CPB honours outstanding Central Alarm
Monitoring Stations
At an award presentation held at Police Headquarters on June 15, Crime Prevention Bureau (CPB) praised Central Alarm Monitoring Stations (CAMS) for assisting in reducing false alarms.
In a bid to save police resources in dealing with false alarms, CPB has been encouraging subscribers to install up-to-standard intruder alarm systems. In addition, CPB also runs a Prevention of False Alarms Award Scheme to recognise the efforts of the outstanding CAMS by offering gold, silver and bronze awards to CAMS with 100 to 500 subscribers and those with over 500 subscribers. On top of that, Certificate of Merit are presented to five CAMS in recognition of their continuous improvement in reducing false alarms over the past three years.
At the presentation ceremony, Chief Superintendent (CSP) Steven Carruthers from Crime Support Group, Mr Daniel Cham Ka-hung, Chairman of the Security and Guarding Services Industry Authority, and CPB Superintendent Kwok Yik-man presented awards to the companies operating CAMS in each category.
Speaking at the presentation ceremony, CSP Carruthers complimented award winners and expressed his gratitude for their continuous support and assistance for the Force to minimise false alarms. He noted: "Although it is the Hong Kong Police that run the Phased Response Scheme (PRS), it is the private security industry that actually has brought the false alarm rate down, reflecting not only improvement in technology but also the level of their services and commitments.
"In 1989, there were 12 024 alarm installations in Hong Kong with 47 423 false alarms. To prevent resources from being wasted in dealing with false alarms, the PRS was introduced in that year, resulting in improvement.
"With the co-operation of all parties concerned, the current four-phased PRS was launched in 2004, leading to further drops in false alarms in the last few years. At the end of 2010, there were 13 301 false alarms, representing a substantial decrease of more than 34 000 cases, despite the fact that the number of alarm installations has increased to 31 527. In 2010, the rate of false alarm was reduced to 0.42 per installation per year from 0.9 per installation per year in 2004. This is a remarkable achievement that the security industry can be proud of and the Force has saved thousands of man-hours in deploying frontline officers to deal with false alarms."
"Operated by licensed security companies, 26 CAMS are utilising advanced systems with sophisticated detectors and remote monitoring functions to protect premises such as private dwellings, business organisations, schools and government facilities. The CAMS are capable of keeping alarm systems under surveillance and verifying whether any activation is genuine before requesting for deployment of police officers to the scene, thus reducing the demand on police manpower," CSP Carruthers added.
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fitting
tribute to outstanding Central Alarm Monitoring Stations