Fire door assemblies must be inspected and tested annually by a qualified person, and the results documented. Most commercial buildings in Ontario have fire doors that would fail that inspection today — usually for reasons the building owner has no idea are problems.
Gamble Lock inspects, documents and repairs fire-rated door assemblies for commercial, retail, institutional and multi-site property portfolios across Ontario and nationally. We have been servicing commercial door openings since 1971.
What the requirement actually is
The Ontario Fire Code requires that closures in fire separations be maintained in operating condition. For fire-rated door assemblies, the referenced standard is NFPA 80, Standard for Fire Doors and Other Opening Protectives, which sets out an annual inspection and testing regime and requires that records be retained and made available to the authority having jurisdiction.
In practice this means three things for a building owner or property manager:
- Every fire-rated door assembly in the building is inspected at least once a year
- Deficiencies are corrected without delay
- Written records are kept and produced on request during a fire inspection
A fire door that has been painted over, wedged open, drilled for a sign, or fitted with a closer that no longer shuts it is not a compliant assembly — regardless of whether it was compliant the day it was installed.
The 13-point inspection
NFPA 80 sets out the criteria a swinging fire door assembly is inspected against. Every opening we inspect is assessed on all thirteen:
- Labels are present and legible
- No holes or breaks in the door or frame
- Glazing, glass kits and glazing beads are intact and securely fastened
- Door, frame and hardware are in proper working order
- No missing or broken parts
- Door clearances are within allowable limits
- The closer or spring hinges are operational and the door is self-closing
- On pairs, the coordinator closes the leaves in the correct sequence
- The door self-latches in the closed position
- No auxiliary items interfere with operation
- No field modifications have been made that would void the label
- Gasketing and edge seals, where required, are present, continuous and of the correct type
- Signage does not exceed the permitted coverage and is not attached with metal fasteners
What we find most often
After decades of inspecting commercial openings, the same failures come up again and again. None of them are exotic, and most were created by well-meaning people solving a different problem:
- Labels painted over or removed. A repaint cycle covers the label, and the assembly can no longer be verified as rated. This is one of the most common findings in older retail and office buildings.
- Doors wedged or propped open. Usually in service corridors, loading areas and stairwells. A fire door that is held open by anything other than an approved hold-open device tied to the alarm is a failed opening.
- Field-drilled holes. Someone adds a pull, a sign, a card reader or a kick plate and drills through the door or frame. Holes beyond what the standard allows void the label.
- Closers that no longer close. Worn, leaking, or adjusted so far down that the door stops short of the latch. A door that does not latch does not hold back fire.
- Misaligned strikes and racked frames. Common in high-traffic openings and in buildings that have settled. The door closes but does not latch.
- Failed coordinators on pairs. The inactive leaf closes second or not at all, so the astragal never seats.
- Missing or compressed gasketing. Smoke seals that have hardened, torn, or been removed during a hardware change.
- Non-rated hardware installed during a repair. A locksmith or handyman replaces a lockset or closer with whatever matched the hole pattern, not whatever carried the right listing.
How fire door inspection is priced
Inspection is quoted per opening. We do not publish a rate card, because the per-door number moves considerably depending on the job — a quoted price that ignored these factors would be wrong often enough to be useless to you.
What actually drives it:
- How many openings are on site. The mobilisation is the same whether we inspect six doors or sixty, so the per-door rate falls sharply with volume.
- How many sites are in the program. Portfolio clients are priced on the whole program rather than site by site, and a scheduled annual program costs less than ad-hoc visits.
- Whether a door schedule already exists. If the building has never been inspected, year one includes building the schedule from scratch. Year two is faster and cheaper.
- Access. Tenanted space, secure areas, after-hours or weekend-only access all change the labour.
- Location. Sites within our own service territory are cheaper than remote locations.
We will quote within two business days of knowing your site count and approximate door count. If you do not know your door count, we can establish it on the first visit.
Repairs are quoted separately once the inspection identifies what needs correcting. Many deficiencies — closer adjustment, strike alignment, gasketing replacement, hardware swaps — are corrected on the spot during the inspection visit where the parts are on the truck, which avoids a second mobilisation charge. We will tell you before we start which items we can close out same-visit.
What you get
Every inspection produces a written record you can hand to a fire inspector:
- An itemised report for every opening, identified by location and door number
- Pass or fail against each of the thirteen criteria
- Photographs of each deficiency
- A prioritised remediation quote, separating life-safety failures from housekeeping items
- A door schedule you can reuse for next year’s inspection and for future capital planning
For portfolio clients we maintain the schedule between visits, so year two is faster and cheaper than year one.
We repair what we find
An inspection report on its own does not make a building compliant. The advantage of using a door company rather than an inspection-only firm is that the same organisation closes out the deficiencies.
Gamble Lock carries hollow metal doors and frames, fire-rated hardware, closers, exit devices, gasketing and glazing, and we fabricate and install replacement openings where a door is beyond repair. That includes label-compliant repairs that preserve the rating rather than voiding it.
Multi-site and national portfolios
We run scheduled inspection programs across national retail, banking and property management portfolios, coordinated centrally and reported in a consistent format across every site. If you manage buildings in more than one province, we can run the whole program through a single point of contact rather than a separate vendor in each market.
Common questions
How often do fire doors need to be inspected?
Annually, by a qualified person, with records retained. Newly installed assemblies are also subject to an acceptance inspection before being put into service.
Who is allowed to inspect a fire door?
NFPA 80 requires inspection by a person with knowledge and understanding of the operating components of the type of door being subject to testing. In practice, authorities having jurisdiction expect a qualified door and hardware technician, not general building staff.
What happens if a door fails?
Deficiencies must be corrected without delay. A failed opening is not automatically a code violation if it is being actively remediated — what creates exposure is an uninspected, undocumented building.
Can a fire door be repaired, or does it have to be replaced?
Most deficiencies are repairable. Closers, latching hardware, gasketing, glazing and strikes can all be corrected without affecting the rating, provided the replacement components carry the correct listing and the work is done to the standard. Doors with extensive field modification or structural damage generally need replacement.
Book a fire door inspection
Tell us how many buildings and roughly how many fire-rated openings you have, and we will come back with a per-opening rate and a proposed schedule.
Call 905-895-3348 or email info@gamblelock.com.
