For insurers, MGAs and commercial brokers
Your hospitality book carries a TR19 endorsement. We can tell you whether it is being complied with.
Most hospitality risks are underwritten on a proposal form, a statement of fact and perhaps a cleaning certificate on file. It is unusual for anyone to physically look inside the extraction system at inception. We survey it, at our cost, and report what is actually there to you and to the policyholder.
What a TR19 endorsement actually obliges
TR19 is guidance published by BESA, not legislation. Nothing in statute names it. What makes it binding on a policyholder is the policy itself — and the wording of the clause decides what the customer must do and what happens if they do not.
In practice we see three patterns, and policyholders rarely distinguish between them:
A condition precedent to liability
The strictest form. Compliance is a precondition of the insurer being on risk for the relevant loss. Policyholders very often do not realise this is what they have signed.
A warranty
Since the Insurance Act 2015, breach suspends cover rather than discharging the contract outright, and cover resumes once the breach is remedied. Section 11 also limits reliance on a term where the breach could not have increased the risk of the loss that actually happened.
A bare condition or a risk-improvement requirement
Breach sounds in damages or affects renewal terms rather than defeating the claim.
Whichever applies, the customer has to be able to evidence compliance, and a certificate on its own is weak evidence. A certificate can be issued after a partial clean. It can cover a canopy while the ductwork was never opened. Without pre- and post-clean measurements and a written scope, it records that someone attended — not that the system is clean.
General information about how these clauses commonly operate, not legal advice. Your own wording governs.
The complimentary post-inception survey
For eligible new hospitality policies, we will survey the extraction system at our own cost and send the findings to both you and the policyholder. Up to 20 surveys per insurer per calendar month, against a total capacity of around 100 surveys a month.
- 1The policy goes live.
- 2With the policyholder's agreement, you or the placing broker send us the business name, site address, contact details, policy number, trade and inception date.
- 3We contact the customer within one working day and arrange the visit around their trading hours and safe access.
- 4We carry out the survey on site.
- 5Within five working days, you and the policyholder each receive the same report — photographs, measurements, findings and recommended actions.
What we inspect
- Canopy, filters and plenum
- Internal ductwork
- Access panels, and where access is missing
- The extraction fan
- The external discharge point
- Grease deposit measurements, in microns, at named points
- Existing TR19 certificates and previous cleaning reports
- Cooking methods and actual operating hours
- Anything that could not be safely inspected, and why
How findings are reported
No immediate concern identified and the available evidence appears satisfactory.
Action is recommended within a stated timescale.
Urgent risk improvement required. Reported to you immediately, without waiting for the written report.
The system could not be fully assessed because of access or safety limitations. Recorded as unknown rather than assumed satisfactory.
We report a grey outcome as unknown rather than quietly grading it green. An inaccessible system is a different risk from a clean one, and the distinction is exactly what tends to get lost.
The annual-cleaning condition, and where it goes wrong
Conditions frequently require kitchen extract cleaning “at least once every twelve months”. That is appropriate for a lightly used kitchen. It is not appropriate for a busy takeaway, restaurant or hotel running long hours, and BESA guidance sets frequency by use rather than by the calendar:
| Usage level | Typical operating hours | Recommended frequency |
|---|---|---|
| Heavy use | 12–16 hours per day | Every 3 months |
| Moderate use | 6–12 hours per day | Every 6 months |
| Light use | 2–6 hours per day | Every 12 months |
Hours of cooking a day are the rule. As typical examples, a takeaway or busy pub kitchen cooking twelve hours or more a day falls in the heavy band, and a school or office kitchen used for a few hours is usually light. The practical consequence is that a policyholder can hold a valid twelve-month certificate and still have a system that needed cleaning twice in that period. Our report gives a frequency for the individual kitchen rather than applying one cycle to every risk in the book.
The questions you would reasonably ask
You are connected to a broker. Is this independent?
BlueTick is a separate family business from Focus Insurance Services. Focus receives no commission, referral fee or other payment from these surveys or from any cleaning that follows. The report stands on its own regardless of who carries out any remedial work.
Is this a free survey that turns into a sales visit?
Where work is needed we will say so, explain it, suggest a timescale and provide a separate quotation. The policyholder is under no obligation to appoint us and can use any suitably qualified contractor and send you the evidence. Where a system is already satisfactory we will report it as satisfactory — we have carried out inspection-only visits and charged for the inspection rather than selling a clean that was not required.
Who actually carries out the survey?
Our principal surveyor, who holds the BESA Academy Grease Hygiene Technician (GHT3) and Grease Hygiene Operative (GHO3) qualifications and the CII Level 3 Certificate in Insurance. The GHT3 covers risk assessment, testing, reporting and access-panel requirements. The CII qualification is why the report is written with an underwriter in mind and not only a kitchen operator.
Are you VHR registered?
No, and we do not describe ourselves as VHR approved. Surveys are led by a BESA Academy-qualified technician using a consistent TR19-aligned inspection and reporting process. We would rather tell you that plainly than have you find it out later.
Can a small contractor service a book?
Current capacity is around 100 surveys a month in total, which is why each participating insurer is allocated up to 20. We would rather cap the allocation and meet it than accept volume we cannot survey properly. We currently cover Peterborough, Cambridge, Northampton, Lincoln, Leicester, Nottingham and Derby, and the surrounding towns within 70 miles of Peterborough and Fenland.
Is this a fire risk assessment?
No, and it should not be recorded as one. This is a TR19 Grease hygiene condition survey: measured grease deposition, a condition grading and a recommended cleaning frequency for that kitchen. A fire risk assessment under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 is a separate exercise, owned by the responsible person and carried out by a competent assessor across the whole premises. Our report is evidence that assessment can draw on. It does not replace it, and we do not sign it off.
What insurance do you carry?
Public liability to £5m, employers’ liability, and professional indemnity to £250,000 any one claim. Certificates and schedules are available on request.
What you get back, monthly
Alongside the individual reports, a monthly summary across your hospitality portfolio: referrals received, customers contacted, surveys arranged and completed, the split of green, amber, red and grey outcomes, missing or expired cleaning evidence, recommended frequencies, risks needing urgent attention, and remedial work completed.
The service cannot guarantee that a loss will not occur. It is designed to identify avoidable extraction-related fire exposure early, and to give you evidence rather than declarations.
A fifteen-minute call
We can show you the report format, walk through the referral process and answer any technical, compliance or data-sharing questions. A small number of test referrals would let your underwriting team judge the reports before anything wider is agreed. If you can point us to the right person internally, that is just as useful.
Background on the standard itself: what a TR19 certificate proves and what it must contain