A hotel has been fined £2,000 after admitting that it put guests at “serious risk” by failing to have a proper fire alarm system.
The Railway Hotel on Forthill Street in Enniskillen also pleaded guilty to failing to comply with an Enforcement Notice requiring it to install an automatic fire-detection system.
Fermanagh Magistrates Court heard that there were battery-operated smoke alarms in the bedrooms but on one occasion they were not fitted with batteries.
District Judge Nigel Broderick said that all too often one sees the “tragic consequences” of no fire alarm system or the system not being properly maintained.
He said customers were entitled to know that when they retired to their beds for the night there was a fire alarm system in place. The court heard that it could cost up to £30,000 to install an integrated fire alarm system in the 100-year-old hotel’s 19 bedrooms and it had been running at a financial loss for the past two years.
Defence barrister Heather Philips said the owners accepted an integrated fire alarm system must be installed and had been in contact with funding agencies.
Belfast Telegraph Thursday 21 August 2014
By Staff Reporter– 11 July 2014
