The Second Commute: Auditing Lifts, Stairs and Service Access Before a UK Office Lease

Most office viewings follow a predictable choreography. The agent meets the prospective tenant in reception, ushers them into a lift, and within ninety seconds the conversation has moved to ceiling heights, meeting rooms and the quality of the kitchen. The floor plate becomes the subject; the means of reaching it is treated as plumbing — necessary, unglamorous and assumed to work.

For a small team, that assumption can be costly. A single lift taken out of service for repair, a goods route that cannot accommodate a pallet of monitors, or a stairwell that feels hazardous at 8.45am can turn an otherwise sensible office choice into a daily irritant. The vertical journey deserves the same scrutiny as the lease terms. At Domain Office Search, we treat access as part of the workspace comparison, not an afterthought.

Why the journey between street and desk matters

Vertical circulation is a shared service. Unlike the suite itself, it is rarely within the tenant's direct control, and it is used by everyone in the building at roughly the same time. That combination — shared, landlord-controlled and peak-loaded — makes it a reliable source of friction when demand exceeds capacity.

Small businesses are not immune. A ten-person team may occupy a modest suite, but its staff still arrive, leave, receive deliveries and evacuate alongside hundreds of others. If the building has two lifts serving twelve floors and a single goods lift booked in half-hour slots, the tenant's operational flexibility is partly determined by machinery they do not own.

The purpose of an access audit is not to demand perfection. It is to establish whether the building's vertical capacity matches the team's working pattern, and whether the lease and service charge arrangements make that capacity transparent.

Measuring the morning peak without guesswork

A midday viewing tells you very little about lift performance. Ask to visit between 8.30am and 9.15am on a normal weekday, and again around 5.30pm if the team expects to leave en masse. Observe rather than rely on assurances.

Useful checks include:

• Wait times at the lobby. Time three or four lift arrivals. Note whether people queue, whether the queue spills into the street, and whether there is a separate route for cyclists or visitors.
• Destination control and access cards. Some buildings use destination dispatch systems that group passengers by floor. These can improve throughput, but only if staff understand them. Ask how visitors are handled.
• Reception and turnstile friction. A security desk that requires every guest to be escorted may be appropriate for a financial firm and burdensome for a creative studio receiving couriers.
• Lift car capacity. Note the stated load limit and the practical number of people who fit comfortably. A car rated for thirteen may feel full at eight if everyone carries a bag.
• Out-of-hours access. If the team works late or at weekends, confirm whether lifts operate normally and whether access cards permit the journey without a security escort.

Record what you see. A simple table of time, wait and destination is more persuasive in negotiations than a general impression that the lobby felt busy.

Reading the lift's service record

Lifts are lifting equipment, and passenger lifts in the UK are subject to thorough examination under the Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998, commonly known as LOLER. In practice, that means a competent person should examine passenger lifts at least every six months. The landlord or managing agent should be able to confirm that examinations are up to date.

Ask for more than a compliance certificate. A building's lift history is a useful indicator of reliability:

• The maintenance contract and the response time for breakdowns.
• The number of call-outs in the past twelve months and the average time to restore service.
• Whether the lifts are original to the building or have been modernised, and whether spare parts are readily available.
• Whether there is a lift maintenance reserve in the service charge budget, and how replacement would be funded.

A landlord is not obliged to hand over every maintenance invoice, but a summary of recent performance and planned works is a reasonable request during due diligence. If the response is evasive, that itself is information.

The stair alternative

Stairs are not merely a fire escape. In a well-designed building they provide a usable everyday route for those who prefer to walk, for teams on lower floors and for moments when the lift queue is intolerable.

Check whether the main staircase is accessible during normal hours, whether doors are heavy or held open, and whether the stair is well lit and clean. A fire stair that doubles as a storage route for bins or deliveries is a warning sign. So is a building where the only everyday stair is external and unheated.

Accessibility requires specific attention. Confirm the step-free route from the street to the suite, the dimensions of lift door openings and car interiors, and the location of accessible WCs. The Equality Act 2010 places duties on service providers and employers, but the practical question for a tenant is who controls the route and who pays for adjustments. Raise this before heads of terms are agreed, not after.

Goods in, waste out

Small teams still receive equipment, furniture, archive boxes and catering. A passenger lift pressed into goods service is a common source of friction with other tenants.

Ask how deliveries are handled. Is there a loading bay, a goods lift and a booking system? What are the permitted delivery hours? Where do couriers wait? How is waste moved from the suite to the bin store, and does that route pass through the main lobby? If the building has no goods lift, establish whether stair carries are permitted and who is responsible for any damage.

For a team that expects growth, test the route with a realistic item: a pallet of monitors, a compact desk, a cycle. The answer will reveal more than a floor plan can.

Evacuation is the other side of the lift question

Lifts are normally out of service during a fire evacuation. The audit should therefore include the stairs as an evacuation route, not just a daily convenience. Ask for the building's fire strategy summary, the location of assembly points, and whether there are refuges for people who cannot use stairs. Confirm that personal emergency evacuation plans can be arranged for staff who need them. Under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, the responsible person for the building must manage fire safety, but tenants need to understand how their staff fit into the arrangements.

Put access into the commercial conversation

Service charge budgets often contain a lift maintenance line, but the tenant may have little visibility of how it is spent. Ask for the relevant service charge headings and any caps on recoverable costs. If the landlord plans a lift replacement during the term, clarify how disruption will be managed and whether rent abatement applies.

The office that looks calm on a Tuesday at 11am may tell a different story on a Monday at 8.50am. A short, structured access audit — peak-time observation, maintenance questions, stair and goods checks, and an evacuation conversation — gives a small team a clearer picture of what it is really signing up to. The floor plate may be the headline, but the journey to it is part of the daily working experience.