Fire alarm commissioning certificate: what it covers and who signs it

General guidance only. Check the standard itself and take advice from your own competent person for the job in front of you. Clause and annex references are to BS 5839-1:2025; earlier editions number things differently, so check the edition you are working to. Last reviewed 3 November 2026.

Four certificates, four responsibilities

A new non-domestic fire detection and alarm system is rarely designed, installed and commissioned by one person, and BS 5839-1 keeps the responsibilities apart by providing a model certificate for each stage in Annex G. Each one is signed by the organisation that did that part of the work:

Where one company does everything, it signs all four. Where the installer and commissioning engineer are different companies, each signs its own, and the acceptance certificate is where the customer confirms they received the lot. A separate verification certificate exists for the case where a third party is asked to check an installed system; in Compliar it is a separate template.

What the commissioning certificate records

Commissioning is the point at which someone takes responsibility for saying the system works. BS 5839-1 Section 5 sets out what has to be done, and the model certificate in Annex G reflects it. In practice the certificate records:

• The premises and the system. Site, the designed category (L1 to L5, M, P1 or P2), the panel, the number of zones or loops, and the extent of the system being commissioned, including any part that is not yet complete.
• Every device tested. Each detector, manual call point, sounder, visual alarm device and interface operated and shown to work, and the addresses or zone text checked against the zone plan.
• Cause and effect. That the programmed cause and effect matches the design: which devices trigger which outputs, delays, staged alarms, plant shutdowns, door releases and lift grounding.
• Sound and visual alarm levels. Sound pressure levels at the required points, and visual alarm coverage where it is relied on.
• Standby power. The standby battery capacity against the system's quiescent and alarm loads for the required standby and alarm durations. The battery calculator shows the arithmetic.
• Alarm transmission. That signals reach the alarm receiving centre, where the system is monitored, and that fault signals are received too.
• Documentation. That the as-fitted drawings, zone plan, operating instructions, log book and the installer's test results are in place.
• Variations and outstanding work. Any agreed departure from the standard, and anything not finished at the date of commissioning, so that nobody later assumes it was.
• False alarm precautions. That the measures to limit false alarms were considered and that the user has been told how to manage them.

The exact wording of the model certificate, and the list of items under each heading, is in the standard. Use it as the reference, not this page.

Common mistakes

• Commissioning before the installation is finished. If there is outstanding work, the certificate must say so. A clean certificate on an unfinished system is the thing an auditor, or a fire investigator, will find first.
• Copying the design loads. Measured loads are what the standby battery calculation needs.
• One tick for cause and effect. Record the matrix item by item. "Cause and effect checked" tells the next engineer nothing about which outputs were operated.
• Variations that are not written down. A department store that agreed to keep manual call points off the shop floor has a variation. If it is not on the design and commissioning certificates, the next servicing engineer will raise it as a defect.
• No handover of the log book. The log book is where the user records the weekly test and every event afterwards. Hand it over, show them how to use it, and record that you did on the acceptance certificate.
• Mixing up commissioning and verification. Verification is an independent check of a system someone else installed. If you are asked to verify, use the verification certificate.

How Compliar lays it out

Compliar has a template for each of the BS 5839-1:2025 certificates: design, installation, commissioning, acceptance and handover, verification and modification, plus the periodic inspection and servicing certificate for the visits that follow. The commissioning certificate is worked down in sections in the order you do the job: commissioning scope, system operational checks, interfaces and alarm transmission, then documentation, false alarms and any outstanding work.

The engineer fills it in on a phone on site, with photos and signatures captured on the device, and it keeps working with no signal. The standby battery readings sit in the certificate next to the panel and PSU readings, with the capacity calculation a tap away. When the certificate is issued it is sent to the customer as a branded PDF, held against the site and visible to the customer's portal login. The premises keep their own weekly tests in the site's digital log book. Issued certificates cannot be deleted, and any later edit needs a reason that is logged.

Compliar provides record-keeping and certificate workflows. The templates are laid out to BS 5839-1; the competent commissioning engineer, and your scheme, remain responsible for the work and for what is certified.