More than 1,00 readers have now attended one of our ACPO Unscrambled forums, proving the huge amount of interest and concern installers have over the new ACPO Policy.
Our report last month covered the first events in Windsor, Berks and Stansted, Essex. Since then Security Installer and its partners, BT RedCARE, have taken the event around the country to Newcastle, Bristol, Coventry, Bolton and across to Belfast.
And while installers from some areas seem more critical of the policy than those in other areas, readers all over the UK have had one thing in common … they all have a thirst for information about the big changes demanded.
The question and answer sessions have reflected the varying degrees of concern installers have had and, more specifically, the relationship between installation companies and the 43 police forces.
For instance, the Coventry and Bolton events sparked a number of sharply pointed questions from installers about the inability for ACPO to speak as one voice. Many installers were dealing with multiple police forces … all with their own ideas about when and how the policy would work. This was causing confusion and adding greatly to installers’ admin workloads.
In contrast, installers in Northern Ireland were dealing with a single force, the RUC, and this made the ACPO changes much less confusing.
The headache caused to installers by the 43 different police interpretations of the policy seems to be something that can’t be remedied. As Kevin Mann, Secretary of the ACPO Security Systems Group, has explained to our audiences: each police force can do what it wants.
No whip cracking!
Because ACPO is a “trade association”, it can’t crack a whip and make all the forces jump at the same time, in the same way.
Although forces have sent out letters, it’s up to the installer to keep up with these individual interpre-tations. Thankfully, with police having individual websites, this is less of a problem. BT RedCARE also has a site dedicated to ACPO infor-mation. Visit www.redcare.bt.com to check on what every force is doing under the policy.
Apart from the “single voice” issue there are two other major problem areas for installers.
The first (and a big one) is the contents of the policy! … ie, the call for confirmation systems, the charges for URNs, the reduced threshold for police response. The second is all the other changes in legislation and standards that the industry is undergoing.
From my point of view, as chair-man of the sessions, I’ve detected a subtle change in installers’ attitudes towards confirmation. While this was almost universally branded as overkill when it was announced last year, I have heard increasing talk from installers along the lines of “there’s more business in it for us in the long run”.
That said, this in no way lessens concerns about what type of confirmation. And it doesn’t subdue the big voices still ranged up against confirmation as being totally unnecessary.
(There are other concerns which I don’t feel have been addressed at all: in an industry suffering from skill shortages – despite the best efforts of SITO’s co-operative training schemes – where are all the qualified engineers coming from to fit all these extra detectors?)
The most likely option
Speaking to installers after the events, my impression is that our audiences have largely dismissed visual confirmation as too expensive and audible confirmation as unmanageable due to the difficulties ARC operators will have identifying real intruders from background noise. (Mind you, I have to report a manufacturer of audio confirmation told me at one of the forums that he’d done more business in the last three months than in the last three years!) That leaves sequential confirmation as the most likely option.
At the forums Scott Elder, Technical Sales Manager at BT RedCARE has been demonstrating RedCARE’s confirmation technology in his own individual style, bringing a much needed light hearted touch to his presentations with musical contributions from the “Hallelujah Chorus” and Queen’s “Another one bites the dust”! Visual demonstrations of RedCARE, RedCARE ISDN and RedCARE GSM have been backed up by a hands-on demonstration area at each venue giving installers a greater understanding of the technology involved and what is available now.
In his presentations, Inspector Kevin Mann of ACPO has (cunningly) asked, and then answered, his own questions. These are the sort of questions that were originally asked by angry readers of Security Installer when the policy was announced last year: “Why are you making alarms so expensive? Why don’t you admit the police don’t want to respond to alarms? Why don’t you retain the Police List of installers? …” One of the most voiced criticisms was “Why are the police imposing a GB pound 30 URN charge?” Insp Mann’s answer is the cost covers a “special service” and the police are not allowed to make a profit. Consequently, there have been fewer questions and comments from installers about “profiteering police” than we’d expected.
How will it be paid?
Questions have centred around how the money is to be paid. In general it seems the forces do not mind who signs the cheques, despite the initial call to make end users more responsible for their systems.
Northern Ireland is again the exception here. Our RUC speaker in Belfast, Det Insp Philip McCullough, was adament that the police dealt with the 60 approved installers and not the 30,000 end users. They also planned to introduce a “bulk sell” of URNs to installers based on previous experience of how many each company might need. They wouldn’t be implementing the policy until October, giving installers much more time to prepare for it.
The other (currently) grey area in the policy is the controversial issue of confirmation of personal attack alarms, something that many installers have considered practically impossible. The opinions expressed at our forums and elsewhere are causing the police to reconsider this and soften their approach … proving, as Insp Mann says, the policy is a “living document”.
The other major problem area for installers is keeping up with the raft of other legislation and changes in standards. These have been ably summed up at our events by our BSIA speaker, Alex Carmichael, in one telling phrase … “Help, I’m an installer”.
Looking at the list of legislation affecting installation companies, is it any wonder that confusion is rife? He lists some of the current legislation: The Working Time Directive; Stakeholder Pensions; ISO 9000/2000; Health and Safety; Human Rights Act; Environmental Standards; Data Protection Act; Minimum Wage… And all that is in addition to the legislation that will have the biggest effect on installers: the current changeover of British to Euro standards This is a matrix of standards not easily digested in a single session – even the simplified version – so we’ve included it in the “takeaway” information packs. We hope, however,that our audiences have gone away with two essential technical documents in their minds: DD243 1999, the current standard document which covers confirmation systems; and the update, Euro Standard PD6662, which includes more details on design & configuration and filtering (also covered in the takeaway packs).
Installers’ practical advice
We have been fortunate to have an experienced regional installer address the audience at each event. These speakers have been a vital part of the events, explaining in their own words what ACPO 2000 means to them. Each had varying degrees of support for the policy but all of them gave practical advice on how they would tackle the demands made on their companies… and if nothing else, we hope our audiences leave with some good, practical advice on how to make it work profitably for their own businesses.
In Newcastle: Anthony King of Kings Security Systems, a “family business” with 135 staff at nine branches, said customers had shown lots of concern and were “very nervous”. But Kings had started addressing this already.
It was an opportunity to raise standards, to go to the customer with the right upgrade to stop false alarms. They were doing a complete overview and upgrade on 400 sites.
“This is a completely different way of working which raises the profile of the industry, so don’t just change the bell box sticker or the digi number.
“We’re not trying to absorb these charges. It’s up to us to go back to the customer and raise the charges. We’re going to design systems, not be afraid of customers.You’re having a chance to get monitoring and maintenance at prices they should be.
“This gives money back to train our staff, not sell on price. It’s a huge potential to increase sales. Profit in our business seems to be an ugly word. We’re not terrified anymore by having to find the cheapest way of doing the job. If someone wants to do it on a lesser spec, let them. They won’t be around for very long.” In Bristol: Steve Rudge of Eurolink Security Systems, Cheltenham, who started his company 12 years ago after a career in the police force, said he was determined to change the negatives into positives and make the best of the policy. He had written to all his customers informing them of the changes.
To lessen confusion, his company had all the regional police policies recorded on its management system. He would be forwarding URN cheques to the police “and keep control of the situation”.
“If you don’t stay on top of this you’ll have very angry clients”, he said. The policy was a great oppor-tunity for business. Installers should upgrade before they needed to.
In Coventry: Ashley Carmichael of Specialised Security Systems, Worcester, said his company were determined to build up its business by making the policy work. One of the problems was to educate engineers aged 45-50, who did not want to understand new technology.
There was a need for more cable protection and more use of aluminium tubing. Installers also needed more idea of risk assessment.
“Installers should start with a clean sheet of paper. Don’t bodge around with what the customer’s already got,” he said. “We shouldn’t be afraid to ask customers to pay for services.” In Bolton: Neil Pearson, of Nu-cam Systems, Manchester, said he had written to all customers offering a free security audit making the letter as plain as he could. There had been a mediocre uptake, he said: “They say they’ll do it when they lose response!” Like Andy Rees, of Absolute Security, Surrey, (who spoke at our first event at Windsor), he warned that more devices meant a greater risk of false activations.
He thought remote CCTV (broadband transmission) might be the way forward in 5-10 years.
“Perhaps we won’t need alarm receiving centres.” He said insurance companies needed to put pressure on clients to make sure they got confirmation systems.
He could not easily keep abreast of all the changing standards, so used a consultant.
In Belfast: Gordon Anderson of Scan Alarms, Newtonabbey, a company established 20 years ago and now with 2,500 monitored connections, said customers had to be made aware they were responsible for their systems.
He was speaking after D.I. McCullough of the RUC had pointed out that a huge 47 per cent of all false alarms in Northern Ireland was down to “user error” and “premises management”.
Anderson said: “We have to talk to customers and re-assure them. We have to explain the importance of false alarms. Customers must take ownership of their systems, must know they are responsible”.
His company was doing that in preparation for the policy.
D.I. McCullough had hinted that if a customer who had lost response got a confirmed system fitted they would be put back on police response before the three months were up. Anderson welcomed this.
As well as installers, we have had representatives of most of the country’s police forces in our audiences ready to answer questions, as well as representatives of the Association of British Insurers.
Champagne winners
The sessions have all ended with lunch where installers have been able to swap opinions … and at each event we have given away a magnum of champagne in a free draw courtesy of BT RedCARE.
Winners so far are: Sean Clarke, Alarm Shop II, Leyton, London; Andrew Gardiner, Gardiner Intruder Alarms, West Thurrock, Essex; Brian Hope, CDS Security, Gilesgate, Durham; Peter Peaches, Direct Services Group UK, Avonmouth, Bristol; Justin Welsh, Swift Security Systems, Salter St, Preston and J Sibbick, Sibbo Alarms, Kenilworth.
