Who actually owns the tape recordings

Question:
    
Recently a certain large monitoring center that provides 3 party monitoring 
has refused to allow us to listen to the tapes of the actual conversations 
between them and our client.  This makes it very difficult for us to determine 
exactly what happened in certain situations.  There are no suing involved just 
questions as to the operator’s attitude. 
 
Who actually owns these recordings?  We pay the monitoring center to monitor 
and we collect the money from the customer.
Thanks,
Mike Macdonald
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Answer:
    I am assuming that the contract between dealer and central station does 
not specifiy who owns the recordings or under what circumstances the dealer can 
listen to them.  Since the recording is made by the central station I believe 
it owns the recording.  Absent consent by one of the parties to the 
conversation I don't think the dealer should has assess to the recording.  
    My central station monitoring contract designates the dealer as the agent 
for the subscriber, so the dealer would be able to authorize listening to the 
recording on its own.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Mike    
Its time to get another Central Station   
 Marty Lanz
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    I think Marty's suggest that Mike look into another central station 
misses the real message I'd like to convey.  The dealer's relationship with the 
central station, like the central station's relationship with the subscriber and 
dealer, is a matter of contract.  The contract terms should address all issues 
likely to arise.  Though I have to admit that the question of "who owns the 
tape recording" is not one directly addressed in the my contracts, there is 
another provision that would govern the situation.
    First let's look at the contracts that the central station uses.  The 
Installer Contract is the one time contract between the central station and the 
dealer.  It governs the overall relationship and certainly could easily address 
the tape recording issue now that it has come up.  
    The three party contract is between the central station, dealer and the 
subscriber.  That contract specifies that the dealer is designated as the agent 
of the subscriber for purposes of dealing with the central station.  That 
provision was added not to deal with tape recordings, but to deal with 
instructions given by the dealer to the central station regarding monitoring which might 
change the contract terms already signed by the subscriber.  For, example, 
advising the central not to dispatch under certain circumstances; putting the 
system on test; changing codes and passwords.  This provision could also be used 
by the dealer to request the tape recording, though that would not give the 
dealer any more rights than the subscriber.  A central station could take the 
position that as a party to the conversation it had a right to record the 
conversation and that it had no obligation to let anyone hear it, without a court 
order.  Keep in mind that the law in most if not all jurisdictions is that only 
one party to a conversation need give consent to a third party listening or 
recording the conversation.  I do not believe that the law requires that the 
conversation be made available to the other party.
    A central station naturally must be concerned with protecting the privacy 
of the subscribers, and could take the position that even the dealer has no 
business hearing conversations.  A dealer's perspective is different; it's the 
dealer's subscriber and the dealer has the greater interest in preserving the 
continued business of that subscriber.  Central station mix ups or less than 
professional treatment of the subscriber are one of the more frequent causes of 
subscriber dissatisfaction, leading to contract termination.  When a dealer 
makes its deal with the central station one of the issues that should be 
spelled out is the right to listen to tapes [I know that this is not really a major 
issue because all central stations I deal with would readily allow the dealer 
to listen to tapes].
    By the way, before I close this issue I want to remind the dealers that 
the central station contract that is supplied to you by the central station is 
not the monitoring contract that you need with your subscriber.  That contract 
protects the central station and has terms needed by the central station.  
Any protection for the dealer in that contract is an add on or afterthought.  
Dealers need their own monitoring contract with the subscriber and if you don't 
have one or haven't updated it within the last year or so, then buy it today 
at http://www.alarmcontracts.com/.  [OK, another plug for my contracts; I 
couldn't help myself].
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Ken ;
We could probably beat this around from both points of view. In 99.9 % of the 
time the tapes are recorded for liability purposes.  We don't consider them 
as the property of the dealer.

Should a legal matter arise, they can be the saving factor... I recall an 
incident many years ago were a village police dept in a rural township was 
dispatched on an alarm. To make a long story short, the subscriber arrives home 
to find the house burglarized.  The police denied receiving the dispatch. the 
central station tapes cleared up the matter in a few seconds.

I'd like to mention also that some fire AHJ's require by ordinance that 
voice records of the fire dispatches be kept on file for two years.

It is clearly a tool for the central station's own use and protection. In 
regard to allowing the subscriber and/or the dealer to listen to a recorded 
incident, that matter is a situation by situation
judgment call at the central station's discretion.

You always seem to hit on some very provocative issues Ken. Keep up the good 
work.

RON PETRARCA
Electronix Systems
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Ken,
First, my compliments on an excellent forum...you raise or invite interesting 
industry issues and tend to keep the fire stirred.
Keep up the good work. 

Regarding CS tape recordings, this is something the alarm dealer should 
discuss with the CS before signing a contract or committing his/her accounts, not 
when the situation arises. This is why, doing due diligence isn't just finding 
the CS with the best marketing or lowest fees. The dealer should have a list 
of ??? to ask the CS when making that important choice, one of them being 
"disposition of recordings if needed?"  The dealer should also consider having 
his/her own toll free number, so that if a choice is made to change CS's the 
change can be made seamlessly.  In turn, the CS should consider the good customer 
relations that can be gained by permitting access to the recordings, with a 
release from the end-user, of course. 

Joseph

My contact information is:
Joseph Hayes, CPP, PSP, SET