A meeting room packs a lot of people, a screen and often a glass wall into a small volume for an hour, then sits empty. Cooling has to cope with that peak without freezing the open office next door. Fresh air has to cope with the staleness, because a split only recirculates. Noise has to stay low enough for speech. Treat the room as its own zone, with a setpoint policy people can live with, and service the filter before the season of long workshops.
Eight people, a bright screen and a glass wall
Eight people and a bright display can outrun a unit that looked fine on a square-metre rule. Glazed partitions add sun and stop air borrowing from the office. The survey should use the room's maximum booking, not the average headcount across the day.
A full booking, then an empty hour
After the meeting the room is empty. Controls should allow a setback so the unit is not holding 18C until the cleaner arrives. A one-hour override is usually enough. A BMS can do that on a landlord floor. A local controller can do it in a smaller suite. Size for the full booking, not the empty hour. Keep the room as its own zone.
Stale air with the setpoint already low
People call a room stuffy and respond by dropping the setpoint. The coil gets colder, the complaints about draughts start, and carbon dioxide from the occupants is still there if no outdoor air is being supplied. The ventilation system, or a dedicated fresh-air unit where the building has one, is the stale-air answer. Cooling recirculates air. Staleness is a fresh-air problem. Dropping the setpoint does not add oxygen. Tell the designer the truth about windows. If they do not open, say so. If they open onto a noisy street and nobody will use them during a call, say that too. HSE's workplace guidance is about reasonable comfort for staff, including air quality factors, not a single thermostat number.
- Fresh air is a ventilation question beside the cooling.
- Choose a noise level that allows normal speech.
- Many offices aim for the mid 20s in cooling, with a setback when the room is empty.
A roar above the table and a condenser outside the glass
A cassette that roars above the table will be turned off in the first client call. Look at sound data at the fan speed you will actually use, not only the lowest catalogue figure. Throw should cover the table without dumping onto one chair. The outdoor unit still has to go somewhere the lease allows. A condenser outside the boardroom window recreates the noise you just avoided indoors. F-gas certification covers the install. GOV.UK publishes that certification. If this room is one zone on a larger VRF, leak-check duties follow the whole system's carbon-dioxide equivalent, which you confirm on current GOV.UK guidance. As a 2026 illustration, adding a dedicated split to a small meeting room is often a low-thousands installed figure including VAT when the route to outdoors is short, and it rises quickly in a landlord tower where you must join the base-build system. Joining the base build can be the better engineering answer and the slower commercial answer. Start that request early. Where the floor's combined cooling exceeds the GOV.UK inspection threshold, this room is part of that inspected system. A clean filter before summer board meetings is still your maintenance job. Energy Saving Trust's air-to-air pages describe a single split. They do not size a glass meeting room.
Stop borrowing the office cassette through a shut door
Stop if the plan is that the open-office cassette will cover a glass-walled meeting room with the door shut, unless air can actually move between them and the unit was sized for both. Otherwise the office is cold and the meeting is hot. A reasonable setpoint is a policy, not a medical rule. Many offices aim for the mid 20s in cooling so people in meeting clothes are comfortable, with a setback when the room is empty. HSE expects reasonable workplace comfort rather than a legal maximum.
Frequently asked questions
Can the open-office cassette cover the meeting room?
Only if air can actually move between them and the unit was sized for both. A glass-walled room with the door shut needs its own zone. Otherwise the office is cold and the meeting is hot.
Why does the room feel stuffy even when it is cold?
Cooling recirculates air. Staleness is a fresh-air problem. Ask for the ventilation path as well as the setpoint. Dropping the setpoint does not add oxygen.
Core buying guides
Start with these high-intent guides, then dig into the rest of the library.
Related guides
Sources and further reading
How this guide was prepared
This guide was written by the Local AC Installers Editorial Team. We compare official guidance, legislation and established consumer information, separate general information from project-specific advice, and show publication dates and sources. We do not accept installer accreditation claims at face value.