Re: An ethical conundrum... Opinions welcome!

[tourman <robercampbell@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Nov 28, 2:04=A0am, Frank Olson
<use_the_email_li...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> We're hip deep in a major fire alarm system upgrade on two residential
> high-rise towers with an interconnected parkade. =A0The old fire alarm
> systems are being monitored by a company that obviously cares more for
> the RMR than they do for the safety of their customer. =A0There are no
> test signals programmed! =A0The service manager stated to me that test
> signals are an additional cost which the customer opted not to send.
> The company is charging the customer $22.00 a month for "basic" service.
> =A0 The communicators haven't been transmitting for over two years (that'=
s
> when the electrician removed them from the wall and placed them neatly
> in the corner of the electrical room). =A0The alarm company's invoice
> supposedly has a reminder to "test your system monthly" and this is all
> they're relying on! =A0The customer started refusing the invoices within
> three months of the panel's disconnection. =A0Granted, he didn't send the
> company a proper notice. =A0The company suspended service on both account=
s
> last year (November). =A0Are they entitled to two years billing or just
> one? =A0Should any professional alarm dealer even offer to monitor a fire
> alarm system without a daily test signal? =A0I shudder to think of the
> possible liability issues involved.

RHC: IMO, they are lucky they didn't get sued. What sort of company
would monitor a life saving system without daily tests. The fact they
didn't factor in the price of daily test signals into their monitoring
rate tells you a lot about this company. There is far too much of this
kind of unprofessional crap in our industry. Sure the customer shares
some responsibility in this but ultimately it's the alarmco who has a
responsibility to ensure the systems they monitor are working. I think
any Canadian court would find them negiligent in their duty....

This sort of thing makes me wonder about another situation hereabouts
that likely is also going on. Recently, the telephone company switched
to 10 digit dialing with much fanfare and lots of time for alarmco's
to get their act together. However, there are literally thousands of
ancient panels out there that are totally incapable of 10 digit
dialing. One of the large nationals (who shall remain nameless), I
know for a fact, didn't switch out these old clunkers, and likely
didn't even approach their clients for fear of the cost of switching
costing them the account. How do I know ? Because I've switched many
of their systems out, and the clients tell me they were never
approached about the problem.

So there are thousands of these old panels not transmitting to the
station properly, and the customer and the station don't know it,
simply because the company in question doesn't use any kind of test
signal. But you can bet the RMR is still rolling in though....

Yah gotta wonder.....