Do you have a valid, current legionella risk assessment in place for the building you are responsible for? If you don’t, you could well be setting yourself up for a variety of health and safety issues that could be extremely serious indeed – you may even risk fines or imprisonment.
In the Health and Safety at Work Act (1974), it states that the responsible person has a duty of care to ensure that all his or her employees, those who visit the building, and any members of the public who might enter or even be nearby are kept safe. They should not be exposed to health and safety risks, particularly if those risks can be minimised or removed altogether.
A legionella risk assessment will show you the areas that could cause problems in this regard. Having an up to date report means that you can see where the issues lie and see what recommendations are made to deal with them. This means your staff, colleagues, tenants, visitors, and members of the public can be kept much safer, and you will be fulfilling your obligations under the Health and Safety At Work Act (1974).
Not only this, but if you don’t have a risk assessment and you fail to assess the legionella risk in your building (or employ an expert to do it for you, which is a much better idea) then you are being non-compliant with Section 3(2) of the Health and Safety at Work Act (1974).
This could lead to a court date and being prosecuted by the Health and Safety Executive. The bottom line is that, by scheduling a regular legionella risk assessment you are demonstrating due diligence, while failure to do so could be considered negligent.