Alarm Monitoring via Cellular - What is best

I have an Elk M1G and currently monitor it myself via it calling me and emailing me. I would like to have a professional monitoring company in the loop as well. I do not have a regular phone line as I use VoIP and my iphone. I of course have internet via road runner.

What experience do folks have using a GSM system to monitor the alarm? What interface and cellular service would you recommend? What about monitoring companies?

Thanks for the thoughts.
Lou

Lou Apo said:

I have an Elk M1G and currently monitor it myself via it calling me and emailing me. I would like to have a professional monitoring company in the loop as well. I do not have a regular phone line as I use VoIP and my iphone. I of course have internet via road runner.

What experience do folks have using a GSM system to monitor the alarm? What interface and cellular service would you recommend? What about monitoring companies?

Thanks for the thoughts.
Lou

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NextAlarm fully supports monitoring over IP and it works well. I still do have a phone line and previously used NextAlarm over that, but had hoped to remove the phone (hasn't happened yet) to go with VoIP. In about two months I've had maybe one or two times when the panel beeped that it could contact the monitoring service but that's it. (In contacts every time I arm or disarm.)

Cellular is an option but its going to cost you. I think NextAlarm costs more when you are using cellular plus you have to pay for the cellular. Figure at least $15 a month just for that, probably more. HAI makes an interface that will work for GSM.

Also, I would disagree a bit with you when you say your "monitoring it yourself." So you are on vacation and you get a text that your fire alarm went off or burglar alarm? You call your neighbor to check it out? Also, I caution you in thinking text messages are 100% reliable. My fire alarm DID go off the other day, when I was changing the battery for a smoke alarm. The alarm company calls and I tell them it was a false alarm. O.K. no problem.

Two days later I'm at the gym and I get a text message from my system saying the fire alarm went off. I call the alarm company and they say they have no alarm. I looked at the date of the message and it was from the previous fire alarm, but I just actually received it then. If my previous fire alarm was REAL, and I wasn't home, my house would have burned down before I got the message.

Well, yes, I agree about the self monitoring which is why I am looking into this. Although I do not use text messages but rather email and phone calls. The system actually is set to email me with every arm/disarm and I have push email on my phone. I get a little "ding" every time the alarm arms or disarms so I know from day in day out use that it is quite reliable. I mostly worry about someone cutting the cable line to the house or just the internet/router going down which it is prone to do from time to time.

I did get a false fire alarm once and went ahead and just called the fire station and had them go out and look. I was able to unlock the house and open the garage door via remote to let them in and check it out. They were pretty impressed.

I have been using the hai Gsm cellular interface for about 5 months now with my alarm. It has worked perfect, it calls the alarm company on every arm and disarm. Never one error, it has it's own battery backup too. The only downside is you have to have another gsm line, I just added one for 10 dollars a month to my family plan and then pay for the normal monitoring on top of it. I think on average it goes through about 150 or so mins a month, which isn't a problem for me, but may be if someone is maxing out their cell phone family plan already. I have next alarms phone number on the a-list program that AT&T gives you allowing to to call certain numbers unlimited so I never have to worry about it.

That HAI unit seems like a good solution. It's not that expensive either.

What do people use for a cellular connection to a monitoring company if they are Verizon (e.g., non-GSM) customers? Is there a way to do the same thing with CDMA? Are there special deals available somewhere that allows a person to get a GSM device without signing up for full cellular service from a GSM company?

Typically you would use a prepaid plan. Find out which carrier (AT&T or T-Mobile) has the best coverage in your neighborhood and get a 1 yr prepaid card. Look here and here.

Steve said:

Typically you would use a prepaid plan. Find out which carrier (AT&T or T-Mobile) has the best coverage in your neighborhood and get a 1 yr prepaid card. Look here and here.

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When you get one of the prepaid or pay-as-you-go plans, do they just give you a SIM chip that can be put into the GSM dialer like the HAI device?

So do companies like NextAlarm (when used with an Elk M1G at the home) allow you to have your wired phone line or internet connection used as a primary connection, and a wireless GSM phone used as a backup connection? If so, it seems like the monthly cost of a pay-as-you-go AT&T connection ($.25/minute) would be next to nothing since it would only call out on the wireless if the primary line was unavailable. Is that correct, or am I missing something?

Thanks,
Ira

Ira said:

Steve said:

Typically you would use a prepaid plan. Find out which carrier (AT&T or T-Mobile) has the best coverage in your neighborhood and get a 1 yr prepaid card. Look here and here.

Click to expand...

When you get one of the prepaid or pay-as-you-go plans, do they just give you a SIM chip that can be put into the GSM dialer like the HAI device?

So do companies like NextAlarm (when used with an Elk M1G at the home) allow you to have your wired phone line or internet connection used as a primary connection, and a wireless GSM phone used as a backup connection? If so, it seems like the monthly cost of a pay-as-you-go AT&T connection ($.25/minute) would be next to nothing since it would only call out on the wireless if the primary line was unavailable. Is that correct, or am I missing something?

Thanks,
Ira

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The more I think about it, I guess the central monitoring office doesn't know/care if your system is calling in on a wired or wireless phone, since it's just a phone call...right? So the question is really can the Elk M1G support a wired phone line as primary and a wireless device as a secondary.

Ira

Ira said:

The more I think about it, I guess the central monitoring office doesn't know/care if your system is calling in on a wired or wireless phone, since it's just a phone call...right? So the question is really can the Elk M1G support a wired phone line as primary and a wireless device as a secondary.

Ira

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I'm not sure if that is true. In talking with companies, they charge additionaly fee for using a cellular connection. There must be something different in the data transmission or how would they even know.

Lou Apo said:

Ira said:

The more I think about it, I guess the central monitoring office doesn't know/care if your system is calling in on a wired or wireless phone, since it's just a phone call...right? So the question is really can the Elk M1G support a wired phone line as primary and a wireless device as a secondary.

Ira

Click to expand...

I'm not sure if that is true. In talking with companies, they charge additionaly fee for using a cellular connection. There must be something different in the data transmission or how would they even know.

Click to expand...

I looked at NextAlarm's web site, and they charge $7.50 a month extra for cellular. Unfortunately, it doesn't say if that means it will support a primary wired phone-in and a secondary wireless phone-in, or if the extra $7.50 just gets you the capability to use the wireless as the primary. Guess I need to give them a call.

Thanks,
Ira

Ira said:

Lou Apo said:

Ira said:

The more I think about it, I guess the central monitoring office doesn't know/care if your system is calling in on a wired or wireless phone, since it's just a phone call...right? So the question is really can the Elk M1G support a wired phone line as primary and a wireless device as a secondary.

Ira

Click to expand...

I'm not sure if that is true. In talking with companies, they charge additionaly fee for using a cellular connection. There must be something different in the data transmission or how would they even know.

Click to expand...

I looked at NextAlarm's web site, and they charge $7.50 a month extra for cellular. Unfortunately, it doesn't say if that means it will support a primary wired phone-in and a secondary wireless phone-in, or if the extra $7.50 just gets you the capability to use the wireless as the primary. Guess I need to give them a call.

Thanks,
Ira

Click to expand...

I don't really understand what is up with the extra charge. I would love to hear the explanation. I did check out HAI's C3 unit and they have a nice little video which quite clearly states it supports all monitoring formats. To me, that means that the monitoring company shouldn't even need to know that it is cellular. The HAI device looks very simple and effective and has me tempted to switch my entire home phone system over to it.

Ira said:

I looked at NextAlarm's web site, and they charge $7.50 a month extra for cellular. Unfortunately, it doesn't say if that means it will support a primary wired phone-in and a secondary wireless phone-in, or if the extra $7.50 just gets you the capability to use the wireless as the primary. Guess I need to give them a call.

Click to expand...

AFAIK, NextAlarm doesn't care if you use cellular as primary or backup. The bottom line, is that SOMEBODY expects to get paid if you use cellular. If you use NextAlarm's add-on cellular service, they reimburse the company that actually provide the cellular infrastructure (such as UpLink). If you pay your cellular provider directly (by the minute or monthly), then NextAlarm doesn't about the cellular aspect.

WayneW said:

Ira said:

I looked at NextAlarm's web site, and they charge $7.50 a month extra for cellular. Unfortunately, it doesn't say if that means it will support a primary wired phone-in and a secondary wireless phone-in, or if the extra $7.50 just gets you the capability to use the wireless as the primary. Guess I need to give them a call.

Click to expand...

AFAIK, NextAlarm doesn't care if you use cellular as primary or backup. The bottom line, is that SOMEBODY expects to get paid if you use cellular. If you use NextAlarm's add-on cellular service, they reimburse the company that actually provide the cellular infrastructure (such as UpLink). If you pay your cellular provider directly (by the minute or monthly), then NextAlarm doesn't about the cellular aspect.

Click to expand...

Ahhh. So I wad thinking that you still had to pay for monthly cell service on top of that fee. Smarthome is advertising 8.95 for monitoring with a year prepay. They have extra fees for wireless and the woman seemed to be telling me that that was on top of your cell service fees. I really like the concept of getting hai system and for $10 month adding my home phone to my cell plan and then having the alarm monitor that way too

Lou Apo said:

WayneW said:

Ira said:

I looked at NextAlarm's web site, and they charge $7.50 a month extra for cellular. Unfortunately, it doesn't say if that means it will support a primary wired phone-in and a secondary wireless phone-in, or if the extra $7.50 just gets you the capability to use the wireless as the primary. Guess I need to give them a call.

Click to expand...

AFAIK, NextAlarm doesn't care if you use cellular as primary or backup. The bottom line, is that SOMEBODY expects to get paid if you use cellular. If you use NextAlarm's add-on cellular service, they reimburse the company that actually provide the cellular infrastructure (such as UpLink). If you pay your cellular provider directly (by the minute or monthly), then NextAlarm doesn't about the cellular aspect.

Click to expand...

Ahhh. So I wad thinking that you still had to pay for monthly cell service on top of that fee. Smarthome is advertising 8.95 for monitoring with a year prepay. They have extra fees for wireless and the woman seemed to be telling me that that was on top of your cell service fees. I really like the concept of getting hai system and for $10 month adding my home phone to my cell plan and then having the alarm monitor that way too

Click to expand...

Are you thinking of having the HAI device as primary or backup? Seems to me that if you have it as backup, it would be cheaper (cellular service-wise) to do a pay-as-you-go "by the minute" plan, since it would hopefully seldom use the cellular service. Even if you had it do a test call from the backup every day to ensure it is working (if that is possible to do), it would still be a little cheaper to pay-as-you-go, unless your primary fails really often.