Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans (PEEPs): Templates, Assistants, Privacy and Annual Review

A PEEP is appropriate for any occupant who cannot evacuate independently in an emergency. This includes: occupants with permanent mobility impairments (wheelchair users, occupants using walkers or canes, occupants with cardiopulmonary conditions that limit stair-climbing), occupants with visual impairments (blind or low-vision occupants who need a sighted guide to navigate egress routes that depend on visual signage), occupants with hearing impairments (deaf or hard-of-hearing occupants who need visual alerting to supplement or replace audible alarms), occupants with cognitive impairments (developmental disabilities, severe anxiety disorders, autism-spectrum conditions, dementia in healthcare settings, where simplified instructions or familiar-face escort is needed), and occupants with temporary impairments (post-surgical recovery, late-stage pregnancy, recent injury with crutches or cast). The decision to develop a PEEP is voluntary on the part of the occupant — disability privacy requires that the occupant request or consent to the PEEP — and the offer of a PEEP should be made through HR or a disability support office during onboarding and annually thereafter. Existing occupants may develop new impairments and should be reminded periodically that PEEPs are available.

A complete PEEP template includes the following sections: (1) Occupant identification — name, work location (floor, area, room), normal work hours, supervisor, emergency contact. (2) Impairment description — type of impairment, specific limitations (cannot climb stairs, cannot hear alarms above 60 dBA, requires simplified instructions), any assistive devices normally used (wheelchair type, cane, hearing aids). (3) Assistance required — specific actions the occupant needs from others (transfer to evacuation chair, sighted guidance, visual signaling, escort to area of refuge). (4) Designated assistants — names and contact information for primary and backup assistants, both of whom work in the same area as the occupant. (5) Egress procedure — specific step-by-step procedure for evacuating this occupant, including the assigned route, the area of refuge if used, the two-way communication procedure, the hand-off to responders. (6) Communication procedure — how the occupant will be alerted, how the assistants will be alerted, how the occupant will communicate with the area-of-refuge attended location. (7) Annual review — date of last review, signature of occupant, signature of emergency coordinator. (8) Confidentiality — statement that the PEEP is confidential under ADA and other disability privacy law.

Assistants should be co-workers in the same area as the occupant — typically within 30 to 50 feet — so that the assistant can reach the occupant within 30 to 60 seconds of the alarm. Two assistants are designated (primary and backup) so that the occupant has assistance even if the primary is absent, in another building, or otherwise unavailable on the day of the event. Recruitment is voluntary — assistants must consent to the role and be trained on the specific procedure for the occupant they are assisting. Best practice: the emergency coordinator asks for volunteers in each work area; in healthy organizational cultures, volunteers come forward willingly and the role is seen as a positive expression of community responsibility. Assistants should be physically capable of the assistance required — operating an evacuation chair requires upper-body strength, sighted-guide procedure requires good vision and ability to move steadily, escorting an anxious occupant requires patience and calmness. Two-person evacuation chair operation requires that both assistants be trained and available; chair operation should not be attempted by a single untrained person. Annual refresher training reinforces the procedure and the relationship between occupant and assistants.

PEEPs contain disability information that is protected under ADA Title I (employment), ADA Title III (public accommodations), Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, and various state privacy laws. The occupant's medical condition, the specific impairment, and the assistance required are confidential and may not be shared beyond the people with a legitimate need to know — typically the occupant themselves, the designated assistants, the emergency coordinator, the HR representative responsible for the PEEP program, and (under controlled access in an actual event) the responding fire department. PEEPs are not posted publicly, are not included in general staff directories, and are not shared with co-workers who are not designated assistants. Storage is in a secure location accessible to the emergency coordinator and the area's designated assistants but not to the general staff; many facilities use a sealed envelope at the fire command center or a password-protected electronic document. In an actual event, the on-scene incident commander is given access to the PEEPs for the building so responders can find and evacuate occupants who need assistance. Privacy protection during normal operations does not override safety in an event.

PEEPs should be reviewed at least annually, more frequently if any of the following changes occur: the occupant's impairment changes (improves, worsens, new impairment develops), the occupant's work location changes (moves to a different floor, different building, different area), the building's egress configuration changes (renovation, new exit, area-of-refuge added or removed), the designated assistants change (assistant leaves the organization, moves to a different area, is no longer able to perform the role), or the building's emergency plan is updated. The annual review is typically conducted in a 30-minute meeting with the occupant, the emergency coordinator and ideally the designated assistants — the meeting walks through the PEEP, validates the procedure, identifies any changes needed, and signs off on the updated PEEP. The review meeting can be combined with the annual PEEP-specific drill (the assistants and occupant walk through the actual evacuation procedure, identifying any operational issues). New employees with disabilities should be offered a PEEP during onboarding, with the first PEEP review within 30 to 60 days of start date.

PEEPs are individualized supplements to the building evacuation plan, not replacements for it. The building plan defines the egress routes, areas of refuge, assembly points and accountability framework that the PEEPs operate within. The PEEP specifies how a particular occupant uses that framework. For example, the building plan says 'mobility-impaired occupants on floors 2-8 use the area of refuge in Stair A and await assisted evacuation'; the PEEP says 'Jane Doe in Room 312 will be assisted by John Smith and Mary Jones to the Stair A area of refuge using the corridor route shown on the floor plan; once in the refuge, the assistants will activate the two-way communication and report Jane's location to the security desk; Jane will then wait with one assistant while the other proceeds to safety and updates the assembly-point accountability coordinator.' The PEEP references the building plan (the specific page or room number) so the two documents are interlocked. When the building plan is updated, all affected PEEPs are reviewed and updated to match. EvacPlan Generator's plan-revision workflow supports this — when the plan changes, the emergency coordinator knows which PEEPs reference the changed area.

EvacPlan Generator (www.evacplangenerator.com) provides the visual framework that PEEPs reference. Each PEEP can include a printed extract of the relevant floor plan showing the occupant's work location, the assigned egress route, the area of refuge and the assembly point. The plan extract makes the PEEP concrete and self-contained — the occupant and the assistants can practice from the plan without needing access to the full building documentation. When the building plan is updated, the affected PEEPs are flagged for review and the plan extracts in those PEEPs are updated to match the new plan. For occupants who use multiple buildings (a faculty member at a university with offices in two buildings, an executive with offices on multiple floors), separate PEEPs for each location reference the appropriate floor plan. The PDF export of the plan is suitable for inclusion in the PEEP document — high resolution, print-ready, with all icons and routes clearly visible. The PEEP program and the posted plan are mutually reinforcing: the plan supports the PEEP, and the PEEP gives concrete operational meaning to the plan.