The Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Alarm (England) Regulations 2015 were amended in 2022, and the amendment is the part most landlords have not absorbed. It took effect on 1 October 2022.
What the rules are now
Smoke alarms
At least one on every storey used wholly or partly as living accommodation. A storey with only a bathroom or a landing still counts if any part of it is living accommodation. Loft conversions and cellars in use count as storeys.
Carbon monoxide alarms — the 2022 change
In every room used as living accommodation containing a fixed combustion appliance, other than a gas cooker.
Before 2022 the CO duty applied only to solid fuel appliances — a wood burner or an open fire. The amendment extended it to gas boilers, gas fires and oil boilers. That is the change, and it is the one that catches people: a flat with a gas boiler in the kitchen needed no CO alarm in 2021 and needs one now.
The gas cooker exclusion is narrow. A gas cooker is excluded; a gas boiler or fire in the same room is not.
Repair
You must repair or replace an alarm as soon as reasonably practicable once told it is faulty. Practically, that means the day the tenant tells you, and it is why the report date matters — the same principle as Awaab's Law.
At the start of a tenancy
Alarms must be tested and working on the first day of the tenancy. Not installed — working, and checked.
The penalty
A local authority serves a remedial notice; failure to comply attracts a civil penalty of up to £5,000. It is a civil penalty with a real ceiling, untouched by LASPO — see why legislation.gov.uk shows the wrong fine.
The greater exposure is not the £5,000. A working alarm is a standard condition of almost every HMO and selective licence, so a missing one breaches the licence too — a second, separately punishable failure under s.249A.
Wales
The 2015 Regulations as amended are England. In Wales the equivalent duties come through the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 fitness for human habitation requirements, which require working smoke alarms on each storey and CO alarms where there is a combustion appliance. The practical standard is close; the instrument is different.
A five-minute audit
- Count storeys with living accommodation. One smoke alarm each, minimum.
- Walk every room. Fixed combustion appliance that is not a gas cooker? CO alarm.
- Check the boiler room specifically — the commonest gap since 2022.
- Test at every tenancy start and record the date.
Keep the record per property. Landlord HQ tracks obligations and dates so the evidence exists before anyone asks. See what it costs.
Information tool, not legal advice.