| 
Looking after yourself
People install a house alarm for a very good reason, to protect their property. The fact that you have a visible alarm fitted will hopefully be enough to stop unwanted visitors from trying to gain access to your property.
If someone does try to enter your property without permission the alarm will sound to disturb the intruders and raise the attention of your neighbours and the police. When an alarm goes off in these circumstances the noise generated is for a genuine reason and most people will accept it as such.
Looking after your neighbours
A noise nuisance may however, arise when for whatever reason, your alarm trips accidentally and sounds for no apparently valid reason. Peope will take exception to the noise caused by a faulty alarm and may decide to complain to us.
If you live in Stoke-on-Trent and someone claims to us about your alarm causing a nuisance, the matter will be dealt with by Regulatory Services. We will try to trace a key holder for your alarm, but if we can't find anyone then we must take action to silence your alarm.
If this happens, you may find yourself liable to meeting the financial costs of disarming or disconnecting your alarm. The typical cost is about £110. You will usually also have to pay the installer of your alarm to re-connect it.
The Government has produced a Code of Practice which is designed to make sure that intruder alarms do not sound in such a way that gives reasonable cause for a noise nuisance. It gives guidance on methods of minimising annoyance caused by your alarm. The main points of the code are as follows:
- stop false alarms by making sure your system is properly designed, installed and maintained as specified by British Standard 4737
- where there are a number of properties with alarms close together, make it as easy as possible to identify when your alarm is ringing
- think about fitting your alarm with an automatic cut out device, so the ringing stops after twenty minutes. Please note if you do this you should tell your insurers. If we believe that a noise nuisance has been committed, we might need you to install this device
- if you live in the city, you can tell is free of charge, the name, address and telephone numbers of two key holders
Please also note the following
- you should tell us about changes to key holders within 24 hours
- one key holder should always be ready to respond
- the key holder response time should normally not exceed twenty minutes, and
- make sure your immediate neighbours have a couple of contact telephone numbers for key holders