A hotel emergency plan: teams, guests, first aiders and evacuation

A hotel emergency plan is the documented plan the Regulation on Emergencies at Workplaces requires: the emergencies you identified, the four response teams and their support staff, evacuation routes and muster points, first aiders under the First Aid Regulation, and how you account for staff and guests, including at night. Drills run at least once a year.

For example: at 03:00 the alarm sounds on the fourth floor. The night manager has a handful of staff on duty, several hundred guests are asleep, and some of them will not understand the announcement. The plan is the only thing that decides what happens next. After reading this article you will be able to check your hotel emergency plan against the regulation's ratios, staff each team by shift, and build the guest accounting routine the regulation does not count for you.

What does Turkish law require a hotel emergency plan to contain?#

A documented plan, prepared from the risk assessment, that names the emergencies you identified, the measures that prevent or limit them, the people appointed, the response and evacuation methods, and an evacuation plan. It carries preparation and validity dates and is drilled at least once a year.

The duty sits with the employer and comes from the Regulation on Emergencies at Workplaces (opens in a new tab) (Resmî Gazete 18 June 2013, No. 28681; amended 1 October 2021, No. 31615). Article 12 fixes the minimum contents: the workplace's title and address and the employer's name, those who prepared the plan, preparation and validity dates, the emergencies identified, preventive and limiting measures, response and evacuation methods, and an evacuation plan.

The Ministry of Labour and Social Security's Emergency Plan Preparation Guide (opens in a new tab) (ÇSGB İSGGM, 2017, updated 2024) adds two practical items to that list: the assembly point and the details of the nearest hospital. Both belong in the document, not in someone's head.

The plan is an output of the risk assessment#

The guide calls the emergency plan an output of the risk assessment, and lists the stages: identify emergencies, take preventive and limiting measures, identify the people to appoint, set response and evacuation methods, document, drill, renew. In practice, that means the plan cannot be written before the risk assessment exists, and a copy-and-paste plan from another building will not survive either an inspection or a real alarm.

Name the people who prepared the plan inside the plan. In practice that is the safety expert with the general manager, and the signature matters when an inspector or an insurer asks. Hazard class drives every number in the rest of this article, so settle it first with your safety expert and confirm your own case with them or your legal adviser. See also safety expert and workplace doctor for hotels: hazard class and required time.

Regulation and guide: which is the duty and which is the method#

Separate the two layers. The regulation's articles state the duty. The guide says its detailed points are recommendations (tavsiye niteliğinde). Use the guide as method, the regulation as the floor.

Which emergencies should a hotel plan for?#

Start from your own risk assessment, but a hotel normally plans for fire, earthquake, flood, gas leak, power loss, food poisoning, sabotage and hazardous chemical release. The Ministry guide gives example preventive measures and response methods for most of these.

The guide gives worked examples for fire, explosion, natural disasters, food poisoning, sabotage and hazardous chemical release. Use them as a starting list, then delete what your building cannot produce and add what it can. A hotel's specific exposures are the ones a sleeping population creates: guests who do not know the exits, a thin night shift, and a building where the kitchen, the boiler room, the pool plant and the laundry each carry their own hazard.

Preventive measures and limiting measures are not the same thing#

Keep two columns for every scenario: measures that prevent it, and measures that limit it once it has started. A gas detector is prevention. A shut-off valve and a trained hand to close it is limitation. The same split applies to fire: compartmentation and a clean escape route limit what a fire does even when prevention has already failed.

Power loss deserves its own page, because the alarm, the lifts, the tills, the door locks and the corridor lighting all depend on it. Decide the first hour before it happens; see power cut at the hotel: a checklist for the first hour and the generator. Earthquake planning is not only evacuation: it includes shut-offs, a place to muster away from glass and facades, and a decision on whether the building is safe to re-enter.

Do not list a scenario you cannot train for. A plan with twelve scenarios and one drill is a document, not a capability.

How many emergency team members does a hotel need?#

At least one suitably equipped and specially trained support person for each of the extinguishing, rescue and protection teams for every 30 employees in very hazardous workplaces, every 40 in hazardous and every 50 in less hazardous, with the multiples counted inclusively (Article 11).

There are four teams: extinguishing, rescue, protection and first aid. The first three are staffed under the emergencies regulation. First aiders are appointed under the First Aid Regulation, which is why the two counts differ.

Counting employees inclusively#

Counting is inclusive: 30, 40 and 50 and their multiples. In a less hazardous workplace, 50 employees need one support person per team, and 51 need two. The ratios count employees, so seasonal, outsourced and contract staff need a decision from your safety expert on how they enter the count and the drill.

Each team also has a team leader. First aiders are counted separately under the First Aid Regulation.

In workplaces with fewer than 10 employees, one trained and equipped employee may be appointed for all three teams and for liaison with national and local bodies. That is a legal allowance, not a recommendation for a 60-room hotel with a night shift.

Night shift and deputies#

Shift patterns are considered when appointing support staff and deputies. A hotel runs 24 hours, so the night shift needs its own named team, not a name borrowed from the day. The list of support staff, with names, titles, areas of responsibility and contact details, is posted visibly at eye level. Replace people when they leave or move, and update the list the same day.

Practical check: write the roster out by shift and by team. The gaps are usually at night, at weekends and in the kitchen during service. For how the hazard class is set and who signs it off, see safety expert and workplace doctor for hotels.

How many first aiders does a hotel need, and what certificate do they hold?#

One first aider for every 20 employees in less hazardous workplaces, one for up to every 15 in hazardous and one for up to every 10 in very hazardous (First Aid Regulation, Article 19). Training lasts 16 hours and the certificate is valid for three years.

The first aid team is the fourth emergency team, but its numbers come from the Ministry of Health's First Aid Regulation (opens in a new tab) (Resmî Gazete 29 July 2015, No. 29429; amended 27 August 2020 and 27 December 2025), not from the emergencies regulation.

Training 16 hours · certificate valid 3 years · update in the 3 months before expiry.

Certificate validity and the three-month window#

Update training must be taken in the three months before the certificate expires, and the certificate of anyone who does not take it becomes invalid (Article 23). Keep a table of expiry dates, not a folder of certificates. Plan the 16 hours as a cost and as a rota problem: it is two working days per person.

Cover every shift. A hotel with a first aider only on the day shift has no first aider at 03:00, which is exactly when the front desk is alone. Place first aiders where incidents happen: kitchen, pool deck, front desk, housekeeping floors. Name a second person for each of those areas.

The plan must say who calls 112, what they say (address, nearest entrance, floor, number of casualties) and who goes to the entrance to meet the ambulance. A guest falling ill is a routine, not only an emergency; see when a hotel guest falls ill: a response routine from the first call to the follow-up.

How does a hotel account for guests during an evacuation?#

Print the in-house list at every shift change, carry it to the muster point, and reconcile it room by room against the people standing there. The routine has to work for guests who are asleep, guests who need help to move, and guests who do not speak Turkish.

The list needs room number, guest name, number of occupants, arrival and departure dates and group name. Print it, because the system may be down or the front desk may be unstaffed when the alarm sounds.

The printed list and the room-by-room reconciliation#

Reconcile by room, not by name. Unaccounted rooms are what you report to the fire crew, with the floor and the side of the building, and that report is more useful than a headcount. Account for staff too: a roll call by department at the muster point, taken from the shift roster, not from memory.

Guests who need help to evacuate#

Record at check-in, discreetly, whether a guest would need assistance to evacuate. The plan names who checks on those rooms and how: a knock, a key, a colleague at the door. For language, prepare the key instructions as short printed cards and pictograms in the languages your guests actually speak. Pictograms work when no shared language exists, and the front desk should know which staff can translate on the night.

Groups and children: use the group leader as the contact, count children with their adult, and keep the group list separate from the individual rooms. Nobody re-enters the building until the fire service authorises it. Staff who live on site are in the plan as residents, not only as employees.

Where should the muster point be, and who runs the night?#

A muster point is the open, signed place where everyone gathers to be counted. It must be far enough from the building to be clear of glass and falling debris, reachable without passing the hazard, and known to the night manager, who runs the first minutes until 112 and the fire crew take over.

Choose a primary and an alternative, because wind direction, a blocked exit or a fire on one side of the building can rule the first one out. Mark both on the evacuation plan posted on each floor and behind each guest room door.

The night manager's first actions, in order: confirm what the alarm is, call 112, send someone to the entrance to meet the crew, start the evacuation of the affected floor and the floors above, take the list to the muster point. Name the people who close the gas, the electricity, the kitchen equipment and the pool plant, by shift. "The technical manager" is not a name at 03:00. Lifts are not used in a fire, and the person who checks the lifts and the accessible routes is named in the plan.

The Ministry guide recommends filming drills, because the camera finds what the debrief forgets: the blocked corridor, the exit door that needs two hands, the announcement nobody heard.

How do you keep an emergency plan alive across seasons and staff turnover?#

Drills at least once a year, a named owner, and a renewal trigger list: new building areas, new hazards, new staff, new shifts. A plan that is not drilled and not updated is a folder.

Article 13 requires drills at least once a year in workplaces other than mines. The Ministry guide adds that a drill means choosing a scenario, that it can be announced or unannounced, and that filming it helps find shortcomings. Seasonal staff should be briefed before the season starts and added to the support staff list with a deputy, with the posted list updated the same week.

Renewal triggers: a new annex, a new kitchen line, a new pool or spa, a change of hazard class, a change in the shift pattern, a real event, or a drill that found a gap. Also renew when the validity date on the plan runs out. Review the guest-facing parts every season: the language cards, the assistance question at check-in, the muster point signage and the room door plans.

Drill evidence that survives an inspection#

Keep the evidence together: drill date, scenario, participants, findings, actions taken, and the updated plan with new preparation and validity dates. Post the support staff list where it is actually read, at eye level: the staff entrance, the back office, the security desk. A list in the general manager's office meets no one. A real incident is also a record: the first hours of a work accident follow their own procedure, and the emergency plan should say who starts it; see a work accident in a hotel: the first hours, the SGK notice and the records, and occupational health and safety in hotels: a department-by-department checklist.

What to do next#

Take the current plan out of the folder and check three things against today's reality: the four teams by shift against the current headcount and hazard class, the first aider certificates against their expiry dates, and the printed in-house list against the rooms you actually sell. Then book the drill date and write it in the plan. The regulation sets the floor, the ratios set the numbers, and the guest routine is what the plan is really for.