Certified Safes Ireland™ advice videos

Checking a safe for accredited European certification of burglary resistance

Accredited European certification is the basis for all insurance rate recommendations for safes in Europe, providing a legal proof of standard of burglary resistance for safes designed to protect cash, jewellery, and other valuables to European Standards, EN1143-1 (Safes) and EN1143-2 (Deposit Safes). Additionally, European Standard EN15659 (Light Fire Standard) and EN1047-1 (Data Standard) provide a legal proof of standard for all regulatory requirements related to the secure storage of documents and physical data under European law.

The ultimate protection against misrepresentation, when there is a need to ensure a proof of standard for the storage of cash, jewellery, gold, watch collections, important documents or data, anything less than accredited European certification and the documented assurance it provides can leave an organisation or consumer vulnerable.

The European accreditation system for safe, physical data and strongroom testing and certification bodies is backed by regular auditing and market surveillance to ensure impartiality, non-discriminatory conditions, and structural requirements in compliance with EU Parliament regulation 765/2008, the systems legal basis.

If you consider that 70% of safes tested for burglary resistance by accredited European testing labs fail on the first attempt, the practical implications of accepting unaccredited claims of burglary or fire resistance are obvious.

No connection between the fire resistance and burglary resistance of a safe

A common myth regarding the fire resistance of safes circulated to insurers and consumers is that there is some connection between the grade of a safe and its resistance to fire. This myth has become so pervasive it has not only been repeated in on-line articles, but far more surprisingly, via accredited insurance industry seminars.

A safe, cabinet or strongroom that has been certified to protect paper documents (EN15659) or data (EN1047-1) from fire, will always have a stamped metal plate on the inside of its door. An accredited fire resistance certification will always be indicated separately from the burglary resistance certification a safe, strongroom or cabinet, (EN1143-1) (EN14450), while some units may be intended for fire resistance only.

Under European law, without properly accredited certification of fire resistance, a secure storage unit can only be considered to have a small level of fire resistance related to its material composition regardless of what a supplier, unaccredited fire resistance mark, article or seminar may say otherwise.

Ireland's dangerously outdated regulations for the secure storage of firearms 

Despite substantial investments made by Ireland’s Department of Justice to update the country’s secure storage regulations for firearms, Ireland still has some of the most contradictory and inadequate secure storage regulations for firearms in most of Europe. Particularly concerning are the challenges faced by gun dealers, where compliance with secure storage regulations for bulk firearms and ammunition have become technically impossible, while Ireland’s continued reliance on a soon to be withdrawn British Standard from 1992 in relation to secure storage requirements for private gun owners continues to have serious implications not only for firearm security but European competition rules.

The objective of sharing this video is to initiate discussions that could pave the way for aligning Ireland’s firearm storage regulations with European standards and best practices.

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Certified Safes Ireland™ in-house advisor on keeping jewellery, watch collections, goods, cash, documents and data, safe, secure, yet readily accessible, is Alan Donohoe Redd.

Alan Donohoe Redd is a member of the European Committee for Standardisation (CEN) Working Group responsible for writing European Standards for safes, strongrooms (vaults), secure cabinets and physical data protection for the European Union and a member of the U.S. Underwriters Laboratories (UL) Standards Technical Panel TC72 covering standards for fire resistance of record protection devices. Alan is also a registered NATO supplier and a longstanding member of the European Security Systems Association. Alan has a vast range of experience spanning almost 40 years encompassing installation of safes, strongrooms, physical data protection, firearms security, secure storage of pharmaceuticals as well as access control, doors and equipment used for Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities (SCIFs) in government, military and I.T. sectors.

An expert on standards and fraud issues related to secure storage in Europe, the UK and the use of asbestos in European safe and cabinet manufacturing, Alan has had articles related to these subjects published by The Law Society Gazette and Irish Broker Magazine, has forced retractions of multiple false claims related to secure storage offerings to the public and has been pivotal in having misleading standards and practices recognised and withdrawn in Ireland, the UK and at a European level.

Alan's seminars on safes, strongrooms and high net worth secure storage have been part of Continuing Professional Development for underwriters and insurers having been awarded CPD points by the Insurance Institute of Ireland and the Chartered Insurance Institute (UK).

 Alan's expertise has been relied on by:

N.A.T.O. Europe, The U.S. Air Force (Europe), The National Treasury Management Agency (Ireland), The Department Of Communications (NCSC Cyber Security) (Ireland), The Revenue Commissioners, The Department of Foreign Affairs, Electricity Supply Board (Cyber Security) (Ireland), The Danish Defence Forces (Afghanistan), PayPal (Worldwide), Grant Thornton, The Insurance Institute of Ireland, The Royal College Of Surgeons, An Garda Síochána (Irish police service), BFC Bank, Interxion Data Centres, Isle of Man Gold Bullion, Brown Thomas, Bvlgari, Boodles, Druids Glen, The Shelbourne Hotel, and many others ....