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Security Tips

When fire strikes, you may have less than one minute to safely get out of the building and your escape route could be blocked by deadly smoke, heat or toxic gases. Having working smoke alarms and detectors in your home can double your chances of survival.

Winter / Holiday Safety Tips
Remember the following tips this holiday season:

1. Never use candles as decorations
2. Keep tree away from heat
3. Water a cut tree daily
4. Use a "non-tip" style tree stand
5. Use fire retardant decorations only
6. Never leave a lit tree unattended
7. Never leave lit candles unattended
8. Dispose of your tree properly, soon after the holiday before needles dry out
9. Artificial trees should have a fire retardant label
10. Purchase lights and electric decorations that are UL tested and approved
11. Check all lighting for frayed wires, broken plugs, sockets, etc.
12. Never overload outlets

Prevent False Alarms
A security system provides many advantages and benefits, especially since it is about six times less likely a protected home will be burglarized than a home that is not protected. However, when protecting your home with an intrusion or burglar alarm, the possibility of a false alarm occurring does exist.

The most frequent causes of false alarms fall into one of the following four categories:

1. Unlocked or unsecured doors or windows that cause an alarm contact to activate and signal an "intrusion" when the system is armed
2. Children, neighbors, relatives, visitors, repairmen, etc., who have access to your home but are unfamiliar with how your system functions
3. Wandering pets
4. Errors by the keypad user

User error accounts for about 80 percent of all false alarms, and we at Barcom take that statistic very personally, when the alarm is ours! Why? Because it could mean that we did not take the time to give you and your family an adequate amount of instruction on how to arm and disarm your security system. If false alarms are a frequent occurrence at your home or if you hesitate to use your Barcom system because of false alarm problems, please call us to arrange a refresher course for those who use the system most often. We can also adjust the activation and deactivation delay times to give family members more time to get to the controls or leave the home, without feeling rushed.

Alarm systems can detect intrusions or attempted intrusions, fire emergencies, flooding, temperature extremes and may even provide you or your family with special medical emergency response options. There is one thing your system cannot do--differentiate between a real emergency and a false alarm--with little attention to detail, that task is one that you or your family can easily manage!

To speak to a Barcom representative about adding an alarm system to your home, please call 800-642-5413 or fill out our Contact Form.