Doing It Yourself
It Just Keeps Getting Better
by Scott Kimball on 04/21/13ipDatatel, the creator and manufacturer of the Broadband Alarm Transceiver offered here, recently received the the prestigious "Best In Residental and Monitoring Solutions" Award at the SIA West show in Las Vegas in April.
The SIA West show (Security Industry Association), held each April in Las Vegas, is the largest security industry show in the world, with 900 exhibiting companies demonstrating their products to 23,000 security professionals.
In 2011, SIA also gave ipDatatel the same top honors for its Wireless BAT. The WI-BAT is also unique in that it utilizes Zigbee's wireless technology, allowing for home automation in addition to broadband alarm transmission.
ipDatatel, headquartered in Sugar Land, TX, engineers, designs and manufactures all their products themselves (made in the USA).
DIY-Monitoring, a service of Aegis Technology, has promoted their product line from the first day. Why this exclusivity? Their products work, they're affordable, and their service does not require a contract.
Scenarios
by Scott Kimball on 11/23/12Latchkey Children
To help with the family budget, mom takes on a part-time job, and now and then her hours extend past the time John and Mary gets home from school. As moms do, she leaves strict instructions for them: 'Come straight home from school, no friends over when she's not home and homework must be finished before watching TV or playing video games.' Mom also knows that they're following her rules because she gets an immediate text message when they disarm the alarm system, and she can look in on them with an Aegis pan/tilt camera.
Situational Awareness & Control
William now has two store locations and with the BAT installed at both, he knows when his managers arrive (disarm text message) and when they lock-up (arm text message). With an Aegis camera surveillance system, he's also able to see and listen-in to either store remotely on his computer or phone. One evening he got a phone call from Sara, one of his new employees. She was a little frantic when she explained that the manager had an unpleasant argument with a customer. After the customer had left, the manager threw her the keys and said, "I've had it," and left without saying another word. William digested this for a minute and then asked her if she was comfortable enough to run the store by herself, or if she rather close the store and lock up. Sara was honest and told him she wasn't comfortable being by herself. He understood and explained the procedures of closing the store and asked her for a 4-digit number she could easily remember.
While Sara was closing down the the store, William opened his DIY Monitoring security page on his computer and brought up the remote keypad. He went into user programming added Sara and her 4-digit PIN number and deleted the manager's PIN. After changing the user codes, William called Sara and told her how to arm the alarm system with the 4-digit number she gave him. He also thanked her for calling him right away about the problem. He also asked her if she was interested in the company's manager training program, since there was now a new opening.
Special Delivery
Tom runs a business from his home and was expecting a critically important package to be delivered. Not only was it time-sensitive for the project he was working on, it was also expensive.
Due to the nature of his business, Tom knew he could be called out and not be there when the package was delivered, and didn't want it to be left on the front porch. So, Tom took the precaution of contacting the delivery company and gave instructions that if no one answered the door to call him on his cell phone.
As it turned out, that was a wise precaution because Tom was not home when the package arrived. The delivery man called him as instructed and Tom said, "Give me just a moment." In just a few seconds, he opened the BAT app on his phone and opened the garage door. "If you don't mind, please put the package in the garage," Tom requested.
"Wow, how did you do that?"
Tom smiled and responded, "DIY Monitoring."
A Great Tool for Business
by Scott Kimball on 05/24/12
With its feature-rich
capabilities, the Aegis BAT (broadband alarm transmitter), is a great tool for
the business owner/manager.
First and foremost on the list is situational awareness - knowing what's going on when it's going on. Not only will the Aegis BAT notify you of an alarm before the central station contacts you, you'll also get the same quick response when the alarm system is disarmed and armed.
Here are some realistic examples:
- Let’s say you own a couple of stores. They both open at 10:00 a.m. and close at 8:00 p.m. Now, it’s 9:30 pm and you’re relaxing with you family watching TV. A commercial comes on and you realize that you didn’t receive a text from one of your stores that it was armed. After double checking your messages, you verify that a text from that store closing was never received. You then open the BAT App on your phone, and arm the store’s alarm system with your phone.
- Same scenario (store owner/9:30 pm), but this time you receive phone call from one of your employees telling you that the evening manager had to leave on a personal emergency. The manager left the key to lock up, but didn’t provide a code to arm the alarm system. You ask the employee what code they would like, and using your BAT App, you remotely program the user code into the alarm panel.
- This time it’s a bit later and you’re ready to go to bed when your phone sounds with a text message stating that there is an alarm from zone 2, front motion detector. Since you recently had Aegis Technology install a new camera surveillance system, you open an App on your phone to view your cameras. Fortunately, you don’t see anything amiss. However, you do see the culprit – your employees hung the piñatas as they were supposed to, but too close to the air vent.
- While putting together the upcoming week’s schedule, you start wondering if your managers are opening and closing the stores on time. On your personal BAT webpage, you have access to your alarm system’s history.
As you can see,
adding the Aegis BAT to your alarm panel adds several useful tools for a
business owner/manager. If you have any
questions or need additional information, please call us at 1-855-311-3110 or
404-787-1694. You can also email us at mailto:sales.diym@gmail.com?subject=Aegis
BAT Query
Dropping Your Alarm Monitoring Service
by Scott Kimball on 05/14/12
Would you purchase a guard dog that doesn’t bark?
That’s a silly question, I know, but it does illustrate what a home security system is without being monitored.
As a local alarm dealer, I’ve noticed a growing trend of home owners opting out of this important 24/7 service. For an alarm company that’s a disturbing trend, yet it’s understandable.
Reasons to Drop Monitoring
There are good reasons for people to discontinue their alarm monitoring service. First and foremost is the economy. Family budgets are what they are and decisions have to be made on cutting back on expenses. Alarm monitoring service is often one of the items on the chopping block.
False alarm fines are another cause, especially for those trying to get by on a tight budget. Consider what cutting $75, 125 or more out of your weekly grocery budget would do, and it easily understood why people decide to drop monitoring altogether after being assessed a fine.
And then there is the contract that many alarm companies trap their customers. When the warm glow of a great deal has worn off and the monthly payment grinds on, and on, and on, many are ready to jump ship when the term of the contract is up.
As an alarm dealer, I am very aware of the situation – don’t like it – but understand it. You see, monitored alarm customers are the ‘holy grail’ to an alarm company. It is the reoccurring income that keeps the company ship afloat.
Doing-It-Yourself
With that in mind, it might surprise you when I say, “There is a way for you to monitor your existing home security system yourself with the Aegis BAT and give your guard dog its bark.”
