Who needs to submit an annual fire safety statement in NSW?

Owners of buildings with a fire safety schedule. Class 1a buildings such as single dwelling houses don't need one.

Who can assess fire safety measures for an AFSS?

An accredited practitioner (fire safety). Routine maintenance doesn't require accreditation, and the maintenance provider doesn't have to be the practitioner who did the assessment.

Where is the AFSS lodged?

With the local council and Fire and Rescue NSW, together with the current fire safety schedule. A copy of both must also be displayed prominently in the building.

What is a supplementary fire safety statement?

A statement for critical fire safety measures that must be assessed more often than every 12 months, as set out in the building's fire safety schedule.

Annual Fire Safety Statement (AFSS) NSW: Requirements for Contractors

Every year, owners of most NSW buildings must certify that each essential fire safety measure has been assessed. The contractor maintaining those measures is often the one holding the evidence.

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Last reviewed: September 2026 · General information, not legal advice — confirm requirements with your council or Fire and Rescue NSW.

What an AFSS is

Under the Environmental Planning and Assessment (Development Certification and Fire Safety) Regulation 2021, building owners must give council an annual fire safety statement dealing with each essential fire safety measure in the building (section 89). The measures that apply to a particular building are set out in its fire safety schedule, so that schedule is the starting point for everything that follows.

Not every building needs one. Class 1a buildings — for example single dwelling houses, terraces and villa houses — don't need an AFSS. For the commercial, strata and mixed-use buildings most maintenance contractors work in, the statement comes around every year.

The statement is the owner's document, but it rests on work that happens across the whole year. If you're the contractor maintaining the measures, the owner — and the practitioner who assesses the measures — will often be relying on your records.

Supplementary statements for critical measures

Some buildings have critical fire safety measures as well as essential ones. A supplementary fire safety statement is required for any critical fire safety measure, issued at intervals of less than 12 months (section 91), as specified in the building's fire safety schedule.

For a contractor, that means the annual cycle isn't the only one to track. Check the fire safety schedule for each building you maintain, note any critical measures and the interval the schedule gives for them, and schedule your work so the evidence is ready before each supplementary statement is due.

Who assesses, who maintains, who signs

Three different roles sit behind an AFSS, and they're easy to blur. Getting them straight tells you exactly what you're responsible for.

The assessor: an accredited practitioner (fire safety)

The assessment of each measure must be carried out by an accredited practitioner (fire safety), known as an APFS. This is the person who assesses whether each measure meets the standard it's required to meet.

The maintainer: you

Accreditation is not required for installation or routine maintenance of essential or critical fire safety measures. The person doing maintenance doesn't need to be the APFS who did the assessment, and owners can choose any maintenance provider for work identified in the assessment. So a maintenance contractor can service the measures and fix what the assessment finds without being the assessor — and without holding APFS accreditation.

The signer: the owner or their agent

The statement is signed by the owner or their agent, not by the APFS. The owner is the one certifying to council, so the owner is the one who needs to be confident the evidence behind the statement is complete.

Lodging and display

Once the statement is signed, the owner must give a copy of it, with the current fire safety schedule, to the local council and to Fire and Rescue NSW. FRNSW accepts statements online.

The owner must also display both the statement and the current fire safety schedule prominently in the building. If you're on site regularly, it's worth noticing whether the displayed copy is the current one — a quick heads-up to the owner or building manager is part of being a good maintenance partner.

Use the current approved form. The current approved Fire Safety Statement form is Version 4, effective 1 September 2022, from the NSW Department of Planning.

Timing

An annual fire safety statement must be submitted within 12 months of the previous one. That makes the date of last year's statement the anchor for this year's work.

Councils can also set expectations about how quickly a statement follows the assessment. Sutherland Shire Council, for example, states the statement must be lodged within three months of the date of inspection and assessment. Check the requirements of the council for each building you work in.

Put together, the practical effect for a contractor is that the assessment, any rectification and the lodgement all need to fit inside the window before the next statement is due. Work that gets left to the last few weeks is the work that holds everything up.

What contractors should have ready

None of the following is a legal requirement set out above — it's good practice that makes the assessment smoother and the owner's job easier. For each building you maintain, aim to be able to hand over:

Service records for every measure — each visit, what was checked, the readings and results, and who did the work. Organise them by measure, matching the fire safety schedule.
A defects list — every defect you've found, where it is, and when it was reported to the owner or building manager.
Rectification records — what was done to fix each defect, when, and evidence it's complete, such as photos and a follow-up result.
Critical measure records — kept separately, so they're ready for each supplementary statement.
A copy of the current fire safety schedule — so your records line up with what the statement has to cover.

When the APFS arrives to assess, a clean set of records per measure answers questions before they're asked. When the owner is ready to sign, they can see that the defects raised during the year have been dealt with.

Having the evidence ready in FieldOp

In FieldOp, each fire safety measure can sit on the building's asset register with its full service history, so every visit, defect and fix lands on the measure it belongs to. A PPM contract schedules routine servicing at the frequencies you set, so the visits are booked in without anyone having to remember them.

On site, technicians complete forms with readings, photos and signatures. The owner or APFS gets a branded report link they can open without an account.

FieldOp doesn't lodge statements and doesn't replace the APFS. The assessment is still done by an accredited practitioner, and the owner still signs and lodges the statement with council and Fire and Rescue NSW. What FieldOp does is make sure the maintenance evidence behind it is complete and easy to hand over.

NSW Annual Fire Safety Statement (AFSS): a guide for maintenance contractors