We often discuss what happens in the monitoring centre and some of the key facts about professional monitoring in general. In this article, we’ll explain what it is you should be looking for in a professional security monitoring provider. This will help you make the right choice for your security customers, whether they’re residential or looking to protect their business.
We’ll cover two of the most important key terms you want to look out for when discussing security and monitored security. This will include things like accreditations and certifications, which can be important, especially to business customers and their insurance providers.
You may also pick up some other industry terms during your search, so we’ll try to explain some of them in this article as well.
“NSI” – National Security Inspectorate Approved Companies
The National Security Inspectorate is the UK’s most highly trusted and respected, independent, UKAS-accredited certification body in the security and fire safety sectors. Each year they conduct over 3,500 expert assessments of 2,000 NSI-approved companies to verify compliance with relevant British and International Standards and Industry Codes of Practice.
Their mission is obviously to help protect residents and businesses by ensuring they receive a certain quality level of services based on structured criteria set by industry experts.
As an example, Southern & Northern Monitoring is an NSI Gold Approved company. This means that we undergo an annual audit program that is quite rigorous to ensure that the standards of our operations still meet the latest standards required for Gold Approval.
This approval includes ISO 9001 approval for Quality Management systems and specifically approved services too. Our Gold-approved services include:
- High Integrity Monitoring of Intruder Alarms (more on that term later)
- Monitoring of Fire Alarms
- Monitoring of Intruder Alarms
- Monitoring of Lone Worker Devices
- RVRC Monitoring BS 8418 Detector Activated CCTV Systems and other CCTV Systems used in Security Applications
So, you can see an NSI accreditation offers a detailed and comprehensive approach to help define who the most reliable and trustworthy security providers are.
NSI is not the only accreditation out there for professional security monitoring providers like us, but it is certainly the one that we have chosen to go with. It certainly offers the best source of trusted suppliers out there in our opinion.
“High-Integrity” Monitoring
High Integrity Monitoring means there should be no single point of failure anywhere in the monitoring centre. Think of it a bit like the old Rolls-Royce principle of having two sets of brakes.
We try to adopt that same principle in our monitoring centres but we try to have more than two of everything that we possibly can do. For example, at the core of our operation is having two separate Alarm Response Centres (ARC, which is another name for Monitoring Centres) for alarm response and security monitoring.
They’re both based in the UK but are about 200 miles apart, which is important because it is part of our contingency plan that if one centre experiences an issue like an outage or even during the COVID-19 pandemic, we could still operate a full-service.
The same could be said for storms, floods, or just about any other risk that could negatively impact the service, and in our case, the protection that clients receive – and that’s important when you have over 100,000 connected devices to monitor 24/7.
Both centres also have what’s known as a UPS System (Uninterruptable Power System) which adds another layer of contingency should things like power cuts occur, which they actually do more often than you think.
Behind that, we also have backup generators too, which can keep our centres running for months at a time, should there be a more severe instance where our power supply is impacted.
So, you can see that high-integrity monitoring is most vital to helping to ensure that your security coverage isn’t interrupted. That’s achieved by adding multiple layers of contingency to our operations and infrastructure, which requires a great amount of planning and investment on our (the monitoring service provider’s) part.
Some security monitoring service providers will appoint a backup provider for the event that their own centre should encounter an issue. But we don’t regard that as being as seamless or as risk-free as it could be. At some point, there must be a cutover from one to the other and, doing what we do, you never want to waste any time as every moment could be vital.
We load-balance calls between our two centres, so an alarm will go to where there is the most availability. We describe it as two ARCs but one team because you could phone now, and the technology makes sure the right person is there to pick up at the other end.
You also don’t have to have high-integrity monitoring to qualify for NSI Gold Approval, but we believe it adds an extra level of safety to allow us to do a more robust job for our partners and their customers.
“ECHO” – Electronic Call Handling Operations
ECHO-connected Police forces in the UK receive digital police despatch requests from approved Alarm Receiving Centres (ARCs) direct to their despatch desks via the ECHO platform. Each ECHO-connected force authorises in turn each ARC once it has completed its full ECHO testing program.
This is a new technology that was only launched in the last 18 months, and it was created to expedite the communication process between police forces and approved security monitoring providers. The result of this is a faster response to emergencies when an alarm is confirmed. ECHO suggests it can improve response times by up to 4 minutes.
At Southern & Northern Monitoring, both of our ARCs are already ECHO-approved. We’ve already connected to a collection of police forces around the country and will continue to add more as and when they become available.
How to ensure you’re working with the right monitored security partner
Whether your clients are planning to upgrade their security to include new features and services, or if they’ll be installing a brand-new system, it is important to ensure that you’re looking for the right things to fulfill your specific needs.
Key terms like ‘High-integrity’ and accreditations like ‘NSI’ aren’t simply used to create marketing buzz. They offer a clear explanation as to the level of protection and quality of service you can expect to receive when you choose a monitored security provider.
If you’d like to learn more about our security solutions and monitoring services, visit https://www.smon.co.uk/services. We’re working with the leading manufacturers to provide security systems that enable installers to provide the best protection to their customers. Plus, they can benefit from one of the best-in-class monitoring services in the UK, from our two fully accredited ARCs.
To discuss the Southern and Northern Monitoring products and services you can provide to your clients, please complete the form below, give us a call at 0844 871 2223 or complete the form below.