Avoiding Security “Surprises”

When it comes to installing home security systems, we strive to create a simple and convenient experience. After all, when dealing with something as important as security, our customers generally do not welcome surprises. However, failing to take proper care when designing an alarm can lead to some unintended consequences. Therefore, we recommend taking some steps to anticipate some of these issues and avoid them. In this post, we’ll share these tips in an attempt to help your efforts in avoiding security surprises.

First, we’ll explain the importance of choosing the right equipment from the beginning. From there, we’ll look at proper alarm equipment maintenance. Then on a related note, we’ll focus on maintaining a different part of your alarm’s performance in the form of keeping your alarm’s monitoring up to date. This section will include a couple monitoring options that we offer to assist in avoiding security surprises. Now, let’s dive in by showing you how to choose the alarm equuipment that works best for your application!

Choosing the Alarm Equipment that Works for You

When we help customers design a security system, we keep a couple things in mind. First of all, we want to make sure their system sensor design gives them the security they need. After all, if customers install the wrong equipment, they can receive security surprises in the form of false alarms. For example, installing motion detectors in homes with pets, or shock sensors in areas frequented by heavy trucks rolling by in front of shaky casement windows, can cause false alarms. We must take each home’s environment into account when designing any alarm.

Additionally, we also want to create the user experience that best fits every homeowner. Some customers prefer a traditional, keypad-based format. This proves especially true for customers that have used alarms consistently over the years. However, newer alarm customers often prefer a more “modern” experience. This includes security touchscreen keypads that provide the same type of user experience provided by smartphones. Creating the most natural user experience possible goes a long way towards making our customers comfortable. In turn, this helps them avoid panicking when they need to quickly remember how to use their security equipment. Next up, let’s see how proper security equipment maintenance can help with avoiding security surprises.

Maintaining Your Security Equipment

We recommend taking a few practical steps towards maintaining your security equipment. For starters, we ask our customers to visually inspect security equipment on a regular basis, especially in basements, garages, or in other areas where dirt may collect. A buildup of dirt in an environmental sensor or a developing spiderweb in a motion detector can easily cause a malfunction. Taking this advice can keep your equipment running for years longer than it would if you let dirt and grime build up until it makes your security equipment fail.

Moreover, we also offer security equipment warranty plans to help ensure your equipment works when you need it most. All of these warranty plans include free replacement of security equipment when it fails. Furthermore, some of them even include annual testing and inspections of burglar-alarm related components! Signing up for one of these plans greatly enhances your security’s long-term effectiveness. Of course, doing so can also save you money in cases where you require us to replace any security-related items. We strongly suggest that you consider signing up for one of our extended warranty plans to give you the best chance at avoiding security surprises. Let’s now shift our focus to some tips on creating effective security monitoring.

Keeping up with Your Security Monitoring

Our security monitoring services involve tying your alarm in to our central station. This service represents one of the most effective and popular security measures we offer. When we monitor a security system, an alarm activation creates a signal  that gets sent from your alarm straight to our central station. At this point, a central station operator attempts to contact you immediately to verify the existence of a real emergency. If they cannot contact you, they dispatch the proper authorities based on the type of signal that gets sent. This may include the police, the fire department, or even an ambulance. Unfortunately, we see this service occasionally fail our customers when they need it most. In this section, we’ll show you how you can create reliable and effective monitoring. Let’s start by showing you how we can use cellular dialers to create the most consistent monitoring possible.

Choosing the Most Reliable Monitoring Available

Phone-based alarm monitoring represents the earliest form of connecting an alarm to our central station. Creating this monitoring involves tying a home’s existing phone lines into your new alarm system. While any form of alarm monitoring creates considerable security, traditional phone-based monitoring has its limitations. For starters, phone companies do not maintain their physical phone lines very well these days. After all, many homeowners have done away with having traditional phone service. Additionally, phone lines often fail due to inclement weather. This means that storms can interfere with your alarm monitoring. Furthermore, burglars often cut a home’s phone lines before attempting a break-in. Of course, this also negates your alarm’s connection with our central station.

For these reasons, we strongly recommend using a cellular dialer to monitor your security system. When we refer to a “cellular dialer,” we are referencing a piece of equipment that provides a direct communication path between your alarm and our central station. These dialers use a cellular network, rather than a phone line, for their communication. Therefore, phone outages do not affect your alarm’s monitoring at all. Finally, our preferred cellular dialer, powered by Alarm.com, makes it quite easy to know when your alarm and its monitoring connection are working properly, or if you need to address an issue. Let’s take a closer look at this monitoring option in our next section.

Receiving Valuable Alarm Updates

In addition to providing more reliable monitoring than traditional phone-based monitoring, the Alarm.com dialer also allows customers to experience interactive security monitoring. When we refer to interactive monitoring, we refer to the ability to control and communicate with your alarm directly using a smartphone or any other internet-connected device. First and foremost, this allows you to arm and disarm your security system remotely. Forget to arm your alarm on the way out the door? No problem! Now, you can use your phone to fix this issue immediately. Of course, the ability to disarm your security system remotely adds tremendous security.

Finally, our interactive monitoring also allows you to receive alarm alerts. These real-time notifications give you the ability to see when someone arms or disarms your security system. Furthermore, it also provides alerts if an expected event does not happen. Expect the kids home from school by 3pm? Now you can create an alert in case your security system stays on past this time! Moreover, these alerts include performance-based security equipment notifications. For example, low sensor batteries and alarm communication issues will trigger an alert so that you can fix these issues quickly. Similarly, if your alarm loses communication with a sensor, you will also receive an alert. All of these features go a long way towards ensuring that your alarm equipment works for you when you need it most.

Putting it All Together and Avoiding Security Surprises

We hope that this post helps you with avoiding security surprises in your own home. Additionally, we encourage you to contact us with any questions you may have. We will happily answer any security-related inquiries this post raises for you. Furthermore, we also invite you to take advantage of our free site survey program. We offer complimentary security audits and equipment quotes for both new and existing customers alike. During our visit, we can address any security concerns you may have. Moreover, we can make suggestions of our own based on our observations of your property. Together, we can create a complete security plan that keeps your home and your family as safe and secure as possible — free of surprises!

 

Featured Image by <a href=” https://www.vectorportal.com” >Vectorportal.com</a>, <a class=”external text” href=”https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/” >CC BY</a>