Ip Alarm Signalling

[jimcarter]

Yes, most of us are I guess....well those in business.... joking apart...and so are clients. If you pitch it right, you don't have to sell on price every time. It's a factor, but if you have the arguements to hand..... And in our Industry, especially where signalling is concerned, the ability to distinguish the features and benefits of one system over another is lacking.

I mentioned it in a post once before, that Alan Sugar once said "I once employed someone who could only sell on price..that person no longer works for me".

[james.wilson]

Jef I find that sometimes when I find out facts rather than believing marketing I do change my mind, hence why we have now stopped fitting grade 3 comms.

[jb-eye]

Jef I find that sometimes when I find out facts rather than believing marketing I do change my mind, hence why we have now stopped fitting grade 3 comms.

Come on James. lets use the DualCom GPRS as an example. Everyone knew the facts, even the ARC promoted the DUAL PATH marketing to replace all those SINGLE PATH RedCare units for the G2 Dual Path comms which were swopped out like wild fire and in most cases without customer and almost never without insurance consultation. We are guilty of the practice using the clause YOU must notify your insurer as a cop out. FFS everyone made a fortune fitting a PsPoorProduct by comparison and to top the lot no one suffered because end of day it reported alarms in the appropriate time frame.

OUponAtime we had the benefit of selling quality with morality because the customer had little choice. Now we have to play to another tune where the customer can call the tune. seems strange that the incumbent authority may now be about to get a taste of what they sew.

What do facts have to do with survival?

[james.wilson]

Jeff

I hear what your saying, I suppose it doesn't. But I don't think its on or right that people follow the 'grade 2 that will do' regardless of risk. The client is carrying the risk and if they are fully aware I'm ok with that. But you must admit that most are not even given the choice. I had it recently where another co were quoting G2 system and comms when the insurer had requested G3 and G4 comms. Fortunatly I got the chance to explain why where the price difference was and got the job. If I hadn't had that oppurtunity that client may have gone that way and actually been uninsured. The alarm co would of been ok as they would have covered themselves in the sdp etc. I don't operate like that.

But as a side note we didn't replace our redcares with G2 DC thankfully. But I will be replacing most of the G3 secures / dualcoms on service now

[jb-eye]

Jeff

I hear what your saying, I suppose it doesn't. But I don't think its on or right that people follow the 'grade 2 that will do' regardless of risk. The client is carrying the risk and if they are fully aware I'm ok with that. But you must admit that most are not even given the choice. I had it recently where another co were quoting G2 system and comms when the insurer had requested G3 and G4 comms. Fortunatly I got the chance to explain why where the price difference was and got the job. If I hadn't had that oppurtunity that client may have gone that way and actually been uninsured. The alarm co would of been ok as they would have covered themselves in the sdp etc. I don't operate like that.

But as a side note we didn't replace our redcares with G2 DC thankfully. But I will be replacing most of the G3 secures / dualcoms on service now

And i commend you. Unfortunately only yesterday we quoted a job which was won on price alone. We costed the option of Digi and informed that should that not be acceptable then sub is not to worry as it can be upgraded to ATE XX later for a small price increase. Guess if the other installer was you then we won because we gave the sub somewhere to monouvre. Rememmber my G2 is actualy G3 and the comms can be implemented at a later date.

Yes you were fortunate to exsplain the diffrence, however as a purchaser i would have gone with our flexable option despite your concern.

On a side note can this topic be seen from public?

[MrHappy]

"main public area"

[jb-eye]

"main public area"

Somethings amiss.

I dont want to be able to read so thus not post in the public areas. I thought the topic was getting a lot of attention.

[MrHappy]

theres no none trade posters in the topic, guess it could be shifted into another forum ?

[james.wilson]

Ill filter it and move some posts into trade, I think its a relevant topic to remain mostly public

[SoupDragon]

This is an interesting topic. Signalling over IP is an excellent idea as the infrastructure is already there. These are the problems I see:

Customer turning the router off at night/unplugging the Ethernet cable - but this is solved by dual com and switching to 3G.

Port forwarding. It shouldn't be needed. Implying that the alarm should be running any sort of service accessible via the Internet (i.e webserver) so information can be collected and/or commands sent to the alarm is just asking for trouble. This could in theory be exploited in the same way any webserver is exploited (and could give an attacker full control over the alarm whether the software was designed to do so or not especially if the 'digicom' is sharing the same resources (cpu/memory) as the alarm, just thinking of the Scantronic ION) ...BUT there is lower hanging fruit with IP.

A denial of service attack is possible with it facing the Internet (either by sucking all the bandwidth up or managing to get it to execute code like a fork bomb) you could monitor the line but you'd need to make sure it wasn't just packet loss, like redcare does.

Also if it's sending the customer an email, what if the email server goes down? They wouldn't receive the email until it's too late. Neither is it a secure way of communication.

Applications on mobile phones are the way forward, and their connected to the Internet and that's the item you take with you where you're out. The whole process from the IP DigiCom becoming aware of an alarm to the customer getting a push notification on their phone needs to be built with security in mind. (Not security through obscurity though!)

I don't see it taking over from RedCare just yet, but it's better than a dialler!