I’ve been seeing that many alarm companies have been moving away from offering two way voice communication through the panel during an alarm. On other hand, they are still some that have it active as default and promote it as a important feature of theirs. What is your opinion on two way voice nowadays compared to just using features such as ARM and regular calls?
I see how that’d be a good option for some people, especially if you don’t have a location phone. I’ve tried it previously with mixed results.
For us, we don’t really have a need for it at the moment. Our house isn’t super open, and while the panel is centrally located, it’s still on the shelf in the corner of a room. We also have a home phone, so it’s pretty easy to answer wherever we are in the house. When I tried it in a previous city, I occasionally ran into connection issues with two-way voice, but it was still pretty quick for the operator to call us when it didn’t work.
I think two-way voice still has its uses. For example, if you have a centrally located large open area that’s easy to get to and where you spend most of your time, using it there may be quicker or more convenient than trying to grab the phone. Additionally, if you have someone with mobility issues who utilizes something like a fall pendant with their alarm system, using two-way voice could be a good option if you can put the panel in an area they’d usually be around. If they end up needing to use the pendant, it might allow them or someone nearby to let the operator know what happened, their current condition, and any information emergency responders might need to know, such as how to gain access to the property.
The one thing I don’t like is that ADC has a 25 second delay before sending the signal to the monitoring center when using two-way voice. I understand that they want to ensure the alarm signal and two-way voice call arrive at the central station at the same time, but if they receive the call from the panel before time’s up, then it’d be nice if they were sent over early. It’s not as big of a deal when the monitoring center is as quick as AvantGuard, but it’s still something to consider.
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Echoing what the post above stated, I think the biggest thing to consider is that Two Way Voice will always slow down alarm response times. There will always be that added 25 second delay from Alarm.com processing and forwarding signals.
Two Way Voice would also always be the first contact method. Other calls cannot be adjusted ahead of it.
The panel siren is turned off during Two Way Voice calls so that operators can communicate with you through the panel, and that happens whether or not anyone is there of course. The siren will turn back on after the call is closed out but when there is no dialer delay involved you can have the siren turning off very quickly after it starts. Some people want the deterrence factor of the siren to be uninterrupted, so that is something to consider.
Two way voice may be very useful for some people based on who is using their system and how they use it, however it is situational and won’t be ideal in every case.
We offer it as an option which can be enabled or disabled at any time in your system manager Professional Monitoring tab.
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