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Engineer Manuals


Service Engineer

Engineer Manuals  

760 members have voted

  1. 1. Engineer Manuals

    • Engineer--Provide them if Asked
      173
    • Engineer--Do not provide them at all
      164
    • User--Im happy to leave the serious stuff to the pro`s
      14
    • User--Its my Alarm, I have the right to a manual
      267
    • Un-decided
      10


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I would choose not to do business with them. It's a scenario which creates too many gray areas of doubt and blame in the event of a system fault or failure.

The only compromise is to fit a DIY system like an Accenta and not guarantee it and that's something I wouldnt want to do.

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I'm in agreement with Pete and Richl on this, The end user buys the system, not the installation instructions, they are for the engineer, hence the name ENGINEERING manual....

and Yes, I'd rather loose the sale for the same reasons stated by pete...

Regards

Bellman

Service Engineer and all round nice bloke :-)

The views above are mine and NOT those of my employer.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Guest double0seven

hi all,

in 95% of cases instructions/manuals are easy to come by but it is the 5% that is the problem in most case's you just ring your installer and they will help you,BUT the other 5% are the manufactures/installers who dont dennie you your manuals/instructions but charge you for it...and these companies and installers need to be weeded out as this isnt a saftey bit but sales pitch........also when u buy a bike from k mart you get instuctions how to put it together..when u get a clock it tells you how to set the time...tell me why you would have to get a service man out to program your fully wireless system that should of had its manuals with it when you got it anyway......i say a big thank you to the rouge installer that just cost me $200au/d on haveing to get fitter out to change my alarm in to my new house........as for a service fee $90 au/d just for things i could of done my self

..........shane..........

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if your wireless alarm was a DIY then it should have had its manuals.

If its a pro one (and Im not familiar with the regs in oz) then it seems fine to me that you have to pay to have it moved and set up for your new house. Afterall, the installer is providing a service.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Guest Brushpusher

Just to add my thoughts.

I project manage a lot of major fire alarm projects and emergency voice systems. As part of these contracts we are required to provide full information in the form of an Operation & Maintainance manual.

Not only does it have to contain all aspects of programming, but access codes too. In addition there are as installed drawings showing the cable routes etc.

This manual is then usually left on site with the end user. Whilst it may not be an intruder system, I think an L1 fire system should be left to us as professionals.

One of my customers recently employed a third party to work on an emergency voice evacuation system. The guys used our manuals to reprogram an aspect of the system. Unfortunately they got it wrong. When the system was tested the following week, the system didn't work.

I hate to think what would have happened if there had been an incident and the buildings required evacuation.

When I submit a manual at the end of a job, I usually omit the engineer programming section, only to be pulled up by the client who insists upon it.

As we don't get final payment until the manual is approved and produced I am left with little choice.

Tony.

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Guest livewire
By law they are not entitled to it, as engineers we purchase systems, and sell the systems to clients... we dont sell them the technical manuals, much in the same way as radio rentals used to buy lots of TV's and get the engineering guides for TV's but did I (as a consumer) ever get the engineering guide.... could I say to Sony im entitled to the engineering manual for my TV? Nope... cause its their intellectual property and im entitled to use it not play with its insides. And any lawyer in the country will tell you that you are not entitled to priveldiged information that could be used to inhibited or circumvent security systems or processes.

22189[/snapback]

IMHO, this is a grey area.

Radio or TV , you buy and it works straight out of the box, user manual covers all, low maintenance too, with security system it's different.

If I was to purchase a security system from a security company I would definitely insist on having all manuals including the engineering one (provided that I was the owner of the equipment not the contracted company). This is due to the fact that I might choose (whatever the reason) to contract a different company in the future and they might ask for these manuals / or for instance I might not require monitoring facility ( ie. someone always at home, but still set the alarm during the night).

If you are saying that revealing engineer's manuals to forum members when asked for is a compromise of security systems then let's take a real example here:

How secure is an Galaxy panel if you can buy the same one (from Ebay, ok, fair enough the rev and s/w might be an older version sometimes) which is DD243 compliant for £10 - £50 including the engineers manual?

This gear is normally sold by security installers (or ex security installers rather) who have access to manufacturers privileged web site areas and will send you eng pdf manual just to make that sale!

This forum's highest number of people logged on at the same time was 76 so we are not talking 1000's here,don' t see the reason why the manuals should not be sent to members if asked for...this used to be the norm in the past...

As someone else said manual is just a manual, as you know it takes more than having the manual to be able to install the system.

Just my opinion, I am sure some people will not agree, though.

rgds :)

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Guest livewire

Pete, I meant the same thing here

Just because you can read the manual does not qualify you to install alarms!

As someone else said manual is just a manual, as you know it takes more than having the manual to be able to install the system.

Anyway, it looks we have hot topic here and the pool results are fairly equal atm. :rolleyes:

rgds

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My opinion is that engineer and programming manuals are not for endusers. They don't have any need for them since they are not professional "alarm engineers".

Don't know the law in GB but here enduser has a right to get them since he/she owns the system. This is also with installer/engineer and master code. Practically we do not give those codes or manuals for enduser. If they want them we will ask for "Release of guarantee" agreement where it is stated that enduser himself takes responsibility of the system under any circumstances since we can't anyhow control what chances are made in to the system/programming.

Endusers have understod that if they have access to those codes they can't anyhow prove that they didn't make the system/programming faulty and has left the codes/manuals in to our possession only.

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  • 1 month later...
we will ask for "Release of guarantee" agreement
That makes a lot of sense Georg. I actually reckon if that were in force over here a lot of end users would NOT take the risk.

........................................................

Dave Partridge (Romec Service Engineer)

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