Slomins vs ADT vs Brinks vs any other home security system vendor

As usual a very helpful post. ADTquoted me $32.xx monitoring fee and I believe I own the equipment. Not sure about owning the equipment. Others have mentioned ADT equipment that is not UL rated and ADTusing, I think, 24 gauge wire. It's reassuring that you've picked up several ADT accounts. Guess that means their hardware is at least transferrable. Others have mentioned the ADT "hair trigger" problem. There is a large fine imposed for false security alarms.

At this point, DIY or an independent is starting to look good. However, fitting in the time to research DIY might not be a wise use of my time right now.

Mike

Unlike ADT, which has never changed hands in the last 130 years. :-)

- badenov

I'm really not out to bash ADT. In fact, I'm a fan...of the old ADT, back when they really were the best in the business. But the things you've mentioned are both irrelevant and misleading.

ADT is not the only company in the industry with networked redundant central stations. Do your homework. And I might add that there are drawbacks to having five mega-central stations monitoring an account: the customer may never speak to the same operator twice. :-) He's just one out of five million customers.

Big is not necessarily good. Ask General Motors and Ford. Both probably sell more cars to the federal government than any other car makers. That doesn't mean they're good cars: the Japanese are killing them on both quality and price.

I doubt the average homeowner knows, or cares, that ADT does a lot of government work. That has nothing to do with whether the homeowner gets a good residential alarm system or good service after the sale. As you know, the people who service government accounts don't deal with homeowners. And doing a wonderful job on a large card access system doesn't relate to doing good house jobs.

There is a lot to be said for dealing with a smaller, independent company, a company that recognizes its customers when they call and truly appreciates their business. ADT recognizes the name "Uncle Sam" when he calls in. And Uncle gets better service than Joe Homeowner.

I will give you points for the crack about Brinks. I use that line myself. Of course, that has more to do with UL certificates than anything else, but it's still fun to beat them over the head with that.

- badenov

What's the dig about Brinks - not using UL rated equipment?

Mike

Don 't remember if the monthly fee includes a warranty. I'll check. I called the 800 # for ADT

medical and fire monitoring is in addition to the $32 monthly fee?

Mike

Does it matter that my land line is DSL?

Mike

I assume what you mean is you have DSL service over a conventional land line (as opposed to "dry DSL"). And the answer is "it depends". Most alarm panel makes do require a special DSL filter on the line in order to communicate properly along with the DSL "hash". A good one is made by Excelsius (sp?). There are a few panel makes that most often absolutely need a filter (DSC for one) and a few that don't need one (Paradox almost never). You'll know when the panel is tested to the station; it won't get through, so will require the filter immediately. I have found in a couple of instances where with the aging of the components of the board (I'm assuming here), the panel will suddenly need the filter to work properly. So if in doubt, install it !! (note, the conventional DSL filters given you for the phone will NOT work for the alarm panel....)

The plus side to installing a DSL filter even when you strictly don't need it for alarm transmission purposes, is that it allows the actual DSL signal through even when the alarm panel has seized the phone line (and cut off the telephones). So if you're doing a multi megabyte download at exactly the time of the early morning when the panel decides to call the station to check in with its test signal, with a filter, your download is not interupted. Without a filter, your download is toast !!

RHC

I choose Polesoft Lockspam to fight spam, and you?

DSL service on POTS.

Mie

"J. Sloud" a écrit dans le message de news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

true

False

Protectron in Canada have central station that are all linked together ,and if one get overloaded or even closed down by what ever situation the other central will get the calls and signal from the customer,and will respond to it..(this proved to be crucial during the large black out of most of the east coast and central Canada a few years ago..) Ottawa was down,but Montréal,Quebec,Vancouver were all online and processing the alarms...

Mr. Sloud is correct. ADT is indeed the biggest by far. All of the complaints (and they are numerous) that I've heard regarding ADT involved their "authorized dealers". I've been in the trade for 29 years and ADT is the only national alarm company that I would consider working with if I were the consumer.

Anyone who has followed this newsgroup for a while knows I'm no fan of the corporate giants. If you want to deal with a national firm, use ADT corporate. I've heard too many horror stories regarding Monitronix dealers, P1 dealers, Sonitrash and the rest to even consider recommending any of them.

It bears repeating that whatever you do, make sure you read and fully understand the entire contract.

What "trade" would that be???

You may require a filter. If you've gone the "home install" route on the DSL, I'd suggest contacting your Telco provider and have them install the filter at the PROT. This will allow for much easier hookup of the alarm system's communicator without interrupting communications to your modem.

I've expressed my opinion about that in an earlier post to this thread.

That one's easy. If I had the power to do so I'd cancel the "authorized dealer" program in a heartbeat. I'd offer every customer from the program the option of switching to deal directly with corporate or canceling with no penalty.

The ADT Authorized Dealer program has done major harm to the industry since its inception. It has also done major damage to ADT's reputation since most consumers don't realize there's a difference between the dealers and ADT corporate.

The slovenly workmanship, misleading advertising, miserable customer service and downright crookedness of too many of these "authorized dealers" is a huge black eye for the industry.

Hmm. In an earlier post I said "rant mode = OFF"... :^)

Hmmmmm.... Speaking of "slovenly"... miserable customer service and downright crookedness...

That is patently untrue. Mr. Sloud (who posts under his own name rather than hide behind a pseudonym like "Nomen") rightly pointed out that ADT is a very stable firm, unlikely to be sold to some unknown entity. While that is not the only consideration, it is one thing a prospective customer will want to consider.

That doesn't really affect job performance. There are good and bad employees in every organization, including ADT and whoever it is the above poster works for.

That's an interesting subject to me. I primarily cater to DIY and small dealers but I get a significant portion of my orders from government and military buyers. I do agree that it's not a major interest to the consumer other than as an indication that the company is well-established which is kind of a given when the company is ADT.

In cases where the small, in dependant company does care, we agree. Unfortunately the homeowner has almost no way to know if the company he's about to sign with is such a firm or if it's one of those fly-by-nights like Milford.

And you don't?

Not necessarily. Saying so without proof is misleading and unfair.

My only major beef with Brinks is their routine habit of talking to prospective customers about "investing in" security and "buying" protection while not mentioning that the contract is a lease -- not a sale. The other major problem is the Brinks system is proprietary -- it cannot be monitored or serviced by anyone but Brinks. Based on discussions with unhappy ex-Brinks customers, they apparently almost never mention that in the sales pitch either.

It keeps changing doesn't it?

I think Mr Sloud is referring to the US not Canada

:-)