Dear customer

As circumstances surrounding the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) continue to evolve I want to personally reach out and update you on the steps we have taken to ensure business continuity for all our customers. We are vigilantly implementing advanced protocols to protect the health and safety of our customers and our employees. Our focus is to ensure we meet your needs while doing our part to keep our customers and our employees safe.

We continue to closely monitor the global impact of COVID-19, and the precautionary measures we are taking are aligned with the latest information and global guidance, including from the World Health Organization, Centers for Disease Control and national governments. The health, safety and well-being of our customers and our employees are of the utmost importance and are driving the actions we’re taking.

The actions include minimizing travel, deploying an enhanced hygiene program across our operations and restricting access to our facilities. We have clear guidelines for employees who might feel ill or be at risk, including a 14-day self-quarantine, if applicable, and completing a health self-assessment before returning to work. We regularly update our employees with the latest guidance.

At the same time, we are working to minimize the impact to the services we provide our customers. We have in place a comprehensive business continuity plan, and are prepared with a robust pandemic response plan to ensure continued service and monitoring capabilities from alternate locations.

Current Status of Continuity Plan:
We are increasingly facing frontline staff shortages due to operators having to self-isolate with Coronavirus symptoms. Further, we are experiencing increased activations due to the unprecedented levels of properties being closed at times when they would ordinarily be open and occupied. Accordingly, in light of the current situation we are having to amend our procedures in our SMC Administrative and Operational Booklet as set out below. Please accept this letter as notification of such changes in accordance with the terms of our contract with you:

Operations team. The following changes to our activation handling procedures have been implemented:
• Our operators will prioritize the following high priority signals: Telecare, Fire Alarms, PA, Lone Worker and confirmed intruder where a valid URN is in place. All other signals are being automated which means that text messages will be sent to keyholders informing them of any activations outside of the above priority signals.
• In the case of CCTV, subject to the volume of activations at any given time we are introducing a revised amount of allowable false alarms to a maximum of three in an hour (false and unwanted). Once the system has reached this limit it will be isolated and a fault report sent until the cause is resolved.

Important Actions You Need to Take
1. Please ensure your keyholders are made aware of those activations as detailed above which will be notified in text format.

2. Please check all your keyholder details to establish which do not have a mobile number and provide us with one for those that don’t. Updates should be made by e-mailing your alarm service provider at info@cannonsecurity.co.uk. If you use a keyholding company this may require you to agree with your keyholding company for them to provide a mobile phone number for this purpose.

These are some of the key measures we have in place at this time; we will adjust, as needed, as the situation evolves. We will clearly communicate to you if we implement any changes to the above measures.

This is an unprecedented time for everyone, and the situation is changing daily. We are committed to maintaining our business operations and ensuring you continue to receive the highest available quality service.

Thank you for your continued trust in SMC.

Yours faithfully,
Colin Walters
Managing Director
Security Monitoring Centres Limited