be aware that the British Gas alarm is along the same lines as the ADT.
you pay a monthly fee for monitoring for a three year contract.
you pay nothing for the alarm system (but then of course it still remains
their property)
the external siren is only a DUMMY.
at the end of the three years you have to continue paying the monitoring at
whatever rate they wish to charge you at that time.
if you do not wish to continue paying they can remove the system if they
wish.(it is their property)
even if they dont you have an alarm system that is no good because it is
incapable of making an external sound.
theoretically you could ask them to fit an external siren (at whatever price
they wish to charge) but before doing anything like that you need to get it
in writing that they will not take back the rest of their system at a later
date.
Utter rubbish. British Gas will sell you an alarm system, the system is not
rented (unless the rent is £1000+ per annum) They are NACOSS approved which
in theory means the systems are pretty good. I'm currently looking to get a
system fitted however and wasn't impressed by the system they offered. It
was very expensive and not very comprehensive. My major fault with their
system was that they only planned to have one sensor in each room. This
means to get a confirmed trigger for police response the burglar has to go
into two different rooms which is always going to happen.
My advice is to look in the Yellow Pages. Mine had a panel showing all the
NACOSS approved installers. From them select some of the local dealers and
speak to them. From my experience they are more willing to talk to you and
provide better advice, better quality systems and better prices than the
likes of ADT and British Gas.
HTH
Bugs