Re: Commercial Alarm - help

["Jim" <alarminex@xxxxxxx>]

J. Sloud wrote:
> On 9 Nov 2005 20:34:45 -0800, "Jim" <alarminex@xxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> >
>
> >An oil burner service company recieves constant calls from people who
> >claim to have furnace problems.  Less than 1% don't have problems. Upon
> >reviewing their service records the service company comes to the
> >conclusion that since 99% of the people who called saying they had oil
> >burners problems, actually did have problems ..... Therefore, oil
> >burners are no good, aren't useful and don't heat homes.
>
> That analogy doesn't stand up. To make it true, you would have to say
> that 99% of people who have oil burners expeience no heat when the
> device is activated.

Gahhhhhh!

YOU"RE not looking at all the OTHER people who have alarms that work
......why should I have to look at all the other people who have
working oil burners.?????????

>Upon further examination by the service company,
> it is discovered that some oil burners are broken, some weren't
> installed correctly, some weren't designed for the application in
> which they are installed, and the vast majority are too complicated
> for the average consumer to operate.

You're not looking at all of that information about alarm systems when
you
say that alarms have no value because the police only see the false
alarms.
You're not looking at the systems that verify code words. The systems
that
have a false alarm and then get service. The calls that the police call
false
because they didn't investigate. The chronic false alarms from the same

individuals. You're just saying that because the police only see lots
of
false alarms compared to a few burglaries that all of the rest has no
meaning.

>Regardless of the reason, 99% of
> the time, the device doesn't operate as intended.

But 99% of oil burners AND alarms DO work. YOU'RE the one that says
that because the police see only false alarms from the bad ones that
alarms have no values.

> 99% of the time,
> the consumer is left freezing.

That's a conclusion that you can draw from assuming that since the oil
service
company is too blind to see that just because they're only considering
the systems
that don't work .....and not the ones that DO work,  that all oil
burners are bad. Which really proves, that in order to acertain how
well alarms or oil burners work, you have to include those that work in
the calculations.

>How long would oil burners be around?

If we could get people who are blind to the facts to understand how to
use
inductive logic, they'll be around as long as alarms systems.

>
>
> In my view the primary value of alarm systems is the monitoring
> service that initiates police response. The equipment is just a means
> to an end.  The percentage of actual break-ins vs. unnecessary police
> dispatches is all that is relevant.  If 99% of the time, the police
> are dispatched due to a false alarm, then the failure rate of
> detecting break-ins and providing police response is what?

Exactly what the politicos want you/the public to see, instead of using
accurate figures and method of calculation, in spite of the fact that
it's wrong.

>
>
> The "system" includes everything installed in the house or business as
> well as the monitoring center and dispatch.  All must function
> correctly to ensure a dispatch and police response to a break-in.  If
> any one of these do not work correctly, the system is broken.

The only thing that's broken is the logic used to come to the
conclusion that
since the police only see false alarms, and that's being compared to
the number
of burglaries to come to the conclusion that all alarms are useless.

> The
> average consumer only cares about the ability to detect an intruder
> and to dispatch the police if an intrusion takes place.


And that's exactly what happens. If police don't respond to all alarms,
 THAT"S when alarm systems will become useless. You tell me, what do
you think a crooks point of view would be? Would he feel more or less
inclined to break into a premise if he knew the police were going to
respond? Once you answer that, you've answered the question about the
value of alarms and response to them. By the way, my stand isn't to do
nothing about the QUANTITY of false alarms ..... only to help people
realize that there are never going to be NO false alarms, that the
false alarm rate is ALWAYS going to be 99% and that actually both
alarms systems and response by the police is the actual deterrent that
reduces crime. The police in my area seem to understand that. So I
guess you'd say they're wrong too ..... Eh?


Of course I guess we could call someone in an let them show  the
politicians and police how to use inaccurate methods to come to
erroneous conclusions