We Need To Cancel Service

I got one of those calls last year and since im getting rid of residential customers said goodbye and good riddens if your stupid enough to waste you money for a piece of wireless crap and $45.00 a month monitoring and not even talk to me first you deserve what you get

Becaue they're highly trained to sell what they sell. They don't know anything about alarm systems the just have to roll play with some good trainers and they've got all the objections and questions memorized. They do what they do ..... very well. Don't give your customers too much credit by thinking that they actually know all the benefits and features of the system they have, even though you may have spent 2 hours training them all those years ago. They learn just the minimun things they have to know and forget all the rest. They forget what you told them an hour after you leave. I've had some people think that they 've been using the motion detectors for years. They've completely forgotten that I had asked them if they wanted the motion detectors always bypassed and that they would have to press the Interior button to unbypass them when they leave.

I presume that they deactivated your panel ????

If they didn't ..... how do you handle the fact that low battery, AC power loss and Fire are activations that will still report even if the panel is not armed? Do you go there and deprogram or try to download or just let them continue reporting because the account is off line?

They usually get about $40. 00 to $50.00 per month. How much were you charging .... including service?

I was getting $35 with service and remote killed the dialer on panel it was a older DSC2550 but still a good panel They actually called other day about switching back and installing a newer panel with remote services told them too late they have to stay with 5 year contract till it runs out lousy service and equipment or not and I do not take customers back. Sorry Charlie burn me once shame on you burn me twice shame on me. I never take customers back.

RHC: These types of sales people are the scourge of EVERY industry, not just the security industry. As long as big companies put money before ethical behaviour, we will always have this problem in society. And there will always be marginal people only too willing to sell this way since they follow the same philosophy of profit before ethics.

I was reading an interesting article the other day whereby the jist of the content was that pure old style capitalism simply doesn't work any more. Society has to come up with a newer version of capitalism where ethical behaviour is rewarded within the operational structure of the corporation, and filters down to the lowest level as part of their expected day to day operational philosophy. Failure to do so can only lead to more of the same kinds of crises that precipitated the catastrophe within the banking industry, and the housing industry in the US.

I too get dismayed when customers make such purely stupid decisions when even a moments thought would have prevented their making such a mistake. I am continually amazed how many truly stupid people buy into (for example) Alarmforce nonsense up here and end up with nothing but a false sense of security. Unfortunately, people will be people, with all their foibles and faults, and there isn't much anyone can do about it, except remain true to your professional standards, and hope things will get better. Once the first service call is required, I suspect this customer will quickly learn the real value of your company and what they lost !!

In the meantime, don't let it bother you too much...we've all been there !!

I saw it in the volunteer fire service to they would believe some one with no credibility how a business decision should be made for the fire company and there I am a business owner telling them not to do it and they got burned every time. some people are just too stupid to live.

Ethical behaviour rewarded? Hmm....setting us up for a lengthy argument as to what 'exactly' is right and wrong. There is another way, I've heard called the "Bright Light Phenomenon" One simply shines a bright light on it. If it should flourish, it will grow. If it should NOT exist, it will simply wither away. But, alas, the birght light must be complete and truthful else backfires

What with all the smog nowdays, the light aint as bright as it used to be. Besides, there seemingly are not that many bright people around anymore. OR it could be that John Gault has gathered them all and is allowing society suffer the consequences of it's own stupidity.

In my limited view of of society my answer to all and I mean ALL the major problems in the world is to cut down on the population. Zero growth for 50 decades ought to do it. In my lifetime the population has gone from somewhere around 3.4 billion people to close to 7billion today. And no one see's this a a problem???? REALL???? We would for starters, reduce the amount of oil consumed, clean up the air, more food for the starving, better available medical, everything! Civilization needs a breather so it can catch up with the technology and overwhelming pressures that over population is driving us into. It's time to take stock of where we are as a world, a civilization, as nations and communities ..... making decisons about what is REALLY important. With out this, we're simply accelerating into a futue blindly creating problems and not taking the time to anticipate what the consequenses of our decision are.

Problem is .... you would never hear a politician even whisper about making this an issue, for fear of how many votes they would lose. Fear, ................ the same emotion that most religions use to foster their dogma to belivers.

I guess what I'm saying is, that civilization needs to use reality, and rational thought, as a basis for moving into the future. Mysticisim cannot be depended upon to guide us into the technolgical future we are headed for. Not that religion can't thrive, it just can't be used as a guide in making rational decisions.

(Stepping down from grandstand)

There might be a service that the "out of town" guy offered that the customer thought you didn't offer. Integration with a smart phone for example. It might be worth a call to find out what it was. There is always one the drawer in amongst the file cabinets for cancelled accounts. It pays to check through them from time to time and see if there is a tend starting. Typically disconnects are for non payment. Some customers move out of the service area, or go to retirement communities and then others go straight from the home to the bone yard. That is what makes up most cancelled accounts. However if the cancellation is for a lack of a feature set you offer then you're not a good fit for the customer's needs; and that would be a good thing to know, not get upset about. Nearly every company has a list of paying customers it would like to see in the cancelled account drawer, but if there is a customer you didn't want to get rid of that got rid of you it would be worth the effort in my opinion to know more.

I just got one of those calls. Ok. Why?

They haven't had any problems. Service has been good and quick. They "had" a full perimeter wired system installed when the house was built. One of those door knocker companies sold them a wireless system in its place, and it went on-line yesterday.

WHY? Why would the door knocker company even install a wireless system when there was a 100% functional wired system with full perimeter already installed.

The customer has a service contract along with monitoring, and I have been out a few times, but its never been a problem with the alarm. They have had sliding doors readjusted, and windows replaced. Things like that. I never charged them even though those types of things are specifically not covered.

I guess good customer service is to be punished, or the door knockers had a really good salesman.

Atleast they called and told me, and agreed to send a signed written notice of cancellation instead of just not paying the bill like so many people do.

Yeah, its an out of town door knocker too. Well, if the install is decent they should be ok for a few years anyway. If not... well its not my problem any more.

All good points. Lost one a while back who said the new company offered them "digital" monitoring. I just shook my head and walked away.

RHC: "Digital monitoring"...?? Not sure what they mean by that, but undoubtably it's all this recent hoopla regarding whole home monitoring through your smartphone and the like. People simply responding to the intense marketing campaign to sell this sort of stuff I guess. Pretty hard to respond to this unless the client has the very latest hardware, some of which has add on modules allowing this capability.

This is going to increase over time....glamour over real functionality, but that seems to be what a lot of people value. I've lost no one to it yet, but I'm sure there are many who don't call for a quote because of the general assumption that conventional companies can't compete

Can not help wondering what mindset, or background education, causes one to believe so wholeheartedly in advertising hoopla, yet distrust one's own government's "disinformation". One should not believe either, but still, it does seem odd.

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RHC: Stupid is as stupid does......

ad...

Or ............. ignorance is curable, stupid is forever.

RHC: Yeah, I love the actor John Wayne's comment...."life is tough, but it's really tough when you're stupid"....:))

Love it!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wow! Just got another one today. "We love your service. We have always been happy with you, but this door knocker offered us wireless (cellular)." Geez. I have been offering cellular for atleast 16 years. I offered analog back in the day. I had analog triggered that could be added to a customers cell account, and I have sent cellular primary and cellular backup fliers in customer bills many many times over the years.

They just got sold by a door knocker.

I even discussed cellular and internet reporting with this customer last time I was out there to replace a flaky glassbreak detector.

I think I am going to spend more time kissing up to my industrial customers.

I figured out who it is and what they are doing. I think they are actually targeting house with alarms so they can just slap a cell on the panel for a takeover without any reprogramming or even access to programming.

sfe20.iad...

RHC: And what do they do when they need changes to panel programming and you are no longer their dealer ?....:)) THAT'S when the rubber meets the road....

RHC: Yeah, I love the actor John Wayne's comment...."life is tough, but it's really tough when you're stupid"....:))

Wow! Now I know why it has been so tough for me all these years!

RHC: And what do they do when they need changes to panel programming and you are no longer their dealer ?....:)) THAT'S when the rubber meets the road....

That's why God made alarm.com.