For the past few years, I have been a member of the BCIT Alarm Technician Program’s Advisory Board… made up of security industry members, regulatory agencies and BCIT instructors and faculty. At a recent meeting, a security company owner closed the meeting with a comment that "members of our committee, when speaking with the media, should refrain from disparaging our industry". When I asked him to elaborate on his comment, he went on to take issue with my comments on the Bill Good Show where I referred to the security industry as a "parasite on the Police".
When I asked him if he had listened to the entire interview, he replied that he heard the interview, and downloaded it from this blog. From the ensuing argument, I can only assume he had only listened to that one line… and had either forgotten or dismissed everything that came before and after that statement that gave it context, relevance and, in my opinion, absolute accuracy.
For the sake of others who only heard the ensuing argument (because I am now receiving emails asking me exactly what it was that I said), or simply that one line, I have posted the entirety of my final comment from the show to clarify exactly what I said.(here is the link to the audio file : the below starts at the 56:41 mark):
Bill Good: "If you are in the business of wanting security for your home, Mike Jagger, what I think I’m hearing you say is that you have to find a way to make it a verifiable system, because the Police are not going to respond in all likelihood, certainly not in a timely fashion to your alarm that simply goes off and is monitored by somebody."
Me: "Right. And I don’t think that the Police should. As taxpayers you want the Police to provide service, but you have to take some responsibility for the things that you can, and creating an extra burden on the Police by expecting them to respond and chase down alarms, where 98% of them are false, I think that that is unfair, unreasonable.."
Bill Good: "Why are 98% false?"
Me: "70% of the 98% are because of just user error. People just mixing up the codes and there is a bunch of reasons, but it’s user error. People just making mistakes and that’s just the way it is really… a huge chunk is just user error and as a result, alarm systems and the alarm industry have become a bit of a, a real pain, for the Police departments, a parasite in a lot of ways… it’s making money off of helping to make the problem worse."
Bill Good: "False hope"
Me: "… well, false hope, and just wasting police time and thats just something that people can do, and take responsibility for themselves that in a way, helps them get better value from the Police and just spends their tax money much more wisely."
So, in the event that it is still unclear… my point is this: the vast majority of alarm systems are still sold to consumers under the false pretense that the Police will provide response when the alarm goes off. With a 98% false alarm rate, and an already over-burdened Police department in Vancouver that cannot come close to responding consistently to true emergencies, the alarm industry, to the extent that it continues to sell new alarms that rely on ‘Police response’, is without question, "parasitic". It is truly making a bad situation worse.
Private response to alarm systems is an option that exists for alarm owners. Provided that it happens fast enough, private response is the difference between an alarm being a parasite and an alarm offering tremendous value. As we explain to our clients, our guaranteed five minute response helps them receive better value from the Police in that it serves to focus the Police’s response to only true emergencies where they have some hope of offering real value. Private response ensures that public dollars are not wasted chasing down the overwhelming majority of false alarms.
The Vancouver Police recently announced that their average response times to burglar alarms is well over two-hours. When the VPD can only manage an average response time of 11 1/2 minutes to a Priority One call (imminent threat to life), clearly any time spent by an Officer responding to an alarm is wasted and could be much better spent on other calls.
In my opinion the City of Vancouver is in desperate need of a verified response policy. Rather than continuing to tolerate a ridiculous situation, the City should simply cease providing any response to unverified alarms. The Police should not continue to allow the alarm industry to get away with suggesting that a burglar alarm without private response offers value. Instituting a verified response policy, whereby the VPD would only respond to alarms that have been verified as being an actual burglary in progress, would improve the situation immensely.