Our next ‘Preventing Burglary’ seminar is on Thursday, November 24th …

Whether you are an existing Provident client or not, you’ll learn effective tips that you can put in place immediately that are both inexpensive (or free) and proven to actually work.

You will walk out knowing exactly how most residential burglaries in Vancouver occur, and what you can do to minimize your risk of being a victim. We discuss practical tips that most people only learn about after they have been broken into. We’ll show you how to maximize security without ruining how your house looks or spending a fortune.

After the presentation, which lasts about an hour, we’ll lead a tour through our 24/7 Operations Centre where you can see what’s on the other end of all of Provident’s alarms, cameras and access control systems.

Come by anytime after 6:30pm to have a glass of wine & some Benton Brothers cheese. The presentation will start at 7:00pm… please click here to RSVP.

Here’s what past attendees have said about the presentation:

“I particularly liked reiteration of the information about how to delay a burglar for 5 minutes. The tour of the operations facility was very interesting and confidence building”.

“I felt at ease. Information was useful.”

“I found it interesting and informative and I’m sure others would as well …. whether they have a system or not. It helps to stay current with crime trends and security options.”

“with all the home security advertising, I think it can be somewhat confusing for people and your session helped to clear up some issues”

There is a big difference between residential burglaries in Vancouver and those in Whistler.

While the typical residential burglary in the city follows a consistent pattern that starts with a kicked-in front door, most thefts in Whistler seem to be committed by people with access to both a key and alarm code.

Coming home to a burglarized home is a lot more obvious when your front door has been kicked in. In Whistler, just because your door is locked and your alarm is armed doesn’t mean all of your belongings are exactly as you left them.

Three recent stories from clients (each of which occurred before they became Provident clients in Whistler) illustrate some of the security risks for Whistler, or vacation properties anywhere…

The ‘Who the hell are you?’ incident…

A Whistler homeowner who lives in the United States happened to be in Vancouver on a recent weekend. When their Saturday night plans fell through, they decided to head up to their Whistler cabin rather than stay in a hotel downtown.

When they walked through their front door in Whistler a little after 11pm, they were shocked to find their home already occupied. After a curt exchange of “who are you’s?”, it was determined that the people in the home were not burglars. It turned out they were renters who had paid in full for a week in the cabin.

It wasn’t a burglary, it was fraud.

To the surprise of the owner, their trusted, long-time cleaning lady had been renting out their cabin for several years. Because she had always been privy to the actual rental schedule, given she did pre & post cleans, she was able to develop a lucrative side gig of renting the cabin out on Craigslist for cash.

The ‘How was the wine?’ incident…

An owner arrived in Whistler and was dismayed to see two empty bottles from his special collection of wines (the cheaper of which was worth about $650) in the recycling bin. Given the fact that he was not using the alarm system at the time of the incident, he had no way of knowing who had accessed his home and enjoyed his wine.

The ‘That’s disgusting’ incident…

The third incident involved another client who arrived at their Whistler home to find their hot tub broken and a few things out of place inside the house. What really set the owners off, however, was finding a condom wrapper under the bed in their master bedroom.

With a lockbox outside the house, the code for which is known by several local service providers, determining who was ‘enjoying’ their home in their absence was not possible.

In my experience, the attitude towards security in Whistler tends to be on the extremes… people seem to be either incredibly security conscious and want to put every possible measure in place, or they leave a key in a lockbox, subscribing to the idea that “there’s nothing to steal anyways”.

As more incidents like these occur, people are tending to move from the ‘there are no security issues in Whistler’ camp, directly to the ‘we have a major security problem in Whistler’ camp. The reality is that the risk in Whistler is very easy to manage. Crooks are taking advantage of the most basic weaknesses in people’s security.

The solutions are simple:

1. Stop sharing your alarm code.

Every user of your alarm system should have a unique code. There is no reason to share user codes.

Right now is a perfect time to change your alarm codes. All of them.

Provident can remotely add, modify or delete user codes for your alarm at anytime upon your request. We can also provide detailed user reports that outline exactly who accessed your home, and when, at any time (or set up a regular report to be emailed to you every day, week, month or other frequency you would prefer).

Click here to learn why controlling alarm codes is such an important first step.

2. Get rid of your lockbox.

While it may be convenient to have a lockbox outside your Whistler home, there is very little security. Given that most Whistler homeowners are away from their homes for extended periods of time (or most of the time), there is little stopping an unscrupulous service provider who has been given access to your lockbox once (or gained easy access using a hammer) from making a duplicate copy for future use.

Provident provides 24/7 key control and can respond at any time to provide a key to anyone who requires legitimate access to your home. There is no need to leave your keys, unsecured, outside your home.

Everyone likes to be able to trust people, but nobody likes to be taken advantage of. By making it clear, up front, that you take security seriously in your Whistler home (by ensuring each of your service providers understand that the alarm code you give them is unique to them and will create an indelible record) our experience has been that people have far fewer problems than those who simply hope for the best and assume that everyone they deal with will be completely honest with them.

Our first Preventing Burglary seminar of the fall will be held in our Kerrisdale Showroom this Thursday, September 29th at 6:45pm.

In addition to learning exactly how residential burglaries occur on the Westside (and what you can do to eliminate your risk of being a victim of one), we’ve added a lot of new content such as how to use your burglar alarm to detect flooding as well as how to integrate your alarm with your heating system to reduce your energy costs each month.

Our seminars are always well attended and are a lot more fun & interesting than you would imagine a seminar on home security would be. Trust us. You should come. Bring your neighbours.

In addition to walking out with actionable steps that will have an immediate positive impact on your home security, we will also have some great wine from our friends at Le Vieux Pin Winery and cheese from Benton Brothers Cheese in Kerrisdale.

After the seminar (which will last about an hour), we’ll lead a tour through our 24/7 Operations Centre so that you can see what is on the other end of all of our client’s alarms and camera systems.

To RSVP, please click here.

Bring along a friend or neighbour and learn why five-minute proofing is the most effective measure you can take to improve your home security as well as why several of the tactics you are probably already using may be having the opposite effect that you intended.

Here’s what past attendees of our seminar have said:

“I particularly liked reiteration of the information about how to delay a burglar for 5 minutes. The tour of the operations facility was very interesting and confidence building”.

“I felt at ease. Information was useful.”

“I found it interesting and informative and I’m sure others would as well …. whether they have a system or not. It helps to stay current with crime trends and security options.”

“with all the home security advertising, I think it can be somewhat confusing for people and your session helped to clear up some issues”

We hope to see you on Thursday! Click here to RSVP.

Several years ago, a Vancouver client was very persistent in asking that we take over the alarm service & monitoring of their Whistler home. We obliged and quietly accepted a few more requests like that one.

What began as a favour for one long-standing client  has grown into Provident serving several dozen Whistler clients who already rely on us to provide exceptional service to them in Vancouver.

In order to do that, we have worked closely with Dow Security, a local Whistler company, who have provided alarm response service and emergency service for alarm systems on our behalf.

We’re proud to announce that on August 31^st, we purchased Dow Security Inc., which will soon be re-branded as Provident Security (Whistler) Corp.

Purchasing Dow made a lot of sense for us. Not only did Dow provide sub-contracted services for Provident in Whistler, they also looked after several dozen other Provident clients directly. They have a similar client base to our Vancouver clients and a similar customer service philosophy.

With the integration of Dow, Provident is now Whistler’s largest home security company… and the only Whistler based firm with its own 24/7 central monitoring station.

In addition to the ‘basic’ alarm monitoring & response services, we will be rolling out several other services tailored specifically to Whistler homes. For example, integration of thermostats to allow for remote control of heating/cooling from an iPhone or Blackberry. This means you can start heating your home (or driveway) in Whistler while you pull out of your garage in Vancouver on Friday afternoon.

We will also be expanding our HomeWatch service to include patrols of  homes to meet clients’ insurance requirements and to ensure that everything that is supposed to happen (or not happen) is happening.

We are excited to have a permanent Provident home in Whistler. While there are many changes to be implemented (such as our key control, response reporting, paperless processes and other systems), we are fortunate to be adding a great company, with a great group of people, to the Provident team.

We’re excited to announce that Bob Stevenson has joined the Provident team as Lead Developer.

In this role, he leads our software development team and is responsible for Provident’s IT infrastructure, including all alarm monitoring servers and database management.

In short, Bob is responsible for all of our software systems that enable us to guarantee a five-minute alarm response, know exactly where every client’s house key at any moment as well as tracking and managing the thousands of custom Homewatches we provide for our clients to make sure that their plants get watered, cats get fed, dogs walked, lights altered and garbage taken out… just the way they want it done.

It’s a big job. But we know Bob is up for the challenge.

Prior to joining Provident, Bob was with ADT for eight years. Originally starting as a Senior Programmer Analyst responsible for ADT Canada, Bob was promoted several times, eventually becoming a Software Engineer with responsibility for both ADT Canada and ADT USA.

In his most recent role, Bob led several major IT initiatives including creating an automated billing system used by several million customers. In addition, Bob was also responsible for developing web & desktop applications used by both ADT employees and clients. He was also involved in designing systems used to integrate databases after ADT’s acquisition of Broadview Security (formerly Brinks Home Security) in 2009.

We’re proud to have Bob on our team.

After the success of an installed NightOwl Remote Video System at an Abbotsford construction site a few weeks ago, one of the neighbouring construction sites that had been relying on a Security Guard to patrol their site had us install NightOwl for them as well.

It took less than a week for the system to pay off. On July 21st, the NightOwl system send us video alarms showing three suspects trying to gain access to the construction site through the front gate. Our Kerrisdale Operations Centre team immediately dispatched the Abbotsford Police, who were able to respond and apprehend the suspects before anything was stolen or damaged from the site.

Click below to see what the video alarms looked like…

Click here to view the embedded video.

It’s important to note that the resolution of the NightOwl video alarms is intentionally low. That’s because the system is completely wireless and is optimized to be able to detect unauthorized activity and send a video clip to us in the shortest possible timeframe. We only need the video to be clear enough to confirm that a human is in an area that they are not supposed to be so that we can dispatch the Police to a verified crime in progress.

Over the past few months, we’ve installed NightOwl systems throughout the Lower Mainland and Fraser Valley. NightOwl does not require electricity, telephone lines, an internet connection or any other infrastructure to work. It is a completely self-contained system that we can set-up and monitor anywhere.

We rent NightOwl on a week-to-week basis, making it an incredibly easy way to maximize security for a construction site or any place requiring temporary security.

Do you have a site where NightOwl could help? Let us know… we’d be happy to set-up a demo and show you how simple it is to get started.

The heat map above (click the map for a bigger image) shows that there were forty-six (46) residential burglaries reported last week to the Vancouver Police Department. Fifteen (15) of those were on the Westside.

One of the trends we’ve seen this summer already is a marked increase of thieves cutting telephone lines before breaking in. Unless wireless communication is being utilized (for example BLINK mesh radio monitoring), cutting the phone lines disables the vast majority of burglar alarms in people’s homes.

In terms of theft from vehicles, there were one-hundred and fifty six (156) reported incidents in the city, approximately forty-six (46) occurred on the Westside.

There were twenty-seven (27) vehicles stolen last week, six (6) of which were taken from the Westside.

All statistics and maps are from the Vancouver Police Department.

I’m voting ‘No’ in the Referendum so that we can keep the HST in BC.

That will not shock anybody. I’ve been a vocal proponent for the HST since its introduction last year.

So vocal, in fact, that I was asked to co-chair the Smart Tax Alliance, which is the official ‘No’ side for the referendum. Acting as a co-chair has meant dozens & dozens of media interviews, more than a few radio debates and appearing in a television commercial.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I was also quoted in the HST Referendum Voters Guide that was sent to every British Columbia household by the Government.

As a result, I’ve had hundreds of people contact me over the past few months… lots of people letting me know they agree with me, lots of people saying they don’t, and plenty of undecided people with questions about what they had heard me say in the media. All in all, it’s been an interesting experience.

Now that we’re at the very end of the road on this issue, with the mail-in vote deadline of August 5th, 2011, I thought I’d answer the most common questions I have been asked about the HST and my involvement.

The most common questions that I’ve been asked are:

1. Why was the PST+GST system so bad for Provident? 

2. Why did I go public to try and drum up support for a tax? How did I get involved with the Smart Tax Alliance?

3. How has the HST helped improve Provident’s customer service (like I say in the commercial)?

4. How has the HST allowed Provident to create new jobs?

5. Has Provident lowered prices as a result of the HST savings?

6. What’s the deal with Bill VanderZalm?

7. What was it like being one of the public faces of the HST debate? How much hate mail did you receive?

Why was the PST + GST system so bad for Provident?

Under the old PST system, the government rules about how and when to apply the PST to alarm systems were incredibly complicated. In fact, they were so complicated that the government had a 15 page bulletin that attempted to explain how PST was to be applied to alarm system installation.

Being complicated isn’t a good thing, but it would be manageable. The real problem with the PST rules was that they were often contradictory… leaving huge decisions, with major financial implications, open to a wide range of opinion & application.

Over the course of the past 9 years, we had three PST audits. During each of those audits, the Auditors themselves disagreed with what the PST rules meant and how they were to be applied.

As a result, we went through lengthy appeals processes in each case in an effort to be treated fairly. Our last appeal ended up taking 5 1/2 years to work its way through the process. The net result was that we ended up spending the equivalent cost of having a full-time position in our accounting department that did nothing but work on government tax compliance issues… every single installation had to be reviewed to confirm what taxes got applied to which parts and in what circumstances labour would require PST (because even though PST was not supposed to be on labour, if labour was involved in installing a product that it was determined to be “PST-able” then it got taxed as well).

The other major costs involved in this were the fees we incurred with our external accountants to try and get clarity about what the PST rules were.

Beyond the hard cost, the PST confusion created a significant distraction in our company. We were forced to dedicate time, labour and money to fighting through the government bureaucracy in an effort to just get a straight answer as to how the PST should be applied.

By contrast, when the HST was implemented, we experienced an almost overnight change. There are far fewer exceptions and exemptions with the HST and we were able to take a process that used to take many hours each week to a process that now takes a few minutes each quarter.

I’ve since heard from many other small business owners who have had the same experience. Unfortunately, some are still having the same fight even though the PST has been gone for a year now.

Introduction

Why did I (and Provident) go public to try and drum up support for a tax? How did I get involved with the Smart Tax Alliance?

Last year, I got inspired to do something after listening to Bill Vanderzalm, all over the media, telling people that the HST was only good for big businesses and that everyone else would suffer. In particular, he talked a lot about how the HST hurt small business.

That concerned me a lot because, as a small business owner, I had seen first hand how unfair and expensive the PST system was. I had seen how the PST added significant hidden costs within our business and wasted valuable resources that our clients received no value from. I knew that going back to the PST/GST system would be a costly nightmare that would hurt our company, our employees and our customers. I had seen how the HST served to eliminate waste and allow us to focus more of our time, money and resources on our clients.

It was clear that the Government had done a terrible job implementing the HST, and Mr. Vanderzalm was taking full advantage of that. I thought what was missing were real stories, from real people, about how the HST was helping, not hurting, small business.

The only person talking about the HST was Mr. Vanderzalm and I knew that what he was saying about small business was not true.

I knew from speaking with many of my friends who owned their own businesses, that my experience was not unique.

I set up a website, www.SupportHST.ca … the idea was to create a page where small business owners could upload a quick video to tell their own story of how the HST had helped them. I filmed my own first…

Click here to view the embedded video.

A few friends of mine who run businesses in other industries filmed their own clips as well… Ken Sim from Nurse Next Door – a home healthcare company, Dwayne Stewart of Pacific Rim Services – a general contractor, Dave Notte from Wolfgang Commercial Painters and Chris Mobius from Garibaldi Glass Industries – a glass manufacturer, were amongst the first. Andy Latchford, COO of Cactus Club Restaurants submitted his video and was one of the first restauranteurs to go public saying that the HST was a good thing for our Province.

Although the original intent of the site was to highlight the stories of small business owners, I was contacted by other people that had also felt offended by Mr. VanderZalm’s HST rants and wanted their voices heard.

Chrystal Ocean, a low-income senior living on Vancouver Island, submitted a video sharing her experience of how the HST has helped put more money in her pocket. Click below to watch her story:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Similarly, Don Wilson, a retiree who has never owned a business, submitted a video explaining why he supports the HST as a consumer.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Shortly after launching the site, we had 21 videos posted. The site got a little bit of media attention, and myself, Dwayne Stewart and Ken Sim were guests on the Bill Good Show a couple of times to talk about what we were doing. 

In February or March, I was contacted by the Smart Tax Alliance who let me know that they were trying to get the same message across as I was, and had already brought about 40 major business & trade groups together (such as the Vancouver Board of Trade, Tourism BC, etc.) who represented more than 1 million BC employees/members.

It seemed to make a lot of sense to get involved with the Smart Tax Alliance and pool our efforts. I was asked to become a Co-Chair and act as one of a few media spokespeople.

How has the HST improved Provident’s customer service (like I say in the commercial)?

Once the HST came into effect, we were able to take the money we had been spending on PST administration and, instead, spend it on our customer service team. Immediately, we were able to add another full-time customer service position without any additional cost to the company.

As a small business that relies exclusively on word of mouth referrals, providing a better client experience has led to more referrals and more business. We’ve reduced our on-hold times and have been able to tackle pro-active customer service projects that we had not been able to get to in the past.

Under the old PST system, a portion of all of our clients fees that they were paying for security services had to cover our tax compliance costs. With the elimination of the need to administer the PST (which was by far the most complicated and time-consuming administration task) our clients are now getting more value for the same fees.

The HST has allowed us to focus more effort on customer service without increasing our costs or prices.

How has the HST allowed Provident to create new jobs?

Under the PST system, any PST we paid for a computer, printer, box of paper, vehicle or tool was a cost that got worked into our pricing as overhead. Since the HST was implemented, we now get all of that money back (as an Input Tax Credit against what we have charged).

Our most important service is our ability to provide an immediate response to client alarms. So, we decided that the best thing to do with those savings was to purchase a new vehicle (which was also cheaper for us with the HST) and add a full-time driver to join our alarm response team.

The impact of adding that one position on the road, as well as the additional person on our customer service team, (both of which added no new additional ‘cost’ to us) resulted in quicker response times and happier clients. We’ve seen an increase in the number of referrals we get each month and added a second new vehicle (and full-time driver) to accommodate the new business.

We are currently recruiting for two new sales people to join our team to help keep up with demand.

Without question, the HST helped put us in a position where we could grow so quickly. The old PST system added a significant cost to our business that did not offer value to us, our clients or even the government. By contrast, we are now growing much faster (resulting in more tax revenue for the government) and we are able to focus much more on service delivery (resulting in much better value for our customers).

With the pending rate reductions on the HST (to 10% by 2014), the impact to consumers has been reduced and I firmly believe that we (business, government and consumers) are all better off with the HST rather than going back to the PST.

The impact of reverting to us would be that we would be forced to choose to either 1) reduce service levels, or 2) raise our prices in order to maintain the same cost structure.

The PST hurt our business and wasted our clients’ money.

Has Provident lowered prices as a result of the HST savings?

With a few exceptions, we have not reduced our prices since HST implementation. Based on our understanding of our clients & our service delivery model, we decided that the best use of the savings we realized as a result of the HST was by investing in new trucks and new jobs. Our business is all about speed, efficiency and service… we elected to spend the money on things that would improve all three.

That was a business decision and one that our clients will judge us on. If a price break is more important, they will tell us &/or simply cancel their service. If we do not keep our clients happy, we will not be in business.

The specifics of how we applied the savings is all about our particular situation. If I was leading a different business, in a different market, where price was the primary differentiator, I would likely make a different choice.

The HST helps BC businesses save money (and waste far less of it). As a result, those businesses are free to choose where those savings are best spent. The decision to add jobs, raise wages, cut prices or anything else with the money is theirs to make.

Ultimately though, it is the consumers who will make the final call as to whether or not a company has made the right choice. Business is far too competitive. If consumers feel they get better value for a better price somewhere else, they will go there. They will vote with their dollars. Businesses who choose poorly will be left behind… quickly.

What’s the deal with Bill VanderZalm?

In all honesty, this is one of the questions that I get asked most often. The truth is that I have no idea.

Listening to him speak, I am often amazed that anyone – anywhere – could (or could have ever) taken him seriously. He’s certainly not one to let the facts get in the way of a good story.

But to be fair to Mr. VanderZalm, Chris Delaney & Bill Tieleman (the other 2/3 of FightHST) have been equally outrageous in their statements, accusations and pronouncements.

Some of the best critiques of FightHST have been made by Chris Thompson, a UBC Economics grad and current UBC Law student who created two great videos that sum up the absurdity of FightHST.

Here’s the first, titled ‘FightFightHST: A Letter to Bill VanderZalm…’ focused mostly on dispelling some of the misrepresentations made by Mr. VanderZalm…

Click here to view the embedded video.

His follow-up video, FightFightHST 2: Fighting the Man, who was “The Man”, who is “Fighting the Man”, included all three FightHST leaders…

Click here to view the embedded video.

The reality is that Mr. VanderZalm accomplished something incredible. He spearheaded the first successful petition under the Recall & Initiative Act. He and his group got more than a half million people to sign the petition and force the referendum.

If it hadn’t been for that, there is no way that we would have seen the Government offer a two point reduction in the HST (to 10% by 2014) which, when implemented, will tie British Columbia with Saskatchewan as having the lowest sales tax in Canada (Alberta is excluded because they’ve got oil instead of a sales tax).

The fact that Mr. VanderZalm has not already declared victory and dropped the FightHST argument suggests to me that this is much more of a political & personal battle for them than an honest debate about an economic policy.

The fact that the BC NDP have joined in the fray and are also pushing for a ‘Yes’ vote alongside Mr. VanderZalm, irrespective of what it costs our Province, is also telling.

The BC NDP and Mr. VanderZalm certainly make strange bed-fellows. More interesting, however, is the fact that politically, nobody else appears to agree with them.

It is not just the BC Liberals who support the HST. The BC Conservatives want to keep it. Jane Sterk, the Leader of the BC Green Party has indicated she will vote ‘No’. British Columbia’s two Independent MLA’s, former NDP’er Bob Simpson and Vicki Huntington voted in favour of the recent amendments to the HST that will see it drop to 10% by 2014. Even one of the BC NDP’s long standing Economists has come out in support of the HST.

The NDP governments in Nova Scotia and Ontario support the HST. Even Jim Stanford, the Chief Economist of the Canadian Auto Workers, Canada’s largest trade union, has warned members against getting involved in anti-HST efforts.

In Mr. Stanford’s 2009 letter to CAW members, he commented on the political opposition to the HST:

“Political opposition to the HST does not reflect a well considered call for a fairer tax system. It’s more about electoral gamesmanship by opposition parties eager to damage the current government. When the anti-HST coalition tries to tap into knee-jerk anti-tax sentiments to win more votes, it also encourages a regressive, potentially dangerous attitude to government and the public services those taxes support. We’ll pay dearly for that kind of attitude in coming years.”

Over the past year, we have seen support for the HST rise with every poll. From an original approval rating of only 12%, support for the HST has been steadily climbing. In every single poll conducted,support for the HST has increased while the number of people who want to go back to the old system has gone down. The latest polls, at the outset of the voting period, indicate its going to be a very close race.

As a small business owner who has seen how HST helps make us more competitive, eliminates government waste as well as helps us to create more jobs, I am frustrated by the FightHST misrepresentations that serve to push our entire province backwards for the perceived political gain of a few.

But it’s not just small business owners.

People like Chrystal Ocean need voters to understand how the HST has put her and the rest of British Columbia’s most vulnerable citizens ahead financially.

School Districts need voters to understand how the HST is capable of putting $500,000.00 back into their budget… allowing them to get more done, with less tax dollars.

Economists like Kevin Milligan and Tax Lawyers like David Robertson who have both spent their entire professional lives studying issues like the HST want voters to understand how the HST helps BC and that the lies told by FightHST have been discredited by virtually every single Economist in our Country.

The Certified General Accountants Association of BC wants voters to understand that the HST is a much fairer tax than the old PST system.

Krishna Pendakur, an SFU Economist, and self-proclaimed ‘lefty’ wants voters to understand ‘why the Left should love the HST’.

The trick isn’t to try and find credible experts who support the HST, it would be to find a single one that does not.

The bottom line for me is that this HST argument is a lot like having some sort of medical condition where you get an opportunity to hear from every doctor in the country who specializes in that condition and they ALL agree on both the cause and the cure.

You also ask your brother’s basement tenant what he thinks. He mentions that he once  knew a guy, who saw a show on TV that clearly proved all doctors were idiots (and that they were also conspiring to destroy the world).

It’s a dilemma. Do you listen to the advice of the experts who have dedicated their professional lives to the study of the issue, and who unanimously agree on what will solve the problem, or the guy in the tinfoil hat?

What was it like being one of the public faces of the HST debate? How much hate mail did you receive?

One of the many lessons I learned is that there is no shortage of conspiracy theorists who are capable of weaving incredible stories together based on a loose collection of random thoughts, an occasional fact, opinions & outright lunacy. From my experience so far, this talent seems to be concentrated on a few people with a lot of time on their hands… and an internet connection.

To say that I’ve received some interesting emails would be a gross understatement.

One of my favorites accused me of somehow masterminding the Canada Post strike to coincide with the mail-in referendum. Another, that I was only trying to get the HST to stay, in order to increase crime levels, in order to benefit personally (those were, apparently, the only steps involved).

More than a few people took to their own blogs and created their own reasons to explain why I would be in favour of the HST. Here’s a quick excerpt from one such blog that gives a flavour of the content…

The reference to ‘what he’s read’ is to another blog that read through the press clippings on our own website, found an article from Profit Magazine where I am quoted explaining our PST fight, and a quote from Premier Gordon Campbell thanking us for providing great service during a security incident several years ago in his constituency office. Two and two were put together, and the “obvious” answer of thirty-seven was arrived at.

For what it was worth, I asked the writer to amend his blog post to at least tone down the libel a bit… He sent me back an email telling me to beat it (not using that exact phrasing), but at least added the words ‘in my own personal opinion’…

Sadly, Provident paid every single penny of our PST debt referenced in the Profit article (more on that below). We were ‘forgiven’ nothing. That PST incident was, however, my inspiration for getting involved in this whole HST argument to start with.

I was even accused of not being a real person. I decided to take it as a compliment that I had to respond to accusations of being a ‘paid actor’.

I’ve also learned how easily & quickly the politics of an argument like this overshadow the argument itself and keep people from considering any viewpoint other than the one they started with. Many people seem completely focused on wanting to ‘send a message to the BC Liberals‘ at any cost … and in most cases, without having any real idea of what that cost actually is (no, the $1.6B transfer payment will not be ‘forgiven’).

Trying to debate the specific merits of the HST with someone whose only answer to any argument is “The Liberals lied” is a pointless endeavour with no upside for anyone. Thankfully, I have had the opportunity to speak to enough other people, willing to have a real discussion, to not destroy my faith in humanity.

Our Operations Centre team at Provident (our team who answer all incoming telephone calls) have done a great job putting up with the increased volume of callers wanting to get in touch with me to tell me that I’m an idiot or, in quite a few cases, simply wanting to ask some thoughtful and reasonable questions about the HST.

With the exception of the people who called/emailed just to say I’m stupid, I called or emailed every person back. I offered my explanations about how the HST has benefitted our company, how it has created jobs and why the PST was such a complicated and expensive mess for us (and our customers).

My frustration (although tempered with some great entertainment value) with the wingnuts, was overshadowed by the vast majority of people who contacted me with good questions or to have a real discussion on the issue.

CTV ran a story last night in response to a Vancouver Police advisory regarding an increase in thefts from construction sites in Vancouver over the past couple months as well as a recent Vancouver Island theft where more than $100,000.00 of equipment and copper were stolen from an unprotected site.

As part of the story, they came to our Operations Centre in Kerrisdale to get a demonstration of Provident NightOwl to see how it can solve the issue of providing complete security for construction sites on either a temporary or long-term basis.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Earlier this year, Provident introduced a new service called NightOwl. It’s a completely wireless, remote video alarm system that is able to detect activity and then send live video alarms to our Operations Centre in Kerrisdale.

NightOwl is primarily focused on the construction market because it is so easy to deploy and is much cheaper (and more effective) than a full-time Security Guard. However, we’ve also started using NightOwl in commercial sites, vacation properties and other locations that are outside of our guaranteed five minute response zone.

Some of the features that make NightOwl such an interesting service/product is that it does not require any electricity, telephone lines, internet connection or any other infrastructure to work. It can detect activity in absolute darkness and sends video alarms to us wirelessly.

The video quality is intentionally low-resolution (read: crappy) because it has been optimized to provide quick detection and to be able to be transmitted to us very quickly. When we receive a NightOwl video alarm in our Kerrisdale Operations Centre, all we need to determine is whether the cause of the alarm is a human or not. If we see anything suspicious, we can call the Police and report a verified crime in progress… which gets a very quick response (as opposed to a regular alarm without verification which gets very, very slow – if any – response from the Police).

Click on the video below to watch a video recap from a burglary on Monday, June 20th 2011 where NightOwl detected two crooks at an Abbotsford construction site. From our Operations Centre in Kerrisdale, we directed the Abbotsford Police to exactly where the burglars were and both of them were arrested.

Click below to watch a quick video we filmed Friday to explain the impact of the Shaw Digital Phone network outage…

May 3rd, 2011 6:10pm

Over the past few hours, several thousand Provident clients have been affected by a Shaw Digital Phone network problem. This has resulted in affected client’s alarm systems being unable to communicate with Provident over the Shaw Digital Telephone line. As a result, most affected system keypads are now displaying a Trouble light (an amber light on the front of the keypad) or ‘FC’ which stands for ‘Failure to Communicate’.

If either of those conditions exist, your alarm will not communicate over the telephone. It will, however, operate locally (ie. you can still arm and disarm, the siren will still sound, but no alarm signals will be sent).

We have been in contact with Shaw and they have confirmed that the issue is the result of modifications that they made to their network earlier today. They have said that they understand the impact that this outage is having and they have indicated that they have made it a “high priority” to solve. So far, they have not been able to give us a timeframe as to when this will be solved other than to say they “hope” that it will be fixed within 24 hours. We are doing our best to stay on top of them and push for the fastest possible resolution to this issue.

For some of our clients, their Shaw Digital Phones were not working at all at times today. However, even for clients who can now use their Shaw Digital Phone to make telephone calls, the Shaw network is still not communicating with our Kerrisdale monitoring station.

To be clear, this is 100% a Shaw Digital Phone network issue. The lines on our end that receive alarm signals are Telus lines and they are working properly, as are all of our back-up systems.

How does this affect you?

If you are not a Shaw Digital Phone client: There is no issue.

If you have BLINK or Cellular Back-Up Monitoring in place: We will still be receiving alarm signals over those systems. You may still have the amber light or ‘FC’ on your keypad, but we will still receive alarm signals wirelessly.

If you do not have BLINK and are a Shaw Digital Phone client: Until Shaw resolves the issue, your alarm WILL NOT be able to communicate any alarm signals over the telephone line.

We are doing everything we can to expedite Shaw’s resolution to this issue.

Once it is resolved, you can confirm that your system is communicating with us by arming and disarming your alarm. If it is able to send either of those signals successfully, the amber light or ‘FC’ on your keypad will disappear and your alarm will be back online with us.