February 17, 2012
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Question
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Ken
Recently, I have come across a few commercial locations that are requested a telephone dialer be installed on their fire alarm. Our county doesn't allow for that kind of alarm traffic. However, the city dispatch does. They have a Silent Knight receiver mounted in the dispatch area.
How can this be up to commercial fire code? Who is tracking the daily test reports? I am pretty sure a monitoring station has to be UL listed to meet NFPA 72. We install the fire alarm and tell them we cannot do that. In the end they have another individual that installs the dialer. Nobody wants to pay the monthly fee.
What kind of fire power can I reference back at them regarding their current setup? Also if the dispatch has a receiver, wouldn't they have a great deal of liability for taking this on?
Thanks,
Doug Fischer
Saint Anthony, IN
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Answer
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If you are using the Standard Fire All in One, our premier contract for commercial fire, both you and the subscriber would be on proper notice of installation and monitoring requirements because the fire alarm system would be installed in accordance with AHJ requirements, inspection and approval. And if not, then the subscriber is going to have to acknowledge that the fire alarm system is not to code and not AHJ approved. You need to make sure that you can even install a non approved fire alarm system, and it's likely that you can not and should not.
Exposure for fire alarm property damage and personal injury is just too great to for you to permit a subscriber to push you to install or monitor a non compliant fire alarm system. No account should be worth risking your business and potentially your personal assets as well as your personal freedom [in case you are criminally prosecuted for installing or monitoring an illegal fire alarm system].
The Standard Fire All in One is clear that AHJ approval is necessary. Plans and specifications need to be filed, inspected and approved.
I can't comment on whether a dialer is permitted for a fire alarm system. Hopefully the fire alarm experts who participate in this forum will comment.
I am also not sure what you mean by the dispatch has a receiver. Do you mean that the fire department is doing it's own monitoring? That is being done in some jurisdictions. What liability the fire district, fire department or the municipality undertakes by performing its own monitoring is not really of concern to the alarm industry, The competition from the municipality who has decided to go into business under the guise of providing better police or fire protection to the public is what the alarm industry is and should be concerned with. As I've suggested before, there's lots of business opportunities out there for a municipality to go into business - let them find something other than the alarm business which has liability exposure most civil servant attorneys don't understand.
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More on no permit - no response issue
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Hi Ken,
Regarding no permit discussion, the issue made national television news in 1992; police refused to respond to alarm because no permit. Woman was raped and beaten for 45 minutes. The result of this incident, was our state legislature added a law to the California Government Code, Section 845: A Police Department shall not fail to respond to a request for service via a burglar alarm system or an alarm company referral service solely on the basis that a permit from the city has not been obtained.
Jon Sargent
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Ken
For some strange reason government employees and politicians feel that FINE is the answer to any problem, that their job is not to help but screw and punish people. Now even kids are fined. There is $5 fine for chewing gum in school, $1.25 bill for not having fully nutritional lunch in a lunchbox, etc. Kids don't have income. What happens when they can't pay? Would they be hauled of to jail or some foster facility? On the other hand, people who make $10,000 for just showing up certainly wouldn't lose the income for $100 parking ticket. Our government is becoming a joke hardly to take seriously. Government employees don't even speak English (ax me and i say you) and cops don't know neighborhood they work in, don't know how to get to address or accident location, so eventually there may be no response. Stupidity will prevail.
Dusan
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Comment on expired fire alarm contract
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Ken;
In response to Gordy about monitoring without a contract, we have come up with a new effective collection agency.
It is the fire department.
Under Florida law, and a variation in the fire code, we are required to notify the fire department any time monitoring service is interrupted for more than 4 hours. We have created a form to send to the fire department and copied to the customer, not only advising them that the system is no longer monitored, but we cite the specific law sections. (We do this for non payment, cancellation, anything abnormal) This protects us from liability with the fire department and also shows the customer that we arent doing it to be nasty, but we have to follow the law. We also block the control panel from reaching our receiver causing a phone failure and tossing the panel into trouble.
Usually, depending upon the fire department, they are there the next day. When the officials get there they see the panel in trouble and either force the customer to reinstate the system, create a very expensive fire watch, or evacuate the building. It works great.
Roy Pollack, CPP SET
Director of Compliance
Hollywood, FL
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Response
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Even I have to worry that the government will want to do alarm collection work soon. PS - the wholesale liquor industry has this by the way. Stick it to one distributor and you get black listed on the NY state liquor authority site and no other distributor can sell you
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Elevator question
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Ken
Do you know if there are any codes for the phone lines that are used in Elevator Monitoring?
With all this MFVN and VOIP I was wondering if there was anyone watching the elevator phones and creating a standard.
Thanks
David Perna
Fire Brigade Alarm Systems
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Answer
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Anybody with an answer?