KEN KIRSCHENBAUM, ESQ
ALARM - SECURITY INDUSTRY LEGAL EMAIL NEWSLETTER / THE ALARM EXCHANGE
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Can you de-program panel if contract ended
April 23, 2021
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Can you de-program panel if contract ended
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Ken,
I have a question for your forum.
If a subscriber is out of contract, and is not paying for a past due service we performed, do we have a right to remove their user code and programming from the panel?
It is a Kirschenbaum residential contract which after 5 years self-renews on a month to month basis.
Thanks,
Duane
All Island Security Inc
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Response
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You have your subscribers sign a Residential All in One agreement. Pursuant to that agreement you sell and install an alarm system and then provide one or more of what I refer to as the RMR services, monitoring, repair and inspection.
As you note, the Standard Form residential contract does not simply end at the end of the initial 5 year term; it automatically renews on a month to month basis unless canceled by either party on 30 day notice. You have gotten any notice of cancelation, but you also haven’t gotten paid into the renewal period [or if you did, payment is not continuing]. Your subscriber is “not out of contract”. In point of fact, your subscriber is under contract, though perhaps in breach of that contract. You need to terminate the contract either for the breach or on 30 day notice because you don’t want to renew on month to month basis. So you have these two options, immediate notice of termination for breach or 30 day notice of non-renewal.
Whichever option you use the contract and the relationship comes to an end. You want to know about de-programming the panel, which I assume you can do remotely. A few issues come to mind at time of termination. Since this subscriber has completed the initial term of the contract they are entitled to the panel code or to have the panel defaulted to manufacturer code. Before you provide that information you want to de-program, but you need to be careful about that. You can de-program the monitoring because the subscriber is no longer paying for that service. However, there is no reason to leave the system entirely inoperable; the subscriber is entitled to the equipment and system; basically a local alarm.
I have recommended in the past, and see no reason not to now, that, if you can, you can leave the message on the panel “no monitoring service”.
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Ken Kirschenbaum,Esq
Kirschenbaum & Kirschenbaum PC
Attorneys at Law
200 Garden City Plaza
Garden City, NY 11530
516 747 6700 x 301
ken@kirschenbaumesq.com
www.KirschenbaumEsq.com
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