If you’ve made a recent fire alarm system purchase then congratulations! You have taken a major first step in protecting your commercial property or business and the assets its responsible for. Whether your system was state-of-the-art or more budget-conscious, having one is a critical component of any smart business strategy. However, mistakes can still be made even if you’ve done everything right on your end.

Did you know that one of the most common mistakes Millennium Fire and Security has found with fire alarm systems is that they are installed or modified incorrectly?

Suppose a businessowner is having some construction done on their property. Walls are being either built, demolished, or moved and thus, other things may need to be moved around. Suppose, then, that same businessowner calls in a contractor to add horn strobes or pull stations to the new construction in an attempt to account for any uncovered spaces. If those additions weren’t meant to go with the original system, your fire alarms may not work properly, which could end up endangering all the personnel in your business should an emergency arise.

Think about what might happen if some people aren’t aware that there is a fire in the building.

The second most common mistake is not inspecting or testing the system thoroughly enough.

We get it. Time-consuming drills can carve out precious minutes and seconds to any business operation. However, these systems must be tested by the Code and that means every single device. You may be tempted to cut corners here and save time, thinking, “oh, I looked at it.” But in the unfortunate event of a fire or other emergency, if your system isn’t functioning it could have some devastating consequences.

Proper testing means taking the device off the wall and testing the wiring.

The last thing that many companies don’t do with their fire alarm systems is neglecting to add surge protection.

If you are in a lightning prone area (more than 5 lightning hits a year), alarms need to be surge protected but many fire alarm companies don’t add this to their alarm systems because they want the revenue from service calls.

At Millennium Fire and Security we make sure that all of our systems are surge protected because we want you to be safe. Call Millennium Fire and Security today to get a free consultation of your business and its security needs.