The battery in my alarm system went dead. I called ADT to get a new battery. I have an extra warranty on my service contract that covers batteries. They told me the battery was covered, but I had to pay $25 for the service call to have them come out and install it. I told them I would install it myself and they said I still had to pay $25 for the tech to come out. I told them I would just go to their office and pick up the battery to save the $25. They told me that they would still have to charge me $25 to open the ticket. Then they said that they couldn't just give stuff away. I then emphaticly told the sons of bitches that I was paying extra for a damn service contract that covered my damn battery and therefor they weren't given shit away and didn't have the right to charge for shit. The guy finally said, OK you can come pick it up (the place is like 10 minutes from my house) and to ask for him and he would take care of me. I thought the whole thing was re-damn-diculous!

 

ADT is a bunch of jokes, I moved into my new house and the old owner never gave me the code to the alarm, he did not have it activated but did in the past and when he moved he was supposed to give us the code, well he didn't when messing with the alarm which i know i shouldnt have done according to my wife, the alarm was armed and it went off when i moved from the motion detector. I called ADT and told them about it and I did not have the code and I just moved in, they told me that they wanted to charge me 150 an hour to come out and fix it and I would have to pay for the system that is installed in order to use it at all. I said fuck that and told them to help me turn off the annoying sound, they said that was confidential information and I said screw it and I saw the box above next to the ceilig and they told me that was the main line, and I know from common sense that the red wire is a hot wire, i got out the old faithful snips and cut the bitch, no more sound, and said fuck ADT, I am totally against them cause their CS skills sucks balls

 

ADT sucks

 

good to know

 

Is Brinks any better?

 

I was thinking of going with ADT. So who is the best?

 

We have Brinks and so far so good. Haven't had any problems yet... but I know setup was a bitch b/c we use Vonage.... so they had install a whole new motherboard and everything... but it was all done free of charge. I even bitched to them about their monitoring fees and they knocked $10/mo off for the first year....

 

We used Brinks before we moved into a highrise, and we found working with them to be very straightforward. We interviewed three firms, and Brinks came out with the best approach and the most foolproof controls. Of course, the primary value of any of those folks is deterrence; we slapped the decals up in the windows of our rowhouse facing the street, and never had a problem.

 

I've heard schools of thought saying it's better to leave those decals off, because pros figure you have something to hide and/or they just do whatever is necessary to get around it first. any ideas?

 

So I was watching an episode of CSI. The house where the murder took place had an alarm with central monitoring. The cops showed up about 4 hours after the alarm. The CSI dude said that cops don't prioritize these alarms because most are false alarms.

Is that true? I would hope not.

 

Probably. My parents had an alarm and it went off because of the pet bird one time. Cops left a note that informed us that any more false alarms would subject us to a $100 fine. The funny thing is, the cops showed up at least 30 minutes after the alarm went off, so if the burglar sets off the alarm but doesn't leave evidence of a break in, like trashing the house or breaking something, then it's considered a false alarm.

 

I'm working with TimeWarner Security... no probs thus far. Everything pretty staightforward...

Guy pre-wired like a master... and told me funny "cable guy" like stories all the while. Heh.

 

This is the case for any alarm, residential or commercial.

Typically, in a commercial break-in... cops can take 15 minutes or more to respond. When they do, they do little more then door check, peep in the windows, and MAYBE a perimeter search.

If they don't see anyone and there's no obvious sign of break-in they just leave.

It's up to the business owner to inspect the property further for a true break in (what kind of burglar makes their break in OBVIOUS to begin with??)


In a residential incident, the operation is the same, but worse, cops take even longer to respond. Sometimes 30-45 minutes. Even then, they do little more then check the front door.


Couple this with the fact that residential systems are EASILY thwarted, it pretty much means that your security system is useless for all but keeping honest people honest.

It will offer you some small amount of protection against amateur intruders at best.


A security systems only REAL benefit is the case of fire. This is what pays for the system... as they will respond much faster and it could possibly save your life if not simply your belongings.


For security, it's best to couple your standard solution with a DIY kit that allows you real-time remote monitoring.

Have the system notify your cell phone immediately of any intrusion, and be able to view your house on your phone. If you note anything out of the ordinary you can call a neighbor, a friend, a family member, anyone close by... or simply respond yourself.

Obviously, you don't want to go running in on a burglar, but you can scare them off quite easily... a car pulling into the driveway or a garage door opening is enough to do it. They're not escaping with your goods if they know you're there... then call in the cops for reinforcements.

 

I don't know... this is a damned if you do... damned if you don't situation.

Nobody is going to assume you have something to hide simply because you have alarm stickers... they're soo common place now.

I think, in most instances, it's going to ward off the amateur burglar... who is responsible for the large majority of break-ins.

The professional is going to work your house as if it has an alarm even if he doesnt know it does. As I said, residential alarms are ridiculously easy to defeat...

 

ADT is nothing but part and parcel of Tyco Industries.
these guys are corrupt. In case you forget, the guy who ran this joint, Dennis Kosloski, spent $6,000 of the stockholders money on a shower curtain, he is now in jail.

 

Well in my case, there are stickers on the doors and windows from the previous owner, but no actual alarm lol. Guess that's good for keeping the amateurs away at least.

 

Another benefit for you is cheaper homeowner's insurance. At least with Citizens anyways.

 

I too get a break on my insurance so it's a plus.

As far as time to response I think it really depends on where you live and what department is responding. I live in a small city suburb of Austin with it's own police department. Crime is very low so our PD doesn't have shit to do and they respond very quickly. I found out my battery was on the fritz because because my alarm went off while I was out of town. ADT automatically calls my cell phone. I then quickly called the PD and asked what was up. Funny thing is I told them my house alarm went off and they quickly said do live it 1234 Street? I gave them an affermative and they told me the status. That alone lets me know that there isn't much going on in my town. My alarm continured to go off for another 2 hours until I arrived at the house. I had one of the police officers meet me there to do a walk through and he explained how he did a complete perimeter search 3 different times and didn't find anything. He even told me what the alarm key pad lights were doing and to do this he would have had to walk around to the back of the house to look in.

I have to pay an annual permit fee to our PD for alarm monitoring. This way I don't have to worry about being charged for responses to false alarms.

I myself tend to be overly protective of my crib. Growing up we had two different houses broken into three different times. With a wife and child I also take it as my duty to ensure they are protected while I am not at home. The alarm really gives us peace of mind.

I am not really knocking ADT as a whole but I feel they are somewhat like Sprint PCS. I am fine and happy as long as I don't have to talk to their bitch asses. But as soon as I need customer service it goes to hell in a handbasket.

In the back of mind I also wonder if they can make my alarm system seem as if it is broken remotely so I have to call a service teck and give them money. They have the ablility to see everything that is going on with my alarm so I think they would have the abiliity to do some stupid shit.

 

I've heard that having NRA stickers on your doors and windows is the best. And I've actually heard that it's true a bunch of times

And can you get in trouble for having an ADT sign (or whatever company) in your yard if you don't have ADT. I don't do this or anything but I always wonder who is bluffing...

 

do you have to have landline service to have monitoring? my guess is

i don't plan on having landline, just sticking with cellular

 

you can get landline, landline+cellular, or cellular only.

usually its another $5-15 month to add or go exclusively with cellular.

 

JB mentioned he is using Vonage for monitoring, but it required a different board.

We have ADT in the office and it appears to work just fine. But I also know someone with it at their house and they don't like it much at all.

 

good to know, i have had cell only for almost 6 years and hope i wouldnt have to pay for landline

 

A land-line would be useless for me unless the crook was a complete idiot. All you need to do is cut the land-line that is going down the side of my house. I didn't know that they had celular though.

My house is patrolled by a JRT. He won't kill you, but he'll bite your nuts off.

 

Your JRT will probably just bark a little and accept any dog treat someone gives it.

 

nope. at least not where i live. there was a false alarm at my uncle's house acouple of month agos and the alarm wasnt even ARMED. but ya the alarm company called my uncle while he was at work. and like my uncle called my dad to check it out and like the cops showed up 5-10mins later.

 

Which systems allow you to use cellular?

And if your security is tied to the fire alarm, technically you need a land line.

 

Cutting the phone line triggers an alert at the central station, letting them know something is up. Its not worthless.

Your point is? The entire security/fire industry is now owned by a handful of large companies. Theres no escaping it.

 

In my case, TimeWarner Security.

Huh? How do you come to that conclusion? Adding a fire alarm to your system is 100% independent of how your system communicates with the monitoring station.

Nope.

This is true of some "always on" commercial systems. In a residential application however, unless you have a cellular backup, there is no way the system can notify the monitoring station that it has been taken offline.

In 99% of residential applications, cutting the phone line defeats the alarm.

 

you would think in this day and age of technology they would have solved that problem.

i would think that a cut line where ther is no longer a connection would show a power failure of some sort

 

they did....... cellular backup.

in commercial applications, the alarm system often has a dedicated phone line which is used to periodically send/receive a ping from the monitoring station. if unable to connect, an alarm is triggered both locally and at the station.

in a residential application, nobody is going to pay for an extra phone line for an alarm, and nobody is going to want their alarm taking up their main phone line every 5 minutes.

so, cellular backup is the answer.

if you don't have cellular backup, and your alarm isn't actively using your phone line to send updates to the monitoring station, how do you suppose they'd know your system went offline? messenger pigeon?

 

 

 

I dunno about that. We had ADT and we had a false alarm, the cops showed up within 5 minutes. Funny, they sent me in the house even though the door was opened because they didn't want to go. What if somebody was there waiting to kill me

 

NFPA codes requires a phone line for fire alarm systems. I know for a fact in commercial applications its usually 2 that are dedicated. I'm pretty sure the codes carry over for residential use.

Huh, figured residential systems caught up by now. THe system in at my house does this, but its also a system that is often used for small commercial applications.