Lots to Gain When You Inspect and Maintain
I recently encountered a false alarm situation that is so typical of the many cases we see and hear about every day.
A monitoring company had received a perimeter alarm at a customer’s home. As the alarm company was attempting to verify the alarm, a call came in from a cable guy who had accidentally caught his jacket on a crawlspace door and tripped the alarm. This person was not able to give the proper code and the owner, having been notified on the second verification call, authorized the police to be called. The customer was later upset that he had to come all the way across town in the middle of the day to let the police into his house.
While this is a very typical false dispatch scenario, what could have been done to prevent this and thousands of other similar situations? Was this truly a false alarm, since the door sensor and the alarm system did their jobs by sensing the open door and sending an alarm? I would argue no. But in the eyes of law enforcement, no one was apprehended so I guess it is a false alarm.
My overall point is that situations like this can be reduced considerably. In the military, personnel maintain their well-being through regular rest and relaxation, or R & R. Alarm systems need the same state of reliable readiness with a regular dose of inspections and maintenance, or I & M. Any seasoned security professional knows that a door contact should only be applied to a door that is physically secure. A periodic inspection or maintenance visit would have uncovered this system application flaw.
Importance of Self-Policing
As everyone knows there has been a large amount of attention to false alarms. Municipalities continue to get pressure on operational budgets and have looked for ways to reduce costs and increase revenues. We are all familiar with new measures such as Enhanced Call Verification (ECV) and more intelligent SIA CP-01 listed alarm controls. However, I & M is another area that is known to reduce false alarms, and increase system performance and reliability. 
Industry statistics show that the lack of system maintenance accounts for around 10 percent of false alarms. National organizations such as the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) have officially recognized the importance of system maintenance; however, ironically, you find very few intrusion alarm ordinances requiring regular I & M. One city that has taken the lead and requires regular I & M is Chicago. You will find some ordinances are reactive, rather then proactive, and only require system maintenance after several false dispatches.
Even the alarm industry’s Model Burglar Alarm Ordinance makes only a few slight nonrequirement references to system maintenance. Fire/life-safety alarm ordinances do include required maintenance, but what about personal emergency response systems (PERS), duress and burglary in general?
My point is shouldn’t the security industry take every opportunity possible to suggest the requirement of valuable maintenance services for all security systems? This is a win-win opportunity, as the alarm company gets enforcement to properly maintain the systems and jurisdictions get fewer false alarm issues. Both get a better opportunity to provide a safer and more secure environment for their customers and citizens.
So let’s say you want to put together an I & M program for your customers. What would be a good template or model for such a program? One rather new source for I & M guidelines is Chapter 9 in NFPA 731, “Installation of Electronic Premises Security Systems.” This chapter gives minimum requirements for testing and inspection along with report templates for systems such as intrusion/holdup/duress, access control and video surveillance. Yes, even video. How often do you still visit a guard shack and find at least one CCTV monitor or camera nonoperational or out of adjustment? Can this have an impact on public and personal safety? Possibly, given the right incident.
20 Ways to Assure Alarm Integrity
Following are some suggested key areas that should be addressed in a technician’s regular alarm systems I & M routine:
1) Review previous service calls to this account. (Service tip: keep copies in a locked alarm panel.)
2) Discuss system operation with customer and staff. Get indication of system performance since last inspection. Explain basic steps you will be taking in the inspection.
3) Notify all key on-site personnel and the alarm monitoring service of the testing period, zones/areas and/or codes on test. Once testing is completed notify the same personnel that system is off of test and live. This may be supported by public address systems and visual indicators and signs.
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