Home Money The truth about your home alarm system and how Brits are being left with a huge secret bill for making a crisis call

The truth about your home alarm system and how Brits are being left with a huge secret bill for making a crisis call

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Customers of some personal alarm companies, when faced with emergencies and false alarms, receive numbers with special rates to call.

If you are one of the tens of thousands of people in the UK paying for a personal alarm system, you may not be aware that a secret charge has been added to your bill.

Customers facing emergencies and false alarms are being given premium rate numbers to call in a crisis.

Ten of the UK’s leading personal alarm companies use 084 numbers which charge customers a sky-high rate of almost £1 per minute if they make a call.

And in many cases, when a person’s alarm system is activated, it alerts the alarm monitoring center using a 084 number, for which the customer will also be charged.

This is because the alarm system software is linked to your phone line, which when activated, contacts alarm monitoring centers, who assess the emergency and then call to check on you.

A joint investigation with the Fair Telecoms Campaign (FTC) found that 11 security companies, which offer alarm monitoring services, openly advertise 084 numbers on their websites, invariably for customers to call in case of alarm emergencies.

Customers of some personal alarm companies, when faced with emergencies and false alarms, receive numbers with special rates to call.

Telecare 24, backed by Dr Hilary Jones (pictured), claims to offer

Telecare 24, backed by Dr Hilary Jones (pictured), claims to offer “affordable personal alarms for older people”, despite charging customers to call in a crisis.

This means customers could face charges of almost £1 per minute for a call from a mobile phone or almost 35p per minute from a landline, according to the Fair Telecom Campaign (FTC).

But many personal alarm systems are set up using 084 numbers, according to industry experts, meaning that when they are activated you will be responsible for the premium rate call.

It is estimated that up to 40 per cent of UK homes have personal alarm systems, but not all are monitored.

The FTC notes that elderly and vulnerable people who rely on personal alarms and alarm monitoring centers are at particular risk because they are often unaware that they are calling premium rate numbers.

One of the companies is Telecare 24, backed by Dr. Hilary Jones, which claims to have “affordable personal alarms for seniors.”

Installing a personal alarm system in your home can cost between £600 and £1,200, excluding VAT, and can cost around £30 a month for the alarm monitoring service.

Custodian, part of the greater Chubb Fire and Security empire, is one of the largest alarm monitoring companies in the country and uses 084 numbers on its website.

Many websites do not clearly indicate the costs of calling a 084 number, despite being legally obliged to do so.

Consumer regulations, introduced in 2013, make clear that 084 numbers should not be used for existing customers for services or products they have already purchased.

Existing customers should be charged a “basic” rate, which is equivalent to a “normal” telephone call rate.

David Hickson of the FTC believes that these alarm companies’ use of these numbers violates consumer standards because they should charge a ‘base rate’, which is the cost of a normal phone call.

To complicate matters, most of the charges for these 084 numbers do not go to the security companies but to your telephone network provider.

Hickson believes that if trade standards cracked down on security companies, they would be seen as violating consumer rights protections.

He said: ‘Alarm monitoring companies have long been known to be among the worst offenders. This is compounded by the fact that many calls are made automatically when alarm systems are activated, so victims only find out if they check their phone bills and understand what is happening.

‘This is more worrying with personal alarms, which, by their nature, are used by vulnerable people.

“We believe that any organization now using 084 or 087 numbers for any contracted consumer contact has breached the rules implementing the Consumer Rights Directive, since its introduction in 2014.”

Julian Shersby, 61, has spent 20 years campaigning against high-rate numbers, so when 084 appeared on his mobile phone alarm bells started ringing.

The custodian called the retired financial data analyst because his personal alarm had been accidentally activated.

Having installed an expensive new Southern Fire Security (SFS) alarm system in his Surrey apartment in October, Shersby realized the insult was adding to the damage.

He said: ‘My mother has been dead for seven years, but around 2015 I remember discovering that her alarm system had a number 084 on its autodialer, so she was being charged a premium rate.

‘That’s the problem, isn’t it? Many people who purchase these alarm monitoring services would think that an 084 number is a normal number and just part of their calling plan. They will only realize that this is not the case when they see their phone bill.

“I have campaigned to close these numbers since 2004. In 2014, we even had consumer rights regulations that should have stopped this sort of thing, but here I am, 20 years later, and this is still going on.”

Shersby’s experience illustrates how complex the picture is. Although your alarm was installed by Southern Fire & Security and the contract is with SFS, it is monitored by Custodian, one of the largest companies in the UK.

Shersby said: ‘With Custodian, in every interaction, they want you to use 084 and they even want you to use it for the sales number. When people don’t see anything ethically wrong with 084 numbers, they seem to use them all the time.

‘Nowhere on the contacts page does it state that there is an access or service charge on any of these numbers. These companies claim they don’t make money from these figures, but they wouldn’t use them unless there was a financial advantage.’

The complications don’t end there. Even the forward premium rate is a minefield. Although you will pay a premium rate for calling 084, Ofcom restricts the time limit to numbers 09, 118 and 087.

Ten of the UK's leading personal alarm companies use 084 numbers which charge customers a sky-high rate of almost £1 per minute if they make a call.

Ten of the UK’s leading personal alarm companies use 084 numbers which charge customers a sky-high rate of almost £1 per minute if they make a call.

These provide premium services such as adult entertainment, directory inquiries, contests and mobile games.

Although you will pay the same access charge to your provider for 084 and premium rate numbers, the service charge for an 09 number can be up to £3.60 per minute.

Since 2015, there have been two separate charges for calling these numbers: a service charge that goes to the recipient, in this case the alarm monitoring service, and an access charge that goes to the telephone provider.

The ten alarm companies that use the number 084

  • Abel
  • ABS alarms
  • Aim monitoring
  • AMCO
  • APS Security
  • Climac
  • Cornerstone Security Group
  • EMCS
  • Custodian/SMC Monitoring
  • Telecare24

For the access charge, BT landlines currently charge you 28.18p per minute, but for EE mobiles it is 89p per minute, according to the FTC. In comparison, the service charge, which is paid by the recipient, is up to 7p per minute.

David Hickson of the Fair Telecoms Campaign calculates that a five-minute call to an 084 number, on an EE mobile, would pay an access charge of £4.45 (£3.71 at EE + 74p VAT), and a service charge of 35p (29p to alarm company + 6p VAT).

A Department of Business and Trade spokesperson says: “If the trader uses a telephone line for consumers to contact them about an existing contract, they cannot be charged more than the basic rate for that call.”

The Post Office contacted the companies involved. EE declined to comment. O2 said they are transparent about network charges and it is up to companies which numbers they use. Vodafone did not respond.

Andrew Gordon, of ABS Alarms, said they were just an installation company subcontracting alarm monitoring to Custodian, and were not responsible for the 084 numbers.

Cornerstone Group said it “does not make money from people calling this number” but declined to answer further questions.

AIM Alarms said they were only an alarm monitoring provider for installation companies and offer alternative base rate numbers.

J&D Security said they were just an installation company that uses another company for alarm monitoring and had now removed the premium number from their website. They declined to comment on whether they had removed this number because of our approach.

Custodian, AMCO, Chubb, SFS, APS, Clymac, EMCS, Abel and Telecare24 did not respond.

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