Has anyone come across a company installing burglar alarms but not requiring a maintenance agreement?
Printer ink, electric toothbrush head.... marketing syndrome!
I feel competent to do an annual walk test and routine battery change but doubt my ability to organise the initial set up.
So far, I have arranged multicore cabling to likely detector points and door button sets but stalled on finding someone to supply the kit and get it going.
Ignore the 'big name' companies and try the smaller (registered) ones. There are a couple that I've used locally (but too far from your location) who have been happy to install/service/whatever without having an annual contract.
They may not be too happy that you have put the runs in but as long as they can proper installation tests afterwards they shouldn't be too much of a problem.
I'm assuming that you *don't* want a monitored system and that it is
*not* an insurance requirement.
Having had a piece of heirloom jewelery revalued, my insurance company wanted an a pro installed system with an annual service. I already had a self installed system. The compnay I picked was quite happy to use my cable runs - and the locations of the the PIRs was thought to be ideal.
On 24/09/2017 09:29, Mark Allread wrote: ... snipped
This raises an interesting point. I've not declared the alarm to the insurance company because I did not want to find that the insurance company wriggled out of a claim if we had an "incident" and had forgotten to set the alarm, the same with window locks. Am I right to be concerned about this?
Also, currently dithering about whether or not to start paying for a monitoring service again. As the OP said: it feels a bit like the printer ink syndrome but, in a rural area, is there any point in setting an alarm without monitoring?
In message , charles writes
OK Chaps. That is reassuring. I'll scratch around locally.
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Our current alarm was installed by a local company following a burglary.
The insurance co didn't insist on us fitting an alarm but there was financial encouragement.
Sadly they were taken over by a National company who had a rather different idea of what an annual maintenance contract should cover: faulty parts were replaced but at my cost:-(
Can you get the alarm to notify your mobile phone?
If you want the police to attend calls, they may have certain criteria regarding maintenance.
On that ... do many 'pro' systems use wires for the PIRs etc or are they all not wireless etc?
I ask because I'm assuming might be less ... umm ... 'defeatable' than running them on some real copper (plus centralised power etc).
Cheers, T i m
p.s. If you have such valuables and assuming they aren't worn / used regularly, I wonder how the cost of a safety deposit box compares with a monitored alarm (if it's primarily being fitted for that reason etc)?
I'm pretty sure pro systems use cables. Certainly the alarm panel has inputs for plenty of cables. We have one RF sensor "on the front door). It's the only one which has given trouble - when I was away from home - as it happened. Having a service contract helped SWMBO.
I fitted the alarm after being burgled once. VCR taken and various locked things got damaged. Advice from scene of crime officer: "Burglar alarms alarm burglars".
Safety deposit boxes may have their uses, but what happens when you take the item out of the box. Particular item was for daughter2 to wear at her wedding. 3 days out of the box staying in an hotel.
That's what mine does.
Not especially. I haven't told our insurers either, because of the points you raise.
No.
So you can sit on a beach in Spain knowing your house is being burgled?
There's no "may" about it.
No - if its not a requirement you don't have to declare it. If it is a requirement it must be used whenever the property is empty (even if a short trip into town).
Insurance requirements usually require a maintenance contract too.
Depends on how close your neighbours are and if they have a key for access. Monitored systems are OK in that they will notify you/keyholder but can be expensive. Only you know what that peace of mind is worth.
And whether you think they'll bother the third time it goes off at 3AM. And whether they're prepared to face up to a burglar. And if they know a good boarding up service and locksmith.
First you have to find a safety deposit box. Not easy these days.
In message , T i m writes
All I know is that my son's monitored system resulted in my getting calls at 3am (his mobile phone, wherever in the world he was, was always set to silent and so didn't wake him) until he got the company to change settings so it required 2 triggers.
Now, after alterations to the house, I always have to reset one false alarm from one wireless sensor whenever I have been in to check his house in his absence.
It is usually a lost signal alarm. He has had the company back to install repeaters but that doesn't seem to have helped.
He has now installed a wife to remove the problem.
"You and Yours" was talking about this a few weeks ago. Most banks have closed their safe holding facilities, and those that haven't seem to have lost most of what people stored with them.
No recommendations except check/insist on getting maintenance code that the installer may have changed from default. .
I'm sure replacing the wireless with a wire would have been cheaper.
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