Why the rules rule

Are we overdoing it with rules and regulations? The reason I ask this is that I got involved in conversation at my local pub with a kitchen fitter. I asked him how he was coping with preparations for the new “Part P”of the Building Regulations and he looked at me with astonishment – he had heard nothing about it.

I let him have a copy of the info I had and took up the conversation again the following week.

“I had a look at all that guff you gave me”, he said. “It's gonna be a right pain in the arse.”

"Yes, but what are you going to do about it?"

“Nothing,” he said. “I’m just going to carry on as usual. Who’s going to know about it, and who cares anyway? My customers don't."

He was thinking that it would put his prices up and cause delays waiting for the local council (renowned for their speed and efficiency) to act.

If he ignored the new rule, who was going to find out? And if they did find out, what would they do? Take him to court and fine him a pittance?

I know that there’s a big maximum fine but, as my unregistered friend pointed out, they rarely give out the maximum and they have to catch you first . Then he quoted the local paper at me.

A young lad had knocked down an old man just down the road from the pub we were talking in. The man died later and the lad had failed to stop. He had no insurance and he panicked. He was fined £470, given eight points on his licence and banned from driving for six months.

Cheaper to risk it

As the kitchen fitter pointed out , there’s no incentive to comply with the law – either for the car driver or himself. The lad was fined £470, yet it would probably cost him well over £1,000 to insure the car. It was cheaper to risk it. He could probably drive for years before his next accident.

Mind you, they were lucky to find a licence to stick points on to! Today's teenagers often just drive without either licence or insurance. And as for getting their old banger MOT'd ... they think, what’s the point? But if a tradesman electrocutes his customers then it’s criminal negligence and he can expect to have the book thrown at him.

We have the self same problem in our industry. It costs a lot of time and money to join an inspectorate, get insured and be proven to be doing the job right. The large majority of one-man alarm companies work outside the inspectorates. They dump the standards and skip the insurance. And before anyone questions my argument, let me give my reasoning.

Some time ago, having made a few telephone calls to the security suppliers, I was quoted between 15,000 and 18,000 on their lists.

They wouldn't give me addresses (I wasn't asking anyway), but they would give me numbers of delivery addresses they held. Even after we have removed the regular inspected companies and all the multiple addresses for the larger companies, and the part timers and electricians who buy the odd bits, there must be at least another 5,000 regular installers out there who are not inspected.

The question is, are we putting too many barriers in the way of installers? Are we making life unprofitable for them and are we making them do things that they don't need to do?

Are we frightening off the installers ... the inspectorate's own potential customers?

Before we answer that question I think we need to look at the larger picture. Some things the public is expected to know about, some things are pure common sense, and other things are "expert opinion", and the public needs help and advice on these things. For instance, the recent tragedy on a railway crossing: modern main line trains travel at high speeds, so the public needs protecting. They need barriers and flashing lights to tell when a train is coming. After that it is common sense to stay off the crossing. Out in the countryside where there are many branch lines with un-gated crossings, we can expect common sense to be used. It is the responsibility of the public to ensure they are not on the crossing when the train gets there. However, if there is an accident at one of these crossings, the driving public tries to cover

up their own stupidity by suing the railway because there were no lights or barriers.

The security industry, on the other hand, is what we could term an "expert" industry. In reality, the public have only the sketchiest idea what a security system does and how it works.

It takes "expert" knowledge to assess risks and install the appropriate systems, therefore the public needs protection from what it cannot see and cannot be expected to know – and here's where the inspectorate comes into its own.

A lot of smaller companies are short of work and they are looking for inspectorate approval to open doors

It becomes the eyes, ears and expert knowledge of the public and is definitely very much needed. The value of a good inspectorate has long been known by the insurance companies and by the police, which is why they first supported and then specified inspectorate recognised companies. As the risk gets higher, the more stringent becomes the requirement to use an inspectorate approved company.

This leads on to the question: How far do you go when inspecting a company? You have to see that standards are met and that companies are competent and capable to meet their customers’ requirements, but there's more to it than that.

You have to check that the company is financially viable and fully insured and therefore is protecting itself against a rearguard attack. By this I mean the company should not be leaving itself open to being sued for failing to perform or for any form of malpractice. It only takes one claim, and even if it is not true or unproven it can sink a small company if they are not insured.

Another classic example here would be the getting of signatures on completion of a job.

I know the NSI is very keen on getting signatures, but I am fully aware that many small non-inspected companies don't bother, and they are leaving themselves wide open to not being paid.

All it takes is for a customer to deny all knowledge of the job and the fitting company then has to prove its case, the customer signature being the critical part of the evidence when it goes to court. As a rule it ends up as “no signature, no proof, no payout”.

Cold hard logic tells us that the inspectorates should expect a company to do all the things that it should do for itself – and that includes covering its back. In this respect, the inspectorate works on behalf of the installer as well as insurers, police and public. On the whole it could be said that ours is a well balanced industry, and this is despite the moans from all sides. I know from my experiences going round visiting the applicant companies that a lot of them are short of work and are looking for inspectorate approval to open doors to more business.

On the other hand most (if not all) of the larger companies have work coming out of their ears and are desperately short of skilled engineers. The beauty of this is that the smaller company can act as a sub-contractor for the larger company. This way the larger company can meet its targets and fulfil its contractual obligations, and the smaller company gets enough work and income to keep the wolf from the door until it can build up its own business. It’s a classic win-win situation. Smaller companies with inspectorate approval are particularly attractive to larger companies.

If you need to see just how valuable the inspectorate system is to the British security industry, you only have to look at the USA.

They have wicked problems over there. They are suffering the same problems with false alarms that we are – but more so, with figures running at 98 per cent. Yet they have no equivalent of the British inspectorate, and they have no equivalent of DD243, so the police in various States are putting their foot down – and hard. They are now refusing to respond to alarms until a key holder or other person has attended the premises.

American installers are kicking up a big fuss, but the false alarm figures (and wasted police time) have to be brought down, and without an inspectorate to monitor them, or an equivalent of DD243 as a standard to work to, then both sides have dug themselves in for a desperate struggle.

Without the inspectorates in this country the police would have been forced down the same route and we could have been facing the same dilemma. If you ever needed proof that voluntary regulation is working compare, Britain to the USA. In answer to the question "Are we going overboard with rules and regulations?”, I think in our industry the answer is a very definite NO – even if it may sometimes look as if we are. For every rule and requirement there is a reason, usually borne out of experience or some incident in the past. The whole regime is aimed at and succeeds in protecting the public, the insurer, the police and, last but certainly not least, the installer.

Is this an American problem only?

Continuing with the American theme, I was contacted by a US police officer who wrote an article in Security Installer a couple of years ago about the situation with alarm installers there.

He was wondering how common were gated communities in the UK and did the gates pose a problem for police response? He said it was a challenge for US police to gain entry into gated properties because most law enforcement agencies lacked the "lock box" keys that fire departments have ... and for a good reason.

Cops lose their guns, so they were certainly going to lose the keys that likely open every door in the city! Gated property owners expected police to keep a key, card, transmitter, or pass code handy to override the gated system. This was “simply dumb”, said our American friend, because of the multitude of cars and officers that could potentially be dispatched to a premises. He wondered whether or not we had this issue here.

I don’t know of any problems with gated communities in Britain. I don’t personally know of any gated communities with the possible exception of monasteries! (According to a recent housing research study, there are about 1,000 in the UK, but they’re mostly small – Ed)

We do, however, have many gated properties, and having electric gates is becoming more popular to secure your property from unwanted visitors. Both the police and Fire Brigade have rights to enter if they have sufficient reason to believe that a crime or a fire is in progress. Do any readers have experiences or problems with gated communities or properties? If you do, email me at the address below.

* Mike Lynskey is a former proprietor and independent inspector of alarm systems. He is now Silver Systems Support Manager with the NSI. The personal views expressed should not be taken as the opinions of the NSI. Email Mike on: mike.lynskey@virgin.net