Warning Issued About Unlicensed Alarm Installers (San Antonio, Anton: house, discounts, install)

[goodmanm]

I wonder what sort of stories scammers/criminals used to prompt this alert.

Warning Issued About Unlicensed Alarm Installers | WOAI.COM: San Antonio News

[Bowie]

I'm not so sure that there's a real danger here. It's now possible to get instructions from companies online to switch providers for your alarm system as a DIY project and save big bucks on monitoring. If you read this story with that in mind, it sounds a little like the big providers are creating fear to prevent people from doing that.

[slaleman]

We had a guy come by the other day wanting to install a system in our house free of charge, and as he finished chatting me up (and waking up our daughter via the dog barking) I asked who they were using as their monitoring company. The company he told me has an unsatisfactory rating from the BBB because of billing complaints. I put him off a day so I could check things out on my own, and when I found that out we decided we weren't going to do it, but I did consider it.

Lesson learned...ask about everything and make them give you a day. We could have made a very bad decision.

[PakBrain]

This past weekend a gentleman in 30s approached me in drive-way and said he was with GE Security Installation (wearing a white jacket and pointing to red GE logo knitted around the chest) and tried to sell me security system/installation.

I was not convinced since I am planning to install cameras around the house anways. The guy left easily (unlike another joker who came to show me how cool his cleaning solution was spraying all over my house I had to kick out)

[rd2007]

those cleaning solution people drive me crazy, especially when they start out "I'm not trying to sell you anything" and they're holding the bottle...

as far as this situation.. I would order the service instead of getting it from someone coming up to me. At least when I contact them I know I'm getting the real deal.

[ryneone]

Who is the person on the block that buys this crap so they keep coming back?

[slaleman]

Originally Posted by PakBrain

This past weekend a gentleman in 30s approached me in drive-way and said he was with GE Security Installation (wearing a white jacket and pointing to red GE logo knitted around the chest) and tried to sell me security system/installation.

That was the same outfit that came to my house...they were installing GE components, but the company itself started with a P...can't remember off the top of my head what it was. It was the second time we've had someone do that at this house, and we had another person come to our previous house with the same offer. All in all, if it sounds too good to be true, especially the "we're going to put $1200 of equipment in your house free of charge," you can bet they're probably getting kickbacks from the monitoring company. And I agree with RD...if I wanted the stuff, I'd call about it myself. I only considered it as long as it took to confirm for myself that it was probably a bad deal.

[hadleyzoo]

Originally Posted by slaleman

That was the same outfit that came to my house...they were installing GE components, but the company itself started with a P...can't remember off the top of my head what it was. It was the second time we've had someone do that at this house, and we had another person come to our previous house with the same offer. All in all, if it sounds too good to be true, especially the "we're going to put $1200 of equipment in your house free of charge," you can bet they're probably getting kickbacks from the monitoring company. And I agree with RD...if I wanted the stuff, I'd call about it myself. I only considered it as long as it took to confirm for myself that it was probably a bad deal.

Was it APX? They came to my house and made the same offer. Told them I was very happy with ADT who we get discounts from because we're USAA members. They then tried to claim they have a relationship with USAA. So I gave USAA a call and they were going to investigate because the only alarm company authorized to say they have a working relationship with USAA is ADT.