Smoke and carbon monoxide alarms: a landlord's duties in England

A landlord in England must make sure a rented home has a smoke alarm on every storey with a room used as living accommodation, and a carbon monoxide alarm in every such room containing a fixed combustion appliance other than a gas cooker. Each alarm must be checked and working on the day a new tenancy begins, and once a tenant reports one as faulty, it must be repaired or replaced as soon as reasonably practicable. The duties are in regulation 4 of the Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Alarm (England) Regulations 2015, as amended in October 2022.

That is the whole of it, and it is three duties rather than one. Most landlords have the first one covered. The other two — the check on the first day, and the repair once something is reported — are the ones that get missed, because neither produces a certificate.

Where the alarms have to be

A smoke alarm on each storey on which there is a room used wholly or partly as living accommodation. A bathroom or a toilet counts as living accommodation for this purpose, so a storey with nothing on it but a bathroom still needs one.

A carbon monoxide alarm in any room used wholly or partly as living accommodation that contains a fixed combustion appliance other than a gas cooker — a gas or oil boiler, a gas fire, a wood burner, an open fire. A hall or a landing counts as a room here, which matters most for a boiler in the hallway. Before October 2022 the rule applied only to solid-fuel appliances. It now applies to anything fixed that burns fuel, except the cooker.

The regulations say nothing about the type of alarm. Battery or mains-wired, sealed or not, standalone or interlinked — none of it is specified. The duty is that the alarm is there and working.

Working on the day the tenancy begins

For a new tenancy, the landlord — or someone acting for them — must check that each alarm is in proper working order on the day the tenancy begins, which the regulations define as the day the tenant is entitled to possession.

That is a different duty from having fitted the alarms, and it is the one people quietly skip. An alarm fitted for the last tenant and never tested since has not been checked. Press the test button on every alarm, on the day, and write down that you did. Doing it with the tenant there, and noting it in the inventory they sign, is the cheapest evidence you will ever collect.

When a tenant says one is not working

Since 1 October 2022, once a tenant (or someone acting for them) reports that an alarm is not working, the landlord must work out whether it is in proper working order and, if it is not, repair or replace it — and both steps must happen as soon as reasonably practicable.

There is no fixed number of days. What there is, the moment the report arrives, is a dated record of when you were told, which is the thing anyone asking whether you acted reasonably will look at first. A chirping smoke alarm with a flat battery is a ten-minute visit; leaving it for a month after the tenant told you is the kind of delay the duty exists to catch.

Room-by-room lets and licensed HMOs

The regulations do not apply where the property needs an HMO licence — mandatory or additional — or needs a licence under a council's selective licensing scheme. That is not an exemption from having alarms. The licence itself has to carry conditions requiring a smoke alarm on every storey with living accommodation, a carbon monoxide alarm in any room with a fixed combustion appliance other than a gas cooker, both kept in proper working order, and a declaration to the council about them on demand. The council enforces those through the licence rather than through these regulations — see HMO licensing: what actually counts.

They also do not apply to a lodger who shares a kitchen, bathroom or living room with you or your family, to long leases of seven years or more, or to student halls, hostels and refuges.

What happens if a council finds a breach

The enforcement here is notice first, penalty second:

1. If a council has reasonable grounds to believe a landlord is in breach, it must serve a remedial notice, within 21 days of deciding so, saying what has to be done.
2. The landlord has 28 days to do it, and can make written representations against the notice in the same period.
3. If the landlord does not comply, the council must — with the occupier's consent — arrange for the work to be done itself.
4. And it may impose a penalty charge of up to £5,000, decided on the balance of probabilities.

A landlord who can show they took all reasonable steps to comply with the notice is not in breach of it, and a tenant refusing access does not make you a failure for not going to court. The penalty attaches to ignoring the notice, not to the original breach — but a remedial notice served because an alarm was missing on the day a tenant moved in is a notice nobody wants on the file.

Where Tenarize fits

The two duties are on two different checklists, because they happen at two different times.

The compliance checklist confirms the alarms are fitted — "Smoke alarm(s) fitted" and "Carbon monoxide alarm(s) fitted" are two of the ten items every tenancy goes through before move-in, and neither can be ticked without a file attached. The move-in checklist records that they were tested — "Smoke alarm(s) tested" and "Carbon monoxide alarm(s) tested" sit alongside the inventory, the meter readings and the keys, and prompt you to test each alarm with the tenant present. The two are kept apart deliberately: ticking the first set says nothing about the second, and the second is the one that gets skipped.

When a tenant reports a problem through their portal, you get a notification and an email straight away rather than in a weekly digest. The report is a dated maintenance request: who reported it, when, how urgent, and what happened next, with the supplier you assign and the date it was resolved recorded on the same job.

What Tenarize does not do: it does not test anything, and it does not know whether an alarm is fitted beyond what you record. An imported tenancy has no move-in checklist, because the move-in happened before Tenarize was involved, so a test on that day is not something it can show. And while it keeps the date a fault was reported, it does not decide what counts as reasonably practicable — that clock is yours.

Where to check this yourself

• Smoke and carbon monoxide alarms: explanatory booklet for landlords — GOV.UK, updated for the October 2022 changes
• Regulation 4 (the duties) and regulation 8 (the penalty charge) of the 2015 Regulations — legislation.gov.uk
• Schedule 4 to the Housing Act 2004 — the alarm conditions every HMO or selective licence must carry, and HMO licensing on GOV.UK, including the postcode lookup for your council
• The compliance checklist for letting in England — where the alarms sit among everything else required before a tenancy starts
• Shelter and Citizens Advice — free, independent advice on a specific property

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