Hotels are establishments that, due to their characteristics, include a large number of regulations to be taken into account: they do not just consist of a building through which customers can walk with a certain freedom or rooms where they have absolute independence. They also include multiple installations, for example, air conditioning, plumbing, fire protection, electrical installations, lifts and freight elevators, kitchen machinery, industrial refrigeration, smoke extraction, etc.
In this post we are going to make a brief review of the main facilities that can be found in a hotel and the regulations that apply to each of them.
Main regulations applicable to hotels
Thermal installations
They are governed, at national level, by Royal Decree 1027/2007, of 20 July, which approves the Regulation of Thermal Installations in Buildings (RITE). This decree determines the periodic inspections by the Authorised Body (OCA) and the minimum maintenance to be carried out by approved maintenance companies.
Although the inspections of thermal installations are determined in the RITE, the competent body of the Autonomous Community may agree on as many inspections as it deems necessary. The Autonomous Regions are legislating the periodicity and protocols to be followed, although this usually coincides approximately with IT 4 of RITE.
For thermal installations there are 2 types of revisions, the IPE and the IPIC and they must be carried out every 15 years.
In the case of air conditioning, for powers greater than 70 kW, monthly revisions will be carried out. For those under 70 kW, six-monthly, quarterly or four-monthly checks will be carried out, depending on the type of installation.
Ordinary tasks for compliance with regulations may be delegated to the on-site staff of each hotel.
Electrical installations
The maintenance of High Voltage electrical installations is governed by Article 12-Chapter II of Royal Decree 3275/1982 of 12 November, which approves the Regulation on technical conditions and safety guarantees in electrical power plants, substations and transformer stations and their ITCs (MIE-RAT).
In the case of Low Voltage installations, R.D. 842/2002, of 2 August, which approves the Low Voltage Electrotechnical Regulation and its ITCs BT 01 to BT 51, is applied. In compliance with this, there will be an annual or half-yearly review, depending on the Autonomous Community, by a company approved in the Low Voltage Electrotechnical Regulation.
In the case of high voltage installations, they must be inspected by OCA every three years.
Low-voltage installations must pass periodic inspections by OCA every 5 years.
Lifting equipment
Reviews are made to comply with the following laws:
R.D. 2291/1985 Regulation of Lifting and Maintenance Equipment, ORDER of 23 September 1987, approving the ITC MIE-AEM 1 of the Regulation of Lifting and Maintenance Equipment.
R.D. 57/2005, of 21 January, establishing requirements for increasing the safety of existing lifts.
R.D. 1314/1997, of 1 August, which lays down the provisions for the application of European Parliament and Council Directive 95/16/EC, on lifts.
Inspections by OCA are required every two years.
Firefighting
The applicable legislation is R.D. 513/2017 of 22 May. It came into force on 12/12/2017 and as the main novelty it provides for the regulatory inspections by OCA to which the facilities must be subjected and also the inspection that can be made by the hotel staff.
A schedule is established for these inspections, depending on the date the establishment starts operations.
It includes the inspection of fire extinguishers and other fire-fighting systems and maintenance must be recorded and kept available for inspection for five years.
Industrial refrigeration
It is governed by the R.D. 138/2011, of 4 February, which approves the safety regulations for refrigeration installations and their technical instructions.
The revisions can be every two or five years and the preventive maintenance is carried out periodically with a frequency that depends on the total installed power. These tasks are contracted out to external companies, except for some that can be carried out by on-site personnel.
Legionella
The regulations to be applied are Royal Decree 865/2003, of 4 July, which establishes the hygiene-sanitary criteria for the prevention and control of Legionnaire’s Disease. Throughout the period of normal operation of the facilities, a programme of maintenance and preventive disinfection must be carried out, which includes tasks to be carried out by on-site personnel and by an approved external control and disinfection company.
How to efficiently manage regulations in hotels
Taking into account the number and diversity of facilities present in a hotel, and therefore the number of rules that need to be observed and managed in order to keep the establishment correctly legalised, it is essential to use tools that facilitate the management of information relating to these in the technical-legal field.
- Cataloguing of the different elements.
- Parameterisation of the regulations.
- Management of the associated documentation.
- Establishment of warnings and alarms.
- Calendar of inspections.
Manual management, on paper or using traditional office automation tools, can be very tedious and also subject to errors that put effective compliance with regulations at risk.
On the contrary, a specific legal asset management tool, based on a centralised information system, will be of great help in the legal maintenance work of the hotel.
Retain platform has a technical-legal management module in which the data is always updated, incorporating intelligence that alerts when an inspection or the expiry of a certain licence is approaching, among many other functionalities.
Do you want more security? Now it is also possible to outsource the legal management of the hotel thanks to services such as those provided by the LLR platform.
Interested? Find out more about the technical-legal asset management offered by the Retain platform, or visit the LLR physical asset legalisation page.
