Intruder Alarms for Businesses

Why a business alarm is a different job from a house alarm

A home alarm protects one household that leaves and returns at roughly predictable times. A business alarm has to cope with several staff, early and late shifts, deliveries, cleaners and keyholders who may be miles away when it sounds. Get that design wrong and the result is either constant false activations or an alarm that people stop setting.

We start with how the premises are actually used: who opens up, who locks up, which areas stay occupied, which doors are used after hours, and who must be contacted if the alarm goes off at 3am.

Designing the system around the premises

The survey produces a written plan covering the parts that matter for commercial use.

• Zones and partitions, so a warehouse can be set while the office stays open, or the reverse.
• Individual user codes or fobs for staff, so the event log shows who set and unset the system.
• Detection suited to the space: dual-tech sensors in draughty units, shock sensors on vulnerable walls and shutters.
• Personal attack buttons for counters and reception desks where staff face the public.
• Signalling: bells only, app notifications, or dual-path signalling to a monitoring centre.
• Grading matched to risk and to what the insurer has written into the policy.

Insurance, grading and keyholding

Commercial insurers often set the requirements rather than leaving them to you: a minimum grade, a signalling path, or a named response. Before quoting we ask to see the relevant part of the policy so the system is specified to it, not guessed at. If the policy wording needs a particular certificate, we tell you at the survey stage whether that is something we can supply.

Keyholding matters just as much. An alarm that alerts nobody is only a siren. We set out who will be notified, in what order, and how, before the system goes live.

Sites we cover and systems we take over

Commercial work runs across roughly 60 miles from our Chatham base: retail units, offices, industrial units, yards, surgeries, churches and community buildings. We also take over existing business alarms from other installers, including Pyronix, Texecom, Honeywell Galaxy and Risco panels, and can add zones, users or signalling to what is already there.

Aftercare once it is fitted

Every system is handed over with a walk through for the people who will use it, user codes set up individually and the event log explained. After that, planned servicing keeps batteries, detectors and signalling tested, and our 24-hour call-out covers faults between visits. The alarm servicing page sets out what each visit includes.

What happens at the commercial survey

The survey is done on site, ideally with whoever opens and closes the building. We walk every entrance, including fire exits, roller shutters, roof lights and rear yards, because those are where commercial break-ins usually start. We note where staff work late, where stock or cash is kept, and where detectors could be set off by forklifts, heaters or warehouse draughts.

You receive a written specification afterwards that lists every detector, keypad and zone, the planned signalling and who will be notified. Nothing is fitted until you are happy with it, and if your insurer has asked for something specific, the specification shows where it has been met. If the survey shows an existing panel is worth keeping, we say so rather than replacing it for the sake of it.