Firework Safety Information for Retailers

If you sell or supply fireworks, there are a number of issues that you need to be aware of, including:

• Know your duties under the legislation governing the sale and storage of fireworks.  In addition to general responsibilities under health and safety at work and fire safety laws, the key regulations of particular relevance to the storage and sale of fireworks are the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999; the Manufacture and Storage of Explosives Regulations 2005 (MSER), the Firework Safety regulations 1997 and the Fireworks Regulations 2004. 

• You must carry out a risk assessment.  This involves thinking about what might go wrong and harm people– the risk of a fire breaking out, for example - and then what action you must take to ensure that it doesn’t.  The HSE have produced a checklist to help you carry out a risk assessment and this can be downloaded from their website.  If you have more than five employees, you must record the risks identified in this assessment and the precautions you have taken to deal with them.

• You must register or obtain a licence to be permitted to store fireworks for sale.  Depending on your location, you’ll need to apply either to Trading Standards or the Fire Service.

•  Unless you have a special licence, you can only sell fireworks during the following periods: from 15 October to 10 November; from 26 December to 31 December; the first day of Chinese New Year and the three days immediately preceding it; and on Diwali and the three days immediately preceding it.

•  Fireworks must be stored safely in accordance with the relevant legislation. 

•  You must display an A3 size notice (or the poster produced by the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (DBERR) that you can download from their website) in a prominent position, reminding customers of the law relating to under-age sales and possession. 

•  Fireworks must not be sold to anyone under the age of 18. 

• It is illegal to sell caps, cracker snaps, novelty matches, party poppers, serpents and throwdowns to anyone under the age of 16.

•  You must only sell fireworks that comply with British Standard BS 7114 and meet certain noise conditions.

•  Fireworks must be sold in the manufacturers’ packed sets.  Boxes of fireworks mustn’t be split and sold separately.

More information about firework safety and the relevant legislation can be found on the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform’s and the Health and Safety Executive’s websites.

 

To find out more about carrying out risk assessments and obtain a competitive quote for your shop insurance, contact your chosen Cherrypicked Insurance broker.

Sources:  Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.  Health and Safety Executive

 

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