Not sure what to do next on this one...
We moved into this house and the alarm was already installed. However, intermittently the phone line was very noisy and has gradually got worse. Some BT engineers came out a few months ago and it appeared fixed for a while. This week the problem got so bad we called BT. They said isolate all extensions etc to see if the line is still noisy - it was. So an engineer came round. He said the alarm circuitry was wired in on the wrong side of the BT master and disconnected - hey presto all the line noise went away. That left an alarm panel continually beeping as the phone line was disconnected from the alarm and me with a bill from BT for £55 plus VAT. Before he left I asked him to talk to the alarm company and explain why he disconnected. The conversation that followed was staggering:
BT "You wired up the alarm to the phone in an unapproved way. You have taken the BT line from the BT side of the master socket and wired it to the alarm and then from the alarm into the master socket."
Alarm company "but we have to do that to meet the alarm regulations. If we don't do it if a phone is off the hook in the house the alarm cannot call the monitoring center."
BT "You are not allowed to wire the alarm that way. I have disconnected it and the customer will have to pay the bill for my visit as it is not a BT fault. What happens after I leave is between you and the customer".
Bizarre or what - the alarm regs contradict what BT allows people to do?
We moved into this house and the alarm was already installed. However, intermittently the phone line was very noisy and has gradually got worse. Some BT engineers came out a few months ago and it appeared fixed for a while. This week the problem got so bad we called BT. They said isolate all extensions etc to see if the line is still noisy - it was. So an engineer came round. He said the alarm circuitry was wired in on the wrong side of the BT master and disconnected - hey presto all the line noise went away. That left an alarm panel continually beeping as the phone line was disconnected from the alarm and me with a bill from BT for £55 plus VAT. Before he left I asked him to talk to the alarm company and explain why he disconnected. The conversation that followed was staggering:
BT "You wired up the alarm to the phone in an unapproved way. You have taken the BT line from the BT side of the master socket and wired it to the alarm and then from the alarm into the master socket."
Alarm company "but we have to do that to meet the alarm regulations. If we don't do it if a phone is off the hook in the house the alarm cannot call the monitoring center."
BT "You are not allowed to wire the alarm that way. I have disconnected it and the customer will have to pay the bill for my visit as it is not a BT fault. What happens after I leave is between you and the customer".
Bizarre or what - the alarm regs contradict what BT allows people to do?