Brinks Home Security
Reviews and Complaints

So you signed a 36 month contract, wanted out of it early, and are angry? Try doing that with a car lease. Its a contract. Also in the contract are the cancellation terms. After the initial 36 months are up, you must inform them IN WRITING 30 days prior to cancellation. I am pretty sure writing on your check doesn't meet that criteria. You are angry because you don't want to meet your contractual obligations, not because of any wrongdoings on the part of Monitronics.

You were working with a dealer... not monitronics. Get it strait dude. Monitronics has nothing to do with installing systems, only monitoring the systems. You should be more specific when talking about a business because this sounds like that installing dealer was a real pos. Why you would be paid from an account that has anything to do with Monitronics is really fishy to. i would forward that info to the monitronics company because some legal action might be taken. Maybe it's the account Monitronics pays that installing company for service threw? i don't know..

I am writting because I have sent 2 cancellation letters to your company. The first one you never received, so I sent another. I keep getting calls and letters from you guys and dont understand what is going on. I have been a customer of yours for a long time, and have sent people to you. I have NEVER, EVER, had a problem with montronices before. Could you please find out what the problem is, so I can stop getting phone calls. I am certainly doing my part, so please do yours. Thank you for your time. I will post a copy of the letter I have sent. Please send me something back, to let me know that this problem is taken care of.

To Monitronics:
I am canceling my services because we have a big dog, and donot need at this time. If in the future we need service, we will be sure to call you back. Thank you for doing a great job protecting our home. We have had you guys for about 9 or 10 years and would recommend you to anyone. Thank you again for your services and have a blessed day. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at [protected].

Robert Mears

We signed up for monitronics nearly a year ago. Since then, I have received multiple past due notices for bills - but never a bill. I set up automatic payment through a credit card, several months ago, but they have no record of it. Every month I call and talk to a customer service rep AND a supervisor and this nonsense continues. Each month they say they have no record of anything. We are thinking of canceling this is so annoying.

I think everyone should consider the fact that you will be required to buy a convertor box for your television or it will stop working at the beginning of 2009. It is the same situation with the alarm system. I paid for my upgrade without having an issue with it as I will do with my older televisions. Also, everyone has to realize that Monitronics just monitors the alarm system, it doesn't install or service the system. The dealer I had with ADT was terrible so I switched to Monitronics and my current dealer has been great. You have to look at the company that handles your installation!

I CANCELED my contract with monotronics recntly because the batteries blow on a weekly basis. the problem is that they are expensive and they cannot be found.

I had a Monotronics Alarm System installed in my home about three years ago. Almost immediatley I had problems with the system. There were problems with my phone line, wires left exposed which I till this day have not been repaired. I also recieved a letter from Monotronics that my system was installed incorrectley and was told a service reprsentative would get in touch with me to set up a date to fix the problem which to this day they have not. I made several calls to the company and the problem has still not been repaired. I stopped making payments for a system that did not work and now I get calss weekly from the company and have been reported to the credit bureau. I made payment in full so this would not go down as me not complying with the contract and to keep up what until now has been an excellent Credit Rating. Can someone give me a idea which is my best way to pursue this problem and have it resolved. Thanks

I agree with what is being said here. I too have come up with the same kind of problem but with another alarm company. My system stopped working right after February 18th and the key pad began to beep. I then called customer service several times but each time I was kept waiting. The longest wait time was 45 minutes which is just wrong. We should not have to pay for a piece of equipment that is needed in order for the alarm to work. And why is it that when we try to get a hold of somone we can never speak to someone. Well guess what, I put a stop payment on my account and they were quick to call me. I had a very agressive conversation with the biling person and afterwards she sends me to technical services. After ten minutes went by I hung up.

They are doing the same thing to me too! I have three businesses and they are all being monitored by them. I can't even explain how upset and unsatisfied I am with this company and how it has cost me money$$$$. They took more then 10 minutes to contact the police after I gave them the go ahead to send them out and my store got wipped out. In one incident they didn't register my permit number on their end and they refused to call the police becuase they said the police would not go. UNTRUE! The police can't refuse to come out when a crime is being committed and I did have my permit Monitronics just didn't record it. (IDIOTS) The police had my permit number and Monitronics lied to me and said that they did contact the police and they refused to go. The police never recieved a call. Why would they lie? So, I am refusing to pay to upgrade my systems becuase that is BS and there has to be something we can do. They are taking advantage of consumers and their has to be law to protect us. Anybody have any ideas?

please my bill details

As a former employee of Monitronics, I can tell you that if you DO NOT know your password, you cannot change it by calling in. The password needs to be mailed to you in order for you to obtain it and then change it.(It isnt their fault you forgot it, really and they certainly do not want to just give your password out to anyone calling in). Second, if you had the wrong password, they wouldnt tell you you had it wrong. Of course they would send out police to make sure all is ok. And third, you getting a call an hour later, well thats normal. Depending on the signal received, we would wait for the police to arrive and make sure everything at the residence is secure (depending on the police dept, it could take 5 minutes or 5 hours, depending on police resources). So, it isnt necessarily BAD CUSTOMER SERVICE. This is for your protection. Bad comes to worse, ask for a supervisor, and deal is done.

Monitronics has bad customer service. their equipment is obsolete and they
Continue to charge premium prices without upgrading their services

I am now encountering similar problem with Monitronics. They continue to pull money from my account after the contract ended. After my home burned, I was told that I had to continue to make payment because I was still under contract, After my home was reconstructed, I called them serveral time to install the system back, but I was told that they did not have an agent in my area and that I should have gotten someone to install it for me, even though they were still receiving automatic payments from my account.

The ### are doing the same thing to me. I canceled in July of 2008. They have it in there records that I wanted to cancel. I mailed out the letter. Moved out and today March 2009 they are still charging me. After getting off the phone they will give me a 100 dollar credit. Why should I pay, for something I don't owe!
I even agreed to start a new contract if they would wipe that dept. I will never do business with them again. I advise other people do the same!

I'm still dealing with an issue of being overbilled my Monitronics. From day one they were a customer service nightmare! At the end of my contract I sent a letter asking them to discontinue the service. They continued to send me bills for the next three months. They finally stopped billing but claim that I never requested to cancel and are still trying to collect $300...

Offered extremely poor customer service. Representatives refused to respond to correspondence timely and appropriately. Instead, they suggested contacting departments that had nothing to do with the concern, overcharged for services not rendered, and avoided solving the problem by taking you through red tape. Representatives were not knowledgeable and were corrected regarding erroneous information that was being provided.

hello every one!
resently i purchise a monitronics alarm system with servise. this is a worth alarm company i ever had! starting from salesman, who is the biggest lier in the world, from the biginning he told us what first 2 false alarms a year is not countible (with paid police permit) wich we paid for. after two false alarms and bill for $598.00 they said we will proccess your alarm permit. its took tham 4 month (from december till march)
customer service ( Destiny) is very unprofessional and very aggrivated. when i call them about falls alarm they told me what we pushed panic button on the remote, (at the time off this event me and my wife was about 6 miles away and system was disarmed!) when i call to monitronics they symply explained what its can happened. 6MILES AWAY? then i was connected to a technical support "mat" he explained to me what systems laying in the werehouse for a few years and battries become weak . Quastion? why at the time of instalation battery never replased? now they addmit by replacing my remotes, what they are in fault! then why i supposed to pay this bill? or better yet they told me what i have to go and attend a alarm school!? are they count me as their imployee? if any body aggry with mee we have to do some thing about this.
please, e-mail me to: kooldaddya@roadrunner.com any suggestion wil be appritiated

I had some door knocker come to my home and offered to give me an alarm system for free. I thought that was a great deal until I started getting bills for $49.00 a month. I did sign a paper that they said and now I feel like I was taken because I was lied to. HELP

they have never called us about an alarm going off, or when the fire alarm came on on and there was a fire in the house, no fire department no nothing, they dont monitor anything. they take your money and bind you in a contract and do nothing at all but take your money, they dont monitor anything, they dont call when it s not working. you are supposed to call them and make sure it works~! some company that supposed to MONITOR does NOT, all they do is take your money and nothing else. they suck.

myself i work 3rd shift and i have not had any bad problems with them and i have been with them for 2 years. in the first 3 month i had a issues with a door sensors so i called Monitronics and they sent out a tech who was better than the one who installed it.I was on vacation and my pet sitter set the alarm off 3 different times the local police came. i got a call on my cell they called the house and they sent emails that i got on my cell phone...Every Time i call them they are great and NO i didn't read all my contract and didn't need to..I got what i asked for no more no less. i sometimes mess up and set the all the sensors so when my wife gets up in the middle of the night it sure wakes her up...LOL

I absolutely hate Monitronics. I feel that we were deceived by them on numerous levels from the beginning. We had similar situations as many of the above and would definitely advise potential consumers to stay far, far away. The service itself was shody, the system never conected properly and, if god forbid we had an actual break-in, the system would have completely failed. We tried to make it work for nearly two years and decided to go with a different company. After spending countless hours on the phone with various reps (who are not knowledgable about the product and their own procedures) in nearly every department and as many different stories about how to cancel, I finally bought out of my contract at the discounted price of $244. As ridiculous as it sounds, it is worth it to get rid of the frustration and annoyance of that dreadful company. - Laura in Denver

I will never, EVER use this company again. We just ended our business with them after realizing that their so-called "24 hour monitoring" meant that police would be dispatched because of an alarm, but WE COULDN'T SPEAK TO A HUMAN BEING.

That's right... Alarm sounding at 11 am on a Sunday and we couldn't reach anyone at the office. Nice, right?

So, we canceled our service since we were out of contract. It took them two days after the new system was installed to contact us to say "they lost the signal."

Now they want $63 because we had to cancel in writing and, get this, our service would not be considered "canceled" for 30 days from the receipt of the letter, which of course meant we had to pay for a month+ of service FOR NOTHING. Not to mention I just gotten off the phone with someone calling about the bill I JUST GOT YESTERDAY.

In a word, they SUCK.

Hello,
I had a wired system with Monitronics for 2 years; the unit only worked properly for a total of 6 months. Either the battery kept dying soon after it was installed or the sensors did not work. I complained and canceled my contract. An "executive support" person called and gave me 6 months free service and had a wireless unit installed saying that it was better. Well 6 months later, my home was burglarized (05/25/10, Clarkston, GA); the burglars cut the power to my home; the wireless alarm did not go off. I was told by Monitronics that even though their relatively new system did not work, they can't be held accountable.

If anyone is listening, do not purchase a monitoring system thru Monitronics!

imigigi you sure would be pissed off if you were at home and set the alarm off but didn't get a phone call before they dispatched. And if you go threw the cancel dispatch directory on the call option menu there is no hold time. As for them not calling your contact list I agree with you there but I imagine they did and your contact list probably wasn't updated or something since you didn't say what the company said about calling your contact numbers. If you step back and really think about it your alarm did exactly what it's supposed to do. Contact the police. it's just because there wasn't someone there this time you are upset. Had someone been there inside your house you would be grateful. And lets just say you didn't have the alarm and someone had been in your house, then the cops wouldn't have been pulling up out front a few minutes later but that's much better then false alarm fees.

I have worked for reputable security companies including Monitronics, ADT and Protection One. Most of these complaints on this site are because the consumer does not read their contracts or you just like to complain. All companies require a 30 day notice to cancel a contract and if you don't do it within that time frame they will renew you for at least a year. Read the contract. If you don't fulfill your contract all companies will charge you. It's in the contract. If you move, most companies will give you a BASIC system to replace your previous system, not replace everything you had before. READ the contract. And why wouldn't a company ask for a death certificate? A lot of companies will ask for that in order to stop billing.
Monitronics is actually a good company. They have a dealer program just like ADT does. There are good Authorized dealers and bad ones. Some of these complaints could be attributed to bad dealers. All of them hire their own techs and staff. I happen to work for a very reputable one with an A rating on BBB. Consumers need to check out their local authorized dealer of these companies before doing business. Don't blame the monitoring company for how a few dealers choose to do bad business.

My experience with Brinks began around May of 2015 when a Monitronics sales guy came to my Dental Practice in Sanger, Texas. I got free equipment (not really free leased) at my office and over 3000 dollars worth of equipment purchased for my home including garage and a large shop. They were complete with 2GiG panels and wifi controlled lighting and door locks. We quickly became frustrated as the techs were not able to actually link the hundreds of items as we lived in the country and had really bad wifi. So after making a deal with a company called Speed of Light Broadband. I made a deal for 179.00 a month they would give me unlimited best they had. I ended up hiring an off duty ADT guy who was a patient of mine to come out and reconfigure the whole house. We even had heat sensors in our attic. Problem solved.

Fast forward to 2018, when we added on to our house. We believed that we were month to month with Monitronics/Alarm.com which had changed it's brand to MONI. Same company new brand woooohooo. We were not in a 36month deal apparently someone had reupped us for 3 more years. Something I and my wife would definitely not do, as we were secretly planning on relocating to the coast of Texas and selling our practices. When asked for the contract we signed we received a sheet of paper with a scribble on the page, and when I asked them about the phone conversations could they produce the tapes of when we said yes Renew for 3 more years. We got busy and never continued to fight it.

Sold my practice on Sept 13, 2019 close date. Had negotiated for the new owner to continue using the now BRINKS instead of MONI monitoring at the office. At our home my wife got on the phone and proceeded to try and pay off our contract which was in the few thousands of dollars and she was transferred on the phone to a Customer Retention Manager after several calls and literally hours on the phone.

On this call, we agreed to pay 1400.00 which was paid on our credit card and if we sent 3 pieces of equipment back to them they would not charge us another 1400.00. Several weeks later we received a bill for 1400.00 from Brinks. We were also being charged on our personal checking account for the monitoring of a home we did not own any longer. It took about 3 months of calls to get them to stop that and no money was ever returned as they said they did indeed monitor the house during that time. Oh well.

During the call the people kept trying to get us to pay for the equipment to "close" the account. We had sent the equipment back and it was signed for by a Brinks employee. Thank God for FEDEX. After living on the coast for several months and numerous phone calls to them during COVID. They continued to say that the Manager we spoke to, was not AUTHORIZED to make a deal. Weird. We found the managers name and sought him out and he was still working for the company but planning to leave. He said yes he indeed had approval for that deal and that he made deals like that 'all day long'.

We escalated all the way to a VP with Brinks who assured us that he would have the charge removed from our record and close the account officially after he had a chance to "pull the tapes and listen to the transaction." He would contact us if he felt that we owed the money, and took our phone numbers, email addresses and great deal of information. If he didn't contact us, rest assured the situation would be handled. YAYYYYYYY!

Fast forward to January of 22. While trying to purchase a new home, we were asked to take care of the Collections from Brinks. Two days later I started receiving text messages, and phone calls from MOUNTAIN RUN SOLUTIONS. Apparently they had purchase my now 1500.00 bill from Brinks. I wrote them a long explanation and told them I would not be paying them for this debt because we did not owe it and that we had already been through all of this for months.

So after about 4 months in 2022, I found online CREDIT GLORY and paid for their service to remove the information from my credit report. I was attempting to expand an office and would need to borrow money. Credit Glory was 299.00 up front and although I have Experian/Free Credit Report since day one, I would have to pay for a company called IdentityIQ? 19.99/month for the 3 months I would need CREDIT GLORY. The 3 months turned into 99/mo until December of 2022 when I noticed I was still paying for both. So I cancelled it was easy and they were a great company, although there is one problem. The second they quit sending the monthly disputes MOUNTAIN RUN SOLUTIONS puts the junk back on my credit so I am out almost the amount that I fraudulently was being extorted from Brinks. What is sad was I was a great customer and they are so greedy that they still attempted to mess with me and it is still a problem today in 2023.

THE MORAL OF THE STORY IS DO NOT USE BRINKS THEY ARE A HORRIBLE COMPANY.

Sincerely, Dr. John Gage Corpus Christi, Texas.

Account # [protected] Address: 15149 S. Culver Road, Victorville, CA

New service was activated 5/20/15 to include 2 cameras which never were installed. The monthly rate of $64.99 included the 2 cameras. Cameras were not installed until April 2016. One full year of overpayment has been paid with no refund. I want an adjustment to the overpayments in the form of a refund.

Yemela Bell-Gomez
[protected]

I want my refund for over payment for services NOT rendered. I paid for one year and I want the refund for no cameras installed from May 2015 to April 2016.

I signed a two year contract with Monitronics International for a home security system. From Spring of 2003 until in the spring of 2005. In 2006 we had to move out of the area and called to cancel the account. We had fullfilled our original 2 year contract and so i didn't think it would be a problem.

The representative told me i had to write a letter of cancellation.

I wrote and sent a letter - and didn't think much more about it- figured it was cancelled. we were busy moving and starting new jobs.

My husband has always payed our bills- and he wasn't sure what this monthly charge was for (it is only 17.00) and finally remembered to mention it to me the other day-

It is three years later and they are still taking deductions out of our checking account.

I called their customer service and they claimed they never got the cancellation letter and there was no record of my call to cancel the service.

They said they would cancel it immediately- i will believe it when i see it!

I would not recommend Monitronics to anyone, their business practices are very questionable.

I worked for them. I am sorry, I have begged God for forgivenerss

I just tried to cancel my account because of moving out of the country and they said I owed a balance of over 700.00.. PLEASE, DON'T MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE I DID BY USING THIS COMPANY! WARNING... They actually use other companies to sell their product but read the fine print. It will be monitored by Monotronics!

OK so I just got a call on my cell phone from these people, at first they could not speak English well but I went on with the story to talk to a manager, they put me on speaker phone, all in the background were laughing, Let me tell you why! I gave a fake name told them I lived in a RV, yes they were still willing to take my money, I told them a line about my neighbor broke into my RV and ate all my tuna, I scrap and sell metal for a living and when my ol' man gets on the paps blue ribbon he beats me so will the system call 911 to save me from my ol' man and my tuna eating neighbor named Ray Charles...yes still willing to take my money< So why don't we turn the tables on these scammers, I use a fake probably unbelievable ignorant accent mispronounce words and yet they still want their money, It gave me a good laugh and I guess them too. Shame on these people! Call me again and I will prank you once again!

I will never sign up with Monitronics again. We had to take the Unit apart because of it not working properly. CS is a joke and does not help. All they care about is that they locked you in a contract and there is no way for you to get out without ruining your credit. They just want your money. My home is not safe and the equipment does not work. i would advise everyone to go through someone else, if you really care about your family safety.

Whoever it is that is in love with or employed by Monitronics and keeps making stupid comments about people whining and go pay your bills, etc. reflects the attitude of the entire company. This is basically how they treat and speak to customers. Are they hurting fo money so badly that they will not let people cancel and even those on month to month contracts(after being loyal customers for years). This whole company operates on fraud and deception. What a way to make a buck! Most everyone I have heard complain here are people who have decided to cancel for legitimate reasons and have already been with this company for a long time. Extortion, deliberately ruining credit and falsely charging for sevice not rendered is a demonstration of very poor business practice and should have been investigated and dealt with a long time ago by D.A. offices or the powers which regulate practice such as this. SHAME ON MONITRONICS! I am in the same boat as the rest of you. Fortunately I am filing bankruptcy and happily adding this company to those un secured creditors who will get nothing!

I just cancelled with Monitronics back in August and have been receiving bills in the mail for monitoring services they could not possibly have given, because the equipment was not even connected! Now I'm receiving calls from a collection agency with threats against my credit report. I called the collection agency after writing to them explaining the events and they offered me a deal, $30 lower. I told them "No way". It's ridiculous that this kind of behavior goes on today. The money they are spending with the collection agency is probably the same as what they say I owe them - go figure.

I have had problems with monitronics too. I will never use them again or refer to them to my friends or neighbors. I have called them five times trying to change my password. No one will help me. In fact I found out tonight that I don't have a password in record. When my alarm went off tonight, a false alarm I tried to tell them that it was a false alarm, but they wouldn't listen to me and sent the police anyways. Don't use Monitronics!

I cancelled my security system aver 6 months ago when my contract was up. I then put a stop payment on credit card charges and am now getting phone calls about an account that is no longer there. We have moved out of the home and are no longer in the area. Stop the harassing calls as I have contacted the Attorney Generals office about this matter.

I'm having the same issues! By far this is the WORST "MONITORING SECURITY SERVICE" available.

Have you thought about, I don't know, testing your system? That might help a bit. Call the main office [protected]