When it comes to securing your home, few measures prove as effective as installing a monitored alarm system. In addition to creating a blaring siren response upon activation, a home security system can also create a visit from the proper authorities as well. This combination of an instantaneous alert and the following monitoring response creates multiple levels of security, as well as peace of mind. In addition to encouraging you to install this security, we also want to see you set it up with the most effective monitoring methods currently available. Specifically, avoiding using your phone line to monitor your alarm can help ensure that your alarm can call for help when you need it most. Today, we’ll show you some of the phone-free alarm monitoring options that we offer.
First, we’ll explain how traditional monitoring works. Understanding this will go a long way towards comprehending the material in the rest of this post. Then, we’ll explain the issues raised by using this monitoring service today. In addition to being somewhat outdated and generally unreliable, phone-line based monitoring also fails to withstand even the simplest means of tampering from burglars. We’ll detail these dangers for you. From there, we’ll shift our focus to the “solution” section of our post. Namely, we’ll explain how both internet and cellular connections can create the monitoring service you need for your own security. Now, let’s dive in with a primer on traditional, phone line-based alarm monitoring.
Your Traditional Alarm Monitoring Primer
Phone-based alarm monitoring represents the earliest form of connecting an alarm to a central station. This method involves tying a property’s existing phone lines into your new alarm system. In turn, an alarm activation creates a signal — transmitted over your phone line — that gets sent from your alarm straight to our central station. At this point, our central station operators attempt 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. With this background in mind, let’s now turn our attention to the issues that arise when you depend on phone lines for alarm monitoring.
Homeowners often opt out of traditional phone service, making phone line-based alarm monitoring impossible.
The Problems with Phone-Line Based Monitoring
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, most customers now sign up for internet-based phone deals as part of cable bundles. It may surprise you to know that doing so does not actually give these customers a true phone line. Rather, it sets them up with inconsistent Voice over Internet Protocol (or “VoIP”) service. VoIP phones create a rather shaky experience for alarm customers, as we outline in our post explaining why VoIP is a Poor Choice for Alarm Systems.
In addition to phone line maintenance and VoIP-related issues, traditional alarm monitoring creates a couple other problems as well. For example, 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. At this point, you should understand the basics — and the issues — behind traditional security monitoring. Next up, we turn our attention to creating effective monitoring for cord-cutters who wish to monitor their security system more reliably.
Alarm Monitoring You Can Count On
At this point, you have a basic understanding of both what alarm monitoring entails as well as the ways that traditional alarm monitoring can fail. Luckily, we have a couple ways that we can address these issues. In this section, we focus on the solutions that can solve the issues described in the previous section. Both of the solutions described here give you an option to bypass your phone lines entirely when setting up your alarm’s monitoring. Additionally, some customers still monitor their alarms through their phone lines, and set up these options as a “backup” in case the phone lines fail. Either way, the monitoring methods described here add consistent alarm monitoring for cord-cutters. Let’s start this discussion with a focus on network-based security monitoring.
Internet-Based Monitoring
We’ve introduced network-based monitoring as a fairly new option for customers just over the last several years. This service allows you to use your home’s existing internet network, rather than a phone line, to monitor your security system. You have a couple different options to add this type of monitoring to their alarm. Many network-based monitoring customers purchase equipment that connects their alarm directly to their home network using a hardwired connection. This can prove ideal when a home’s router or network device resides within easy access of their alarm panel. Other times, these devices allow a security system to connect to your Wi-Fi for your alarm monitoring.
As an additional option, some security systems have the capability for network-based monitoring right out of the box. Select modern alarm panels, such as our preferred QOLSYS IQ Panel, come with the ability to wirelessly connect to a network for monitoring with no additional equipment necessary! This allows you with reliable monitoring as efficiently as possible. Now, let’s show you how cellular dialers provide our most popular and effective form of phone-free alarm monitoring for cord-cutters.
Alarm Monitoring Through a Cellular Dialer
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. Moreover, we can also program cell dialers to communicate via a cell network and your home’s internet connection as a backup! This gives your alarm multiple chances to communicate over the quickest route available to call for help.
Interactive cellular monitoring through Alarm.com allows users to control their alarm through a cell phone app and receive important alarm alerts instantaneously.
Furthermore, your cellular dialer can add convenience and security above and beyond providing a reliable communication path. In our post on Using Your Smartphone to Add Security to Your Alarm, we discussed the generational expectation that customers can control their electronics with their smartphones. Our interactive cell dialer powered by Alarm.com allows users to arm and disarm their security systems remotely using the Alarm.com smartphone app. It also allows them to receive notifications regarding security system status changes. These status updates can include low battery alerts, power failure notices, and other similarly important messages. This unique combination of additional security and convenience provided by interactive Alarm.com monitoring make it our most popular monitoring option!
Putting our Phone-Free Alarm Monitoring Options to Work for You
We hope that this post helps you understand your phone-free alarm monitoring options. As always, we encourage you to contact us with any questions this post may raise for you. We will happily answer any and all of your security-related inquiries. Furthermore, we also invite you to take advantage of our free site survey program. We’ve long offered complimentary security audits and equipment quotes to both new and existing customers alike. While on site, we can find solutions to address your security concerns. Moreover, we can make suggestions of our own based on observations of your property that we make during our visit.
Perhaps you have an alarm in place, and wish to take advantage of some of the ideas found in this post. Or, maybe you have yet to install a security system, and need to start from the ground up. Either way, we are here to help! Over our 38 years in business, we’ve helped over a thousand customers design an alarm that provides both the security and the user experience they desire. We would love to have the chance to work with you to secure your own home. Together, we can create a complete plan to keep your home, your most valuable possessions, and your family as safe and secure as possible!