Anyone have an Apex Home Alarm w/Monitronics monitoring?

[LiQiCE]

The other day a salesman came by knocking on doors offering a free home alarm with installation if you agree to a 3 year contract with Monitronics, a home security monitoring company.

The alarm seems pretty cool, it has a two-way speakerphone type system so if the alarm gets tripped the operator can listen to whats going on in the house and better determine if its a false alarm or not. In addition it has a smoke detector that will contact the fire department if there's a problem ... Otherwise its pretty much like any other alarm system.

Anyways, Monitronics wants $40/month for 3 years after which time my contract is over and I have no obligation to continue.

However, I did a little research on monitronics and it seems like there was more than one horror story about how monitronics wouldn't cancel the person's contract and in one case monitronics had collection agencies calling a family that had moved and did not even have the alarm anymore.

Was wondering if anyone has any experience with Monitronics and Apex Alarms? ... I have until June 3rd to cancel my contract, although they're coming out tomorrow at 10am to install the actual alarm system ... so if I want to cancel it'd make the most sense to cancel before that time.

Thanks to anyone who can provide help!!!!

 

[DAGTA]

I have no experience with Apex Home Alarms but my two experiences with other Apex electronics were very poor.

 

[LiQiCE]

Originally posted by: DAGTA
I have no experience with Apex Home Alarms but my two experiences with other Apex electronics were very poor.

Actually I asked the salesperson and he said they were not related to the Apex that makes dvd players etc etc ... they're name is actually "Apex Alarms", and the equipment itself is made by Honeywell...

 

[Pepsi90919]

Originally posted by: LiQiCE

Originally posted by: DAGTA
I have no experience with Apex Home Alarms but my two experiences with other Apex electronics were very poor.

Actually I asked the salesperson and he said they were not related to the Apex that makes dvd players etc etc ... they're name is actually "Apex Alarms", and the equipment itself is made by Honeywell...

THEY MAKE FRAM OIL FILTERS !!! BAD

 

[LiQiCE]

Nobody has any experience with these guys huh? ... Was hoping to get a positive or negative on them.

 

[TwoBills]

$40 a month is steep. Is this a purchase or a lease? Once the contract runs out they're probably going to want $500+ to unlock the program so it can be addressed to a different central station, so you'll be inclined to stick with them, at a rate of $40/mo.+ (the system is now 3 years old, so a maintenance contract would be a good investment (lol) for an additional monthly fee, of course). A new company will just change the control panel and keypad, basiclly a new system. Your system is only going to have one keypad, one pir, one smoke, one siren, and a couple of doors. All but the smoke located near the front door, unless we're talking wireless.
When the installer comes tomorrow he's going to point out the fact that you can't turn on the security system at night w/o bypassing the pir (the only real part of the security, except the smoke), unless you have a keypad in your bedroom (high ticket item). While your at it, a 2nd smoke would be nice, another high ticket item. The subs that they have installing these things only get paid about $75 per install, their money comes from selling upgrades. $3 or 400 added to the price is not uncommon.You're going to have $2000 wrapped up in this system before your done. Why not do a little shopping around and find a small company that will install a real system, monitor it for $20 a month, and be done with it. Installation to own s/b 12 or 1300 dollars, with 2 of everything, plus all doors. BTW All companies use pretty much the same equipment and wire, so that shouldn't be a consideration.

 

[LiQiCE]

Originally posted by: TwoBills
$40 a month is steep. Is this a purchase or a lease? Once the contract runs out they're probably going to want $500+ to unlock the program so it can be addressed to a different central station, so you'll be inclined to stick with them, at a rate of $40/mo.+ (the system is now 3 years old, so a maintenance contract would be a good investment (lol) for an additional monthly fee, of course). A new company will just change the control panel and keypad, basiclly a new system. Your system is only going to have one keypad, one pir, one smoke, one siren, and a couple of doors. All but the smoke located near the front door, unless we're talking wireless.
When the installer comes tomorrow he's going to point out the fact that you can't turn on the security system at night w/o bypassing the pir (the only real part of the security, except the smoke), unless you have a keypad in your bedroom (high ticket item). While your at it, a 2nd smoke would be nice, another high ticket item. The subs that they have installing these things only get paid about $75 per install, their money comes from selling upgrades. $3 or 400 added to the price is not uncommon.You're going to have $2000 wrapped up in this system before your done. Why not do a little shopping around and find a small company that will install a real system, monitor it for $20 a month, and be done with it. Installation to own s/b 12 or 1300 dollars, with 2 of everything, plus all doors. BTW All companies use pretty much the same equipment and wire, so that shouldn't be a consideration.

Thanks for the tips ... It would have been a wireless system with 2 remotes so I could arm/disarm it in my bedroom. I decided against it though because I did some more searching on Monitronics and there were a ton of complaints against the company where they would not honor people's cancellation requests after the 3 year contract is up ... they auto-renew for a 1-year contract even for people who tried to cancel. All of the complaints were the same so it seems pretty consistent. The salesman called me after I decided to cancel and said that all of the complaints were handled on the BBB website, but it seems like the company should be able to handle cancellations w/o the BBB getting involved.

Guess I'll keep looking for another alarm