Patty Yost and Renee Karlsen of Hillsborough County, NC, located near Chapel Hill, NC, recently experienced the damage that can result when home alarm isn’t working properly.
This past New Year’s Day the two were awoken by smoke and the sound of a fire alarm. The women report that they had a contract with Vector Home Security to provide monitoring services to their home in the case of an emergency, including a fire, so rather than spending the time to dial 911, they decided to work the contain the blaze themselves. They believed that Vector Home Security would alert the proper authorities, and fire fighters would arrive at their home.
Instead, no authorities arrived and the women’s home continued to burn for 15 to 20minutes or more. The women believed they were paying for Vector to constantly monitor their, and when authorities didn’t arrive, the women went to a neighbor’s house to dial 911.
“So you’re thinking, ‘OK any minute now we’ll see firemen and fire trucks here to help us with this fire,’ and it never happened,” Karlsen told reporters from ABC 11, a news affiliate based in Raleigh, NC.
By the time the local fire departments were able to respond, $250,000 in damage had been incurred as a result of the fire.
The women claim Vector Home Security never contacted them, and after three days of not hearing from the company, they contacted the company to report their house had been on fire.
The residents of the home say they then tried to have representatives from Vector complete an investigation on their home to determine why the security equipment wasn’t working, but a supervisor reportedly told them they couldn’t investigate because the home had been so badly damaged.
Yost and Karlsen told Vector they expected to hold them accountable for their losses as a result of the fire, but the insurance company for the told the women that the Vector contract places a $1,000 liability limit on claims when a system fails to operate properly.
The woman are currently in the process of rebuilding, and are working to spread the message about what occurred at their home, in the hopes that they can prevent other residents from experiencing similar situations.
The story highlights the importance of not only being aware of what the details are in a home security contract before signing, butalso the necessity of testing home alarm and security equipment on a regular basis to ensure it is working properly. Many alarm companies offer instructions for residents to test their , and it’s recommended that residents test equipment frequently, optimally on a monthly basis.
Tim Eveler
Author & Public Relations – Tim has been working in sales for the home security system industry over twelve years. He’s held positions at large home security companies and in charge of working with the team to create our security system reviews.