I have had a long relationship with Safe Touch; first by having them take over the monitoring of my existing alarm, then by upgrading that alarm to a cellular backup, and then, in April of 2017 I took the plunge and requested the installation of the top-of-the line NEO system. The reason I wanted the NEO was simple; I was tired of getting calls for false alarms and battery failures. Having to quickly decide whether to call the police and, regardless the decision, rush home from whatever I was doing had become extremely stressful and left my family and I anxious regarding out-of-town travel. A new, completely cellular system, with new batteries and, especially, the "Two-Way Communicator" seemed to be the worry-free solution.
Boy, was I wrong. The "Two-Way Communicator" has never once worked as intended. Oh yes, the unit mechanically works. However, the installation placed it as far away from both of my keypads as it could possibly be, and placed it beside the alarm speaker! This, of course, results in the Safe Touch operators being unable to hear a thing and, in the case of a family member mistakenly setting off the alarm; the family member being unable to hear the "Communicator". This was acknowledged almost immediately after the initial install but now I'm told I signed off that it worked and will be responsible for service charges to have the issue corrected. After spending an entire lunch hour, the service supervisor still only agreed to waving the first hour's service charge. Yes, I signed that the speaker worked but my mistake was trusting that the Safe Touch installer/service technician actually knew what he was doing!
In addition I have since learned that the smoke detectors, hardwired into my old system, had been disconnected WITHOUT NOTIFYING ME! They left my family vulnerable to fire without so much as a murmur despite telling me that my existing sensors would be incorporated into the system! Never was I offered or told that fire protection was "additional". In fact, form Schedule C, states that on receiving a fire alarm signal the monitoring station will telephone the Fire Department! Even when it was determined that I wasn't being monitored for fire (I called to request a fire alarm certification), I was told the smoke detectors would still activate the alarm. Nope, on checking closer, I see they have not been wired into the new system and are just hanging on my ceilings for looks.
"Stay away from Safe Touch", is truth in advertising. Either that or hire a third party security consultant to oversee the installation. It is disgraceful that a company that claims to have the well-being of its customers as a priority will allow such haphazard work and then fight to avoid correcting it or even inspecting it to see if the customer's complaints are justified. read more
