Cladding scandal latest: homeowners forced to spend millions on 24-hour fire patrols

May 24, 2022

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Thousands of flat owners are being forced to pay countless pounds monthly for round-the-clock fire wardens because their buildings are deemed unsafe.

Known as 'waking watches', these patrols could be forced upon leaseholders who live in buildings with potentially dangerous cladding and other safety defects, with hundreds added to their monthly fee bills.

Waking watches are installed when buildings fail safety tests, that have been designed to try to avoid a repeat from the Grenfell tragedy. But some homeowners are finding the costs too much to deal with.

Leaseholders representing four developments told Which? they and their neighbours are struggling to cover the expense of waking watches – and sometimes they are not even getting a worthwhile service, with some wardens discovered to be cutting corners or even resting on the job.

Homeowners in these four developments alone have paid an estimated lb906,500 for waking watches so far, and the bills continue coming.

Here, we take particular notice at this growing phenomenon, and also the people who are suffering.

What are waking watches?

Waking watches contain wardens who patrol a building's common areas taking care of indications of fire, and who oversee a building's evacuation process if a fire starts.

They can be required in buildings that fail the new fire safety tests created following the Grenfell tragedy, for instance if they've been constructed with unsafe cladding or any other dangerous materials.

Waking watches are intended like a temporary measure to safeguard homeowners until unsafe materials are removed. Consider removing these materials may take months or perhaps years, watches can stay in position for very long periods, with large bills piling up every month.

The often substantial costs for these watches fall on leaseholders – the people who own in most cases reside in the flats – rather than the freeholders, who own your building itself. This really is despite them being unaware their flats were unsafe when they bought them, and never being the reason for the newly discovered poor safety standards.

No result in sight

Many leaseholders are actually paying hundreds of pounds a month for their waking watches, with no result in sight.

This means leaseholders over the UK are potentially paying countless pounds collectively before any remediation work even starts.

The total collective costs of waking watches from four from the developments we been told by was approximately lb906,500. This can just be a small fraction of the entire across the nation.

According to LBC, there are 590 buildings in London with waking watches, which could be costing up to lb144m annually for flats within the capital alone.

One leaseholder told us she'd personally spent lb11,000 on the waking watch so far.

Failing a fireplace safety test may also land your home having a lb0 valuation, meaning you will not have the ability to market it or re-locate to flee waking watch charge can not afford.

‘It’s so out of control’

Alex Dickin, from Cardinal Lofts in Ipswich, were built with a waking watch installed on 6 November which is costing the 81 flats in the building lb5,625 each week.

He believes this calculates at about lb300 per flat per month, and states that the expense were passed onto leaseholders without consultation by his building’s managing agent.

When he first saw the waking watch, he didn't expect leaseholders in the building would have to purchase them. ‘I did not really experience how it would cost much. However when you recognise that they're there 24/7 and there is always two of them, it hits you that, yeah, it might cost much.’

The monthly charge has made an enormous difference to Alex's finances. ‘lb300 is around 20% of my monthly income,’ he told us. ‘And it’s something you don't plan for. You never expect to pay a couple to patrol your building. Therefore it came out of nowhere; it had been a complete shock.’

Alex described the wardens like a ‘constant reminder’ that his building is dangerous.

We also heard from Charlotte Daus, whose block paid lb37,000 just for 20 days of waking watch. ‘It is so unmanageable,’ she told us.

The cost hasn't yet been passed to leaseholders, but Charlotte fears it will be. She's expecting to find out in September 2021, which leaves her entire block in limbo with huge bills potentially coming their way.

People in Charlotte’s building feel ‘personally violated having these people in their space’, she said. ‘It's a constant reminder from the issues and a failure of fireside safety.’

She says she's seen wardens appearing to chop corners, ‘However i don't wish to blame them – it's the system itself.

‘I feel like my home's been removed from me already,’ she says. ‘Not a day surpasses we do not get reminded from it. It's just a sense of complete hopelessness.’

Another leaseholder in St Albans paid roughly lb100 a week for a waking watch which was removed after nine weeks when a new fire alarm was installed. They are saying wardens were caught sleeping, reading papers and watching football matches and Netflix on the job.

This image continues to be obscured to safeguard the individual’s identity.

Read more leaseholders’ stories:

'We can not afford lb100,000 each to make our buildings safe'
'My entire life continues to be changed by combustible cladding'
'My EWS1 Olympic Park nightmare'
'We've been told our cladding bill might be lb13m'

Are waking watches effective?

With wardens only patrolling communal areas, would they really be able to spot a fireplace?

The National Fire Chiefs Council (NFCC) – which drew up guidelines around waking watches – says they'd. However the watches aren’t intended as a long-term solution.

When we asked the NFCC for comment, it directed us to the website's FAQs page.

The website says:

‘The purpose of a waking watch is to ensure there is sufficient warning in case of fire to support the evacuation strategy and has been utilised in buildings prior to the Grenfell Tower fire. It's intended for very short periods of time as the increased risk has been urgently addressed through either remediation or even the installing of a typical fire alarm system.’

On situations where remediation can't happen quickly, the NFCC says:

‘Building owners should move to install common fire alarms as quickly as possible to reduce or remove the reliance on waking watches. This is actually the clear expectation for buildings where remediation can't be undertaken in the “short term”. This method should, in almost all circumstances, reduce the financial burden on residents where they're funding the waking watches.’

And can leaseholders can trust that wardens are competent? The NFCC says companies providing waking watches have a duty to make sure their staff are fully trained.