"Right Place, Right Time: Positioning Your Evac+Chairs for Maximum Safety"
The Moment That Changes Everything
It’s 2:17 PM. The fire alarm blares through your building. Smoke begins to fill the stairwell and chaos erupts. People are rushing to escape. Somewhere on the second floor, someone with reduced mobility needs urgent help. It could be a colleague using a wheelchair, a visitor recovering from surgery, an employee with a broken leg or a heavily pregnant team member. It might even be someone experiencing a panic attack, asthma flare-up or dizziness from a medical condition. In an emergency, disabilities aren’t always visible – but the need for a safe evacuation is always real. Every second counts. In that moment, the location and readiness of your Evac+Chairs is not just important – it could save a life.
Every Floor, Every Staircase
When lifts are out of service due to fire, power failure or maintenance, an Evac+Chair becomes a lifeline. But in an emergency, time is everything and every second lost increases risk to life and health, if a building only has one Evac+Chair but there are multiple staircases, staff will first need to locate it and then move it to where it’s required. That delay not only costs precious time but also puts both the person waiting to be evacuated and those retrieving the Evac+Chair in danger.
Sharing a single Evac+Chair between multiple staircases introduces additional risks. The Evac+Chair could be misplaced, in use elsewhere or not returned to its designated location – leaving staff uncertain of its whereabouts in an emergency. Positioning an Evac+Chair on every stairwell eliminates that delay entirely. It ensures no member of staff is at risk trying to fetch equipment from elsewhere, and that every exit point is ready and prepared for immediate use. Emergencies are unpredictable – you never know where people will be or who might need assistance first. By having an Evac+Chair on every stairwell, organisations can plan for multiple people requiring evacuation at once, transforming uncertainty into safety and reassurance.
Every Evac+Chair must remain unobstructed and clearly signposted with a photoluminescent sign, so it can be found quickly – even under pressure or in low-visibility conditions such as heavy smoke. Ensuring each Evac+Chair is fully accessible and ready for use means that, when the unexpected happens, you’re prepared to protect every life in your care. In a crisis, poor signage or unclear communication can make locating the Evac+Chair stressful and confusing, further delaying evacuation efforts. Keeping a clearly signposted, unobstructed Evac+Chair avoids these complications and ensures all staff can practise evacuation procedures in the exact locations where they may be required.
Accessibility is not just best practice; it’s a legal requirement. Under the Equality Act 2010, employers and building managers have a duty to ensure equal access and opportunity for everyone, regardless of mobility. Expecting someone with a mobility impairment to travel to another floor to reach an evacuation chair is not only impractical but unfair – it denies them the same right to a safe, timely escape as everyone else.
PEEPs and GEEPs: People Before Equipment
An Evac+Chair is only part of the picture. Real safety comes from integrating your evacuation equipment with Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans (PEEPs) and Generic Emergency Evacuation Plans (GEEPs) and regularly reviewing them. PEEPs are bespoke plans created in agreement with an individual who requires assistance during evacuation, detailing how they will be evacuated and by whom. A GEEP provides a generic framework for buildings used by the public or with a transient workforce. Regularly reviewing and keeping them up to date ensures your plans reflect any changes in personnel, building layout or individual needs. Planning ahead isn’t just about ticking a safety box. By considering how people move through your building and how they’ll evacuate safely, you transform a simple evacuation plan into a truly lifesaving system.
Confidence Comes from Training
However, even the best-placed Evac+Chair and well-designed evacuation plans are ineffective without trained staff. Hesitation in an emergency can cost lives, cause bottlenecks, panic or even lead to injury. That’s why Evac+Chair offers Operator Training which trains delegates hands-on skills and Key Trainer courses to empower teams to teach and certify others within their organisation. Training ensures staff can act decisively, passengers feel safe, and evacuations are swift, controlled and efficient.
Maintenance: When Reliability Isn’t Optional
Like most evacuation equipment, an Evac+Chair is only effective if it’s in full working order. As the manufacturer, no one knows our Evac+Chairs better than us. An Evac+Chair is a Class 1 Medical Device and must be maintained under the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 (PUWER) in the UK. Annual servicing by trained Evac+Chair Service Technicians ensures your equipment is operational, compliant and ready to perform flawlessly when every second counts. When parts need replacing, only genuine Evac+Chair components are used, guaranteeing reliability, compliance and total peace of mind.
Make Every Second Count
With over 40 years’ experience, Evac+Chair is the world’s leading evacuation chair, trusted to help organisations protect people in real emergencies. We guide you through placement, maintenance, training and compliance – so your evacuation plan is not just theoretical but ready for action.
Let’s make sure every person with a mobility impairment can be evacuated safely – contact Evac+Chair here or book your complimentary Evacuation Assessment here to review your Evac+Chair needs.
