fully charged and has credit on the phone (there are no phones at all within the rooms).  This appears to me to be about the worst possible use of a non-geographic number as it directly relates to the safety of the students.  I have contacted the company who state that 0845 is the only option, although I understand that all calls terminate in the companies central control unit in Bristol (unite operate halls at all the major universities).  Any advice that anybody can give or if anyone has other details that I can use to try to get "unite" to release a geographic number would be appreciated.

redant wrote on Oct 8^th, 2008 at 12:37pm:




So what happens if there is no one in the halls and there is a false alarm, do the students still get fined? I would suggest you look into the legality of this clause.

There are few concerns about this post. Normally if you discover or suspect a fire, you will have to raise the fire alarm, I think this is a normal policy. Students are trained to investgate fire? Is it fair to fine students even if it is not their fault? Is there any phone available to use by the students to contact 'unite'? As sherbert suggested you need to seek legal advice.

Many thanks for link and comments by Gudman.  No there are no phones provided by Unite so students have to rely on their mobiles.  My thoughts are the same about how to determine how serious the fire is.  Faced with a potential £100 fine would you concider a minor fire to be within your capabilities to deal with it?  I have referred the matter to Birmingham City Council who referred the matter to the Fire Service; they are currently reviewing fire procedures as they do not appear to be as agreed when the building opened (new accommodation opened September this year).  I will post if I have any further information.

I would seriously suggest that you contact Birmingham City Council Health & Safety Department. The more I read and think about this,I think there is something very wrong here. If it is, then the council should bring an injunction against Unite Group to take this clause out of the students leases, contracts or what ever.

I think before people get too carried away here, I think what UNITE is trying to say is that if you yourself had accidentally set the fire alarm off, then it is your responsibility to contact the control room and inform them that it is an accident. I think what has happened here is that people have misinterpreted what UNITE has said as assuming that students should be investigating fire alarms within the building that they didn't set off - I'm more than sure UNITE would never suggest that.

As I said earlier, I believe that there is an emergency call point in the reception of the building that students can use to inform the control room of a false alarm. Also, if there are members of staff on duty at the time, they would also be able to contact the control room and inform them of the false alarm.

I've tried emailing UNITE myself to request either an alternative or consideration of using an 03 number which would be cheaper for students to call. I never got any reply, so the next course of action would be calling their switchboard directly and speaking to someone knowledgeable of the situation.

Perhaps one should try to establish whether the threat of a fine is actually meant to be applied with common sense against clearly irresponsible behaviour, e.g. setting off alarms deliberately as a prank and then claiming it was an accidental false alarm.

(Or perhaps students are different these days!)


03 is now a little more widely used than was the case when this issue was raised in the other thread. As mobile use is widespread amongst students and the negative effects of revenue sharing numbers are seen most strongly with mobile tariffs, one might look to the student community for a strong body of campaigners for users of non-geographic numbers that they are required to call to switch to 03.

(Or perhaps students are different these days!)

Many thanks Dave-will pass this information on.  I am still waiting for a reply to my e-mail from Unite re why they dont use 03 number as students have to advise the control room using their own mobile phones, and the interpretation of the fire regulations which do appear to be flawed.  Will post reply when received.