Get the Facts: Phone Service and Home Protection

Over 26 mil­lion Cana­di­ans owned cell phones by 2013, which rep­re­sents more than one per house­hold.  This num­ber con­tin­ues to climb.  The pop­u­lar­i­ty, reli­a­bil­i­ty and con­ve­nience of mobile phones, espe­cial­ly smart phones, has seen the impor­tance of tra­di­tion­al land­lines drop off sig­nif­i­cant­ly.

In fact what many peo­ple are find­ing is that when the ‘land­line’ phone rings, it’s more often than not from one of three peo­ple: an old­er rel­a­tive, a poll­ster, or worse… a tele­mar­keter.

As a result it’s not sur­pris­ing to see 15% of house­holds use exclu­sive­ly Cell Phone users and this num­ber jumps to 50% of house­holds led by the 18–34 year olds.   The tech­no­log­i­cal improve­ments in VOIP and ser­vices like Skype, Apple’s “Face time”, and Blackberry’s  “BBM Video” all are tak­ing away the need for land­lines in homes.

So what does all this mean to you, your home secu­ri­ty sys­tem and pos­si­bil­i­ties?   The answers are quick­ly chang­ing, and the news is most­ly good.  Here are a few things you should know:

1) Call your alarm com­pa­ny BEFORE you make any ser­vice changes to your land­line if you cur­rent­ly have a mon­i­tored alarm sys­tem. Being informed can save you mon­ey and headaches.

2) Land­lines are still a secure reli­able form of com­mu­ni­ca­tions, and tra­di­tion­al phone com­pa­nies don’t want to lose your busi­ness, so put on your nego­ti­at­ing hat, call your phone com­pa­ny and nego­ti­ate a bet­ter price.  The major phone com­pa­nies have “cus­tomer reten­tion” depart­ments that are ful­ly pre­pared to give sig­nif­i­cant dis­counts to retain your busi­ness.

3) VOIP (Voice over inter­net pro­to­col) phone ser­vice is NOT equiv­a­lent to con­ven­tion­al dig­i­tal phone lines,  while you may be able to have a con­ver­sa­tion suc­cess­ful­ly on a ‘mag­ic jack” con­nec­tion, it does not mean devices like Alarm sys­tems etc., are com­pat­i­ble.

4) The good news is that Alarm Indus­try has embraced all the new tech­nol­o­gy avail­able. The results are some great new options for you.  Excit­ing and very use­ful new options can be but a few steps away.

Now more than ever, with increas­ing­ly busy lifestyles, we need secu­ri­ty sys­tems, that like our smart­phones, are inter­ac­tive flex­i­ble and reli­able.  With prod­ucts and ser­vices like Total Con­nect from PROTECTION PLUS ®, your alarm sys­tem can uti­lize your inter­net ser­vice, a cel­lu­lar net­work or a land­line to be mon­i­tored.  Now with the inter­net con­nec­tion your alarm sys­tem can offer much more than basic secu­ri­ty, it can be the hub for some great home automa­tion con­ve­niences. Con­trol your alarm, your lights, ther­mo­stat and more… all from the touch of smart­phone or tablet.  Plus receive email alerts for any alarm activ­i­ty includ­ing when the kids get home from school!   It’s all about “being con­nect­ed” call us to find out how to join.