SSS Management Services' Alarm Receiving Centre (ARC), which filters millions of alarm activations on behalf of some of the biggest names on the high street, saw almost double (48 per cent) the number of false activations during November and December 2005 and 2006, with at least 17 per cent directly triggered by over-ambitious Christmas displays. This year it's going to present an even bigger headache because of new guildelines from the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) to remove police officer response from stores that have activated more than one false alarm. This 'blacklisting' lasts for three months or until such time that the store can prove that it has remedied the problem, whether it be a faulty alarm or a piece of stray tinsel. In the former case, this could result in a system upgrade costing up to £2,000.

Our own 2007 industry report into the high levels of false alarm activations, highlighted the fact that up to 96 per cent of all alarms are triggered falsely and many retailers don't even know that their stores have been blacklisted by police.

If they don't have cover, there is an obvious risk to staff and property from rising incidents of violent crime, a fact highlighted in last week's BRC report which said that attacks on shop staff were up by 33 per cent on last year. It also puts their stores at risk from loss of insurance cover, according to the Association of British Insurers.

But you can't blame the police, who are increasingly under-resourced and over-stretched by other crime priorities, when they refuse to attend what is likely to be a human-error induced activation. The tragic case of WPC Sharon Beshinevsky, who was gunned down in 2005 while attending an alarm activation in Bradford, proves another point - officers need to be aware of what they are attending.

So what can be done? Firstly, we are to sit down with ACPO to discuss the strategy of dealing with alarms so that officers only have to deal with genuine emergency callouts. This is easily achievable and ACPO is aware of the visual and audio verification technology we have been piloting with some of our larger customers. This technology enables the ARC to actually talk to the store when an alarm has been activated. If it's a member of staff who has accidentally pressed the personal alarm button, the ARC can advise on its correct use and no signal is sent to the police. However, in the case of a genuine emergency, the ARC can even warn off intruders or assailants before the police arrive. More importantly the captured images and sounds are proof to the police that a genuine incident took place and mean that the store won't lose its police response in future.

We will stress to ACPO the point that the security industry itself has a conflict of interests. It knows there is a problem, but is in no hurry to remedy it because it owes its millions of pounds-worth of profits to the fixing of false alarms, most of which its members sourced and installed in the first place. Until that meeting with ACPO, we must encourage retailers to educate their staff about the correct and incorrect use of personal alarms and also educate retailers about where and where not to place decorations.

We must all be more transparent and communicate more openly on this key issue in the spirit of Christmas.

l David Barrington is a director at SSS Management Services

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