SafeTouch Security

I have been a Safe Touch customer for many, many years. My monthly payment goes out automatically, from my bank each month. I was not aware in March my bank missed sending a payment into Safe Touch. This caused a missed payment fee to be added to my bill. Additionally, Safe Touch raised the monthly billing amount. However, my bank continued to pay $17.07 per month. This too was being added each month to my bill. The last few months have been difficult months because of the circumstances happening nationally. I called into Safe Touch 'Billing' simply asking forgiveness of the missed payment fee. The individual I spoke with simply gave the company line "If Safe Touch did not cause the mistake - then no refund will be given.

With as many years of being a loyal customer, I would think Safe Touch could at least forgive a one-time late fee.

Kevin Manos
#160058
3533 Little Road
New Port Richey FL 34655

Awful, awful service. 1) A 60 ft oak tree fell on my house demolishing 3 rooms of my home. The Safetouch installed alarm never went off, not once. They were not aware of any issue until I alerted them to it. 2) System failed within 3 mos of a 3 year pre-paid contract expiring; Safetouch absolutely refused to send a service tech to my residence unless I pre-paid for the service call with a credit card. Period. 3) Call Center Reps are rude and not equipped to handle basic problem solving / service requests. 4) When contacting Safetouch in a good-faith effort to find out HOW to cancel service, they play games with their clients- ie: continually transfer you to a person/dept that is never available, instruct you to leave messages for that person/dept, when that person/dept will never return your calls and/or voice mails where you inquire HOW to cancel your service; instruct you that you can ONLY speak to one particular person regarding cancellation and that person is NEVER available to answer service/contract questions. The as sold "3 year pre-paid" contract turns into a 5 year hostage, forced-agreement as they will not allow you to cancel within their specified terms. They in essence make it impossible for a reasonable person to cancel within their specific terms. **** EVERGREEN CLAUSE *** Very shady business practices. 5) They heavily advertise a 45 second guaranteed response time, but that guarantee is meaningless. Contracts state on the back in fine print “Response time cannot be guaranteed.” In addition the guarantee gets the consumer nothing. There is no remedy for the consumer if this 45 second “guaranteed” response time is not met.

A company Rep offered us a 3 year contract which we paid in full of $3200. for our home & business. The one at the home worked for only a short time, they refused to fix it. The one at the business stopped working, they refuse to fix it. I'll rephrase that. It will not let the alarm set properly as we leave which is what makes a security alarm system of value. It does however go off several times a week with the silent alarm causing the police to waste their time checking on us. They have now threatened to charge us for every call and I can't really blame them. We were told we could move the business one for free seeing as we were changing locations within the year. They lied and charged us. Their reply was we could pay the fee or cancel and forfeit the money paid. They also started the contract again from the beginning and canceled out our first year as if it did not exist. We decided not to renew our contract after our 3 years were up this spring but found out it was really a 5 year contract we knew nothing about. Our 3 years were up earlier this year. We have tried numerous times calling, faxing and sending letters, which they refuse to accept to cancel the supposed 3 year contract that is really a 5 year contract. One of their supervisors said "I see where you signed next to where it says 3 year contract but in reality Safe Touch only offers 5 year contracts." This is not just theft by deception of personal property but theft from a business. In a letter to the Chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, the FTC defined the elements of deception cases. First, “there must be a representation, omission or practice that is likely to mislead the consumer.” When their Reps purposely lie to make sales, that is 100% deception. When they claim "We don’t cut corners on equipment or service." That is 100% deception. When they say "No other company comes close to our track record." They're right. There are many, many complaints on the internet about them lying about 3 year contracts and their inability to come through with promises on goods, services and equipment. Safe Touch Securities definitely have a pattern of misleading and cheating businesses and individuals alike. My recommendation is that if you really want to use this company confront them about every topic I mentioned here and use a camera to video record everything said. Safe Touch claims "Every Safe Touch employee passes rigorous testing before receiving our stamp of approval. Every member of our team is background-checked and fully licensed. We don’t rely on subcontractors who may or may not live up to our high standards." Shouldn't this mean that Reps in the field would know all of the basic rules? Apparently they make it up as they go and the company upholds every lie told to get people signed on.

April 2009 approximately was solicited by Pedro to install a system in my shop. At this time I only had a cell phone for my business, therefore had to have a digi-cell back up. Was explained that any service issues would be covered and that the account would require a credit card be opened by Wells Fargo Financial and I would pay them for the system.

From this point to the following year I cannot get the records for the false alarms and the company will not cooperate in getting them to me.

April 21, 2010 3rd false alarm goes off in my building and police are dispatched. I receive a letter and fine of $75.00

May 4, 2010 4th false alarm goes off in my shop and police are dispatched.

May 31, 2010 alarm goes off again. Security system was armed and working the night before but my employee comes in in the morning and goes to disarm the system and the panel has the lights on it but all the button are dead and are not working. There was no way to disarm the system.

June 1, 2010 Safetouch is called to report the problem.

June 2, 2010 Safetouch comes out and repairs system, said on the work ticket that they were not sure if the panel was replaced, tested and verified that all is ok.

June 25, 2010 Safetouch called again because the panel is dead again. Keypad was replaced.

July 28, 2010 alarm goes off again due to the second panel being dead at the panel again and we are unable to disarm, $100 fine is assessed because police were dispatched

July 30, 2010 alarm goes off again because panel is dead again, received 5th violation and $150.00 fine. Company comes out again and specifically writes on the work ticket that customer was not at fault, and that customer could not disarm the system because the panel was dead again due to keypad malfunction. Safetouch retested the system, replaced transformer and battery.

Sent letter to Hillsborough County Code Enforcement with service ticket and they denied the appeal, stated that they needed a letter from the company on letterhead in 10 days and that the appeal was denied. Spoke to Luke in the local Safetouch office and explained the situation and said there was nothing he could do and that the county is hard to fight and to just pay it. Easier said than done as it is not coming out of his pocket. Spoke to him in length and said that his company will not be doing anything to help or write a letter.

October 20, 2010 6:30 am husband goes into my shop and goes to disarm the alarm and again even after three panels have been replaced, batteries, panels, the keypad is dead yet again. My husband calls safetouch to disarm and is told by dispatch there was nothing they could do and hung up on him. Standard practice is to call my cell phone first, my son William is second and neither one of our phones were called and I can provide a call log from my cell phone as proof. Once I found out the situation from my husband I called at 8:10 am and spoke with Deborah and said that there was no record of any phone call made to cancel dispatch.
10:34am I spoke with Luke in the local office and made him aware of the situation and said that he would have a Supervisor call me. I spoke with Willie the am floor supervisor and explained the situation again and that the panel was dead and that I wanted the system removed from my building as this alarm going off would cause another false alarm of which $350.00 would be assessed and I already owe another $350.00 from previous fines. He said that they could not do anything until they come out and determine what the problem was. I asked him what number was called and he said the office line was called and I checked the caller id log and it was not called and told him that that number is not even on the call list to be called in the event an alarm goes off. Willie than changed his mind and said that the my cell was called and I told him no it was not because as well I checked the caller log, called my son and had him check his and the third person in line. NONE of our phones were called to cancel the dispatch. He then said that he would have to send someone out to determine the problem. I said fine.

10/21/2010 Service rep craig and luke from the local office came out. Service ticket said that all voltage and everything was ok, they reset kepayd and it was ok. 3rd time that the keypad was replaced and ran a new keypad line, could not find the cause of the problem. Noted there was no rodent damage on the wired, replaced panel, battery, keypad and changed were the battery was being plugged in to. Luke came over and while at my shop called and spoke to Willie and said that they would be sending me a letter, I explained that I had 10 days to get the letter to the County of Hillsborough.

10/22/2010 called Safetouch to talk to Willie, but he was not there

10/23/2010 called Willie to follow up on Service ticket and was told that the system was not updated yet

10/26/2010 called and spoke to Christy about the situation and she said that she would check into the problem and get with Willie and call me back. Said that she would escalate the call.

10/28/2010 I called back and tried to talk to Willie and was told that he was on another call and would call me back.

11/5/2010 Received a call from Christy at Safetouch/PM floor supervisor in reference to getting a letter from the company. She stated that Safetouch would NOT send a letter as the last servince ticked stated that it was from a surge in the electric and not their problem. On the service ticket it says no such thing and on a previous ticket it stated that the voltage was fine. Safetouch was the one that installed the system on that particular plug NOT me. If there was a problem with the voltage they should have changed the system three or four panels ago, but did not. I said this is ridiculous, I shouldl not be responsible for all these fines as I did not install the system. She could not care less and said "was there anything else that I can do for you?"

11/8/2010 called Safetouch local office and left a message for Luke, he will not call me back either.

11/12/2010 called and spoke to Deborah and asked if she could send me a copy of my contract and all service tickets on the account. She said that she would process the the request and could get the contract but would have to get approval for the service tickets as they cant just send them. I asked her to call me back and let me know about the contract and service tickets and never received a call back as to whether I would get them or not.

I have spent $1, 202. on this system of which I still owe money on and have a current outstanding amount of $700.00 in fines plus. I have maintained the system properly and never had anyone touch any of the wires, panel or plug where the system was plugged in to but yet had the system fail on me four different times, the last time where I was never even called to cancel the alarm. This company is irresponsible and have caused a large amount of stress on me, my company and financially. I expect one of two things that they cancel my system and refund me for $1200 for the system which has been nothing less than aggravation and costly due to the fines assessed or pay for the $700.00 which is a result of the lack of experience, knowledge in fixing the alarm system for my company. They installed a faulty system in an improper location and have been unresponsive and unwilling to take care of their mess.