Fire Service Monitoring

History:

An independent service provider

Fire service monitoring was undertaken by AFA Monitoring Ltd for 20 years, as a contractor to the New Zealand Fire Service. Building owners undertook a contract directly with AFA, and AFA Acted on behalf of the New Zealand Fire Service collecting and collating information, and providing feedback on issues such as false alarms. All of the Building Owners information was handled by AFA, and the fire signal was dispatched to the watchroom

AFA Monitoring was an independent company, shareheld by a collective of fire protection contractors. Fire Fighting Pacific had no interest in this company, but supported the independent service provided.

The change...

In 2005, The Fire Service arranged the break-up of the monitoring services to allow a competitive provider, however they first awarded the changeover to a single provider, ADT Fire Monitoring, to commission the existing providers onto a new Fire Service Computer Database and Message Handling System. Owners took up contracts directly with ADT, and the Fire Service recalled many of the service AFA provided, under the umbrella of the Commission in Wellington, handling the building owners' information under their own system.

Other parties were allowed to become approved into the market from 18 months after the start of the changeover, and ADT, aware of this, sent their contracts out with a 60-month contract term in order to eliminate (or at least substantially delay) the onset of competition in the marketplace.

Due to extremely vocal protest from the fire industry and building owners, options were provided from 18 months up to 5 years.