Re: DCS Power 832

["Jim" <alarminex@xxxxxxx>]

tourman wrote:
> Yes, thanks for putting things back on track. And I apologize once
> again to anyone who may have been offended by the tone of my post last
> night. In thinking about what was said, I think I may have been overly
> affected by the number of letters I get from people who have suffered
> as a result of alarmco's refusal to unlock a board. It happens all too
> often, but yes there are two sides to the story. And I'm glad for the
> poster in question that all worked out well for him.
>
> This morning, I went through a large pile of received and saved mail
> and pulled out 26 separate instances of where this sort of thing has
> happened in the last six months. I will quote you the exact text of the
> last message, not because it is unique but rather typical. Personal
> information is excluded for obvious reasons.....
>
> And I quote....
>
> "Hi, please find enclosed an older DSC 2550 revision 6 version 1.31
> locked board. I recently purchased a house through a bank (foreclosure)
> with an existing alarm system but was never given the passwords to set
> new alarm codes nor did the bank know of any. Everything functioned
> correctly except I couldn't arm or disarm since I never knew the former
> owners codes. When I approached the alarm company for the codes
> explaining the situation they simply wouldn't help me unless I signed
> some kind of 1-2 year contract despite their confirmation that I owned
> the alarm system out right. I was able to set everything back to
> factory default except the installers lock out. As it stands the alarm
> only serves as a glorified door chime since with the board locked out I
> can't reconfigure / redefine the zones from the default setting. I've
> enclosed an $X money order for the return shipping . If its at all
> possible can you make every effort to have it unlocked and returned
> before the holidays. I may take advantage of the few days off to
> re-install the system...Thanks...etc "
>


Robert, using the above seems to be more of an example in favor
of *not* helping this individual than in favor of helping him.

If he got the house on a foreclosure, doesn't it seem likely that the
alarm company got screwed out of something somewhere
along the line? Owning the alarm system outright, doesn't mean
that the alarm company owes him anything. Why it's entirely
possible that the alarm company never got paid for the installation,
much less, probably got screwed out of months of monitoring fees. If,
in fact, this person is telling the truth about the alarm company
refusing to unlock the board, don't you think that his first reaction
would be to send them a registered letter stating that he was going
to report them to BBB, local alarm association, attorney general,
dept of consumer affairs, his attorney, etc, etc, etc, rather than
spend the time to unwire it, along with the effort, time and money
to get the board unlocked?

Why would you believe this guy anymore than you'd believe the
alarm company, if they told you that they still owned the equipment?
Without proof, and only hearsay, you're acting as if you're Solomon
making decisions, as to who's tellling the truth or not and I'll bet it
just so happens that it always falls in favor of the side that is
willing to pay you for unlocking the board.

Have you ever refused to unlock a board?

I'll bet not.

> If I may seem overly sensitive on this issue, the above is part of the
> reason.

If you think that the above is an example of a *good* reason to unlock
boards, then it's likely that you're doing a lot of ligitimate alarm
companies
out of their just returns.

Don't get me wrong on this. I know damn well that there are some
companies
that wont unlock boards. But before I'll do a takeover, I'll always
propose that
the end user try all of the means that I've mentioned above, before
they pay
me to either unlock,  reprogram, or change out the board. Some just
don't
want to be bothered and tell me to go ahead. But there are others that
I've
never heard from again and I can only presume they either got
satisfaction,
found someone else, or just never followed through.

This is area of uncertanty and there's no way for you to ever know if
you're doing the right thing or not. Yet you do it anyway, always
presuming the end user is right and the alarm company is wrong.

And you think that what you are doing is right?


>
> Regards,
>
> RHC
>