Seeing z-wave devices on alarm.com?

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I own my own 2gig system. It was originally installed by a dealer who gave me the option to lease the hardware or buy it outright. I chose the latter. It’s also monitored by Monitronics on a month-to-month basis, I am not under contract with the dealer, Monitronics, or alarm.com. That said, whenever I’ve contacted Monitronics or alarm.com, they are typically quick to point out I have a dealer-linked system and they point me toward the dealer for any inquiry I might be making. On that note, I’ve learned that my dealer has focused their business away from security systems and more on general electrical installations/remodels. It’s a small shop and while they make themselves available to maintain security systems for existing customers, they are no longer selling the systems and they are rather terrible at working on them. It’s clear that just from spending a little time on this forum I’ve gained more basic knowledge about 2gig than that of the technician who’s showed up at my house in the past. Very basic questions are usually returned with a scratch to the head. Anyway, on to my question…

For the last five years I’ve used alarm.com for basic alarm functions like remote arming/disarming and never had reason to explore some of the more advanced capabilities of alarm.com. I am now interested in adding some z-wave automation to my system. I’d like to set scenes and automate a few basic things like light switches linked to arming events. Last night I followed instructions on adding a new z-wave device to my 2gig panel. The device appeared to pair successfully with the panel (I followed the explicit instructions found on this forum for enabling z-wave functionality on the panel and then pairing the device after first releasing it). I have not yet set a scene.

My question: after the device successfully pairs and then the network rediscovery was executed and all appears good, should the device soon thereafter appear on alarm.com? Or is the version of alarm.com I see limited in capability because my system is linked to a dealer and they need to flip a switch through a dealer-only portal or something? I don’t see any tab on my alarm.com page listing z-wave devices or functions.

Or might there be some other potential reason I am not seeing the device appear after it has seemingly been successfully added to the panel?

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We are glad to assist anyone looking to get a little more DIY with their systems!

If you do not see the “emPower” tab when logged into your account, that would likely indicate your plan does not currently support remote Z-wave controls through Alarm.com. You would in fact need to contact your dealer for options regarding enabling that feature.

I cannot speak for your dealer, but similarly, suretyDIY Basic Interactive does not support Alarm.com-based Z-wave automation. Gold Interactive, on the other hand, includes it.

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Confirms my suspicion. I definitely do not see the emPower tab after logging on to alarm.com. Thank you. I’ll contact my dealer. And soon thereafter begin the inevitable conversion of my house to a true DIY system.

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One follow-up question on this (excuse me if any of my assumptions here are off base as I’m still rounding the 2gig/z-wave learning curve): Regardless of remote controls through alarm.com, I’m still able to set scenes and automate just through the panel, correct? And assuming the answer to that question is yes, if a scene is automated to an arming or disarming event (something I CAN currently do through alarm.com), will that automation still take place when those armings and disarmings occur remotely? Let me know if that question is unclear.

Jason, I really appreciate your insight on this stuff.

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Regardless of remote controls through alarm.com, I’m still able to set scenes and automate just through the panel, correct? And assuming the answer to that question is yes, if a scene is automated to an arming or disarming event (something I CAN currently do through alarm.com), will that automation still take place when those armings and disarmings occur remotely? Let me know if that question is unclear.

You would be able to dependent on panel programming. Q79 would be set to (2).

Scenes and rules on the panel are fairly simplistic, but with local access you can create them. I do not believe remote arming commands can trigger these however, but we would need to test that.