Re: "Failure to communicate" problems

["Doug" <doug@xxxxxxx>]

"tourman" <robercampbell@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1158e748-b3af-43a7-b95f-03245b110033@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Perhaps some of the regulars can suggest a solution to a problem I'm
> having.  For years now, I've been having random failures to
> communicate that are not caused by improper programming of the panels.
> There seems to be no pattern to them that I can determine, nor is it
> make specific. The station is no help and insist there are enough
> lines coming in to handle any amount of traffic. Whenever they happen,
> I have the client send a manual test through to the station, and it
> always goes through properly. This only seems to occur with
> conventional land lines
>
> I get daily reports and every day, and there is at least one panel
> that doesn't seem to have communicated it's test signal (out of a base
> of 1100 accounts). When I check, rarely is it a real problem....
>
> Can anyone familiar with station technology suggest potential
> solutions/problems that could be occurring. I'm at a loss...
>

What carrier are you using?
I believe that some long distance carriers use some form of VoIP to route
calls over their network, so even if you have a the alarm connected to a
POTs line, the signal may end up being transmitted over VoIP. Even if the
call is routed over a conventional circuit, my money is on congestion or
some other issue on the part of the carrier, not at the central station.

Do the panels show a FTC trouble, I've seen on rare occasions where the
panel has  received a kissoff, but the signal has been corrupted and shown
up on another account.

Assuming you have your own 800 lines for the receivers, then take a look at
your 800 phone bill and see if an account that has missed a timer test
completed a call or made repeated calls on the day & time it missed a
signal.
If your bill shows that the panel completed a call of a duration that
indicates it sent a signal, then have the central station run a report to
see if another account received an unexpected timer test at that time.

Doug