I have my entry delay set to 30 seconds currently and a couple weeks ago I opened the garage coming home and forgot to disarm the alarm. I then realized it was going off and disarmed it. When I looked at the alarm.com history nothing was recorded as if nothing had happened which was surprising since I was sure it had gone past the 30 second entry delay.
So then I did some reading and found a setting for the Neo at Section 377 - 02 that is called Zone Tx. Delay and it appears to have defaulted to 30 seconds.
I then did some tests opening my front door while looking at the alarm.com app and noticed the door did not show open for about 30 seconds.
Am I correct that this really should normally be set to 0 seconds and that it represents a delay between a sensor triggering and that being sent to alarm.com? And that the entry delay plus this delay is how long the system waits to send a signal an alarm has “gone off”.
Seems by having it at 30 seconds the crash and smash protection is delayed as a result ny 30 seconds. And that a 30 seconds entry delay and 30 second zone tx delay is why in the situation I had nothing appeared sent to alarm.com at all. (I was surprised that what happened did not result in a phone call to me).
Would appreciate it if you can confirm/clarify how this setting works and what the typical value should be to ensure I’m getting the full benefit of the crash and smash protection and so forth.
Figure I also may put the system on test and then trigger an alarm just to see that I show something on the alarm.com side.
Note I did a further test of opening a door and then checking the alarm.com website, using the export to get the events that occurred which shows the seconds and in fact the signal is going immediately so I’m incorrect about the transmission delay affecting that.
So possibly in the scenario I encountered I must have disarmed in time to avoid an alarm and phone call. But I still wonder why I did not see anything on the alarm.com site when I checked later that indicated there was a pending alarm at one point. Is that something that would not show or should have?
Hi! Transmission/TX/Dialer Delay is a setting that is described in this thread.
What it does is delay the forwarding of alarm events to the professional monitoring station. It doesn’t delay signals being sent to Alarm.com. Crash and Smash is not affected by use of dialer delay, as Alarm.com is still looking for the pending alarm or disarm.
You def should see a Pending Alarm in history if one occurred.
Can you test this scenario again and disarm within the TX delay 30 seconds? You should see a Pending Alarm in history followed by a disarm.
Thanks for your response. I put the system on test and did the following test to see what would happen. I’m not sure how to interpret the results exactly.
I armed the system and then
11:30:00 PT I opened the front door. The entry delay (30 seconds) started.
11:30:30 PT - The siren went off and the transmission delay started (30 seconds). I got a popup immediately in the alarm.com app that a pending alarm occurred.
11:30:45 PT - I disarmed the alarm.
If I export the events from the alarm.com web site so I can see the seconds (which don’t show in the UI), here is what it reflects.
11:33:30 - Front Door - Pending Alarm (Awaiting Panel’s Programmed Delay)
11:33:34 - Front Door - Opened
11:33:43 - Disarmed
I actually opened the front door at 11:30:00, not 11:30:34.
So it’s not clear to me if the actual signal was sent at 11:30:00 when I opened the door or not for a 30 second delay (which would not be what should occur).
Are you able to tell the times of the actual signals to alarm.com?
I would not expect to get the pending alarm popup on my phone necessarily until the alarm goes off since otherwise I would get it every time I entered the house and disarmed which would not be friendly but I’m wondering whether the signals went out immediately when the door opened and entry delay started or whether they are somehow delayed.
Door Open/Close reports are a little inconsistent as far as looking for exact times. There is a 3 minute delay between when Alarm.com will register the same open/close signal from the panel, to avoid overloading the system and history if a door is opened and closed repeatedly or a malfunction occurs which simulates that.
Entry Delay reports and alarm signals are separate from that and not affected by the delay, which is why it ends up looking odd with the pending alarm showing first. Entry Delay doesn’t show up in user history, but I see the Entry Delay report kick in at 7/6/2020 11:33:02am
Pending alarm occurs after a siren occurs locally, but before the dialer delay period is up.
When Entry Delay kicks in, ADC then expects to see a disarm or an alarm. If neither happens, that is considered a possible crash and smash.