Verisure
In the last year, Watchdog has received more emails about Verisure than any other security alarm company. Complaints have featured common themes, such as, being led to believe they owned the equipment when actually they were renting it, pressure tactics being used by sales representatives and the Terms and Conditions not being shown or explained to them at the point of sale. This was particularly problematic when they said they found out later, that the terms and conditions appear to differ significantly from what they believed they were told in the sales meeting and also from the quotation paperwork they received when they signed up – with many customers thinking that they owned the equipment, when the terms and conditions say they don’t.
Watchdog spoke to Roger who signed up for a Verisure alarm system in August 2022. He was initially quoted over £1300 for his alarm system, which was reduced to £596. He understood this would cover the purchase of his equipment and agreed to £44.90 per month as a monitoring fee. After his monthly bill increased to £55.88 in February he decided he wanted to cancel the monthly monitoring. When he tried to cancel, he claims he then found out he did not own the equipment he thought he had purchased and that the initial £596 he paid, only covered the installation. He calculated he would have to pay an extra £360 for the equipment he thought he had already purchased.
Watchdog conducted their own undercover investigation inviting a Verisure sales representative to a house in Lancashire and shared this footage with Graeme Dow, former director of the association of security consultants. During our sales meeting, the representative references a break in, in the local area where a homeowner is held hostage while their house and car are burgled. Graeme Dow stated said that using fear is banned in the security industry.
The Verisure sales representative also significantly reduces the price of the alarm system, offers free equipment and says that the offers are time limited and will only be valid for the next few days. Graeme Dow said that sales tactics such as these would be considered pressure selling which he would not expect to see in the security sector.
We asked the sales representative what would happen if we wanted to cancel, and were told that we could cancel at any time and keep the system as a bells only alarm system. The monitoring would then be cancelled, as would the associated monthly monitoring fee.
When assessing the full sales pitch and information provided verbally about cancellation, Mr Dow stated he understood that you would own the equipment, however, when he reviewed the terms and conditions, which were not available online at the time of recording or provided to us during the sales meeting, he says this document says very clearly that Verisure own the equipment and not the customer.
Terms and conditions were not provided to us during this meeting – despite asking if there was anything else we needed to know before going ahead. Mr Dow stated that the sales rep should have made it clear to the customer that the system is a rental system, as stated in the terms and conditions.
In a statement Verisure told Watchdog:
“Verisure is proud to protect close to five million families and small businesses around the world. Our TrustPilot rating in the UK has nearly 25,000 reviews, 90% of which are at 4 or 5 stars. At Verisure we always take customer complaints very seriously. We are happy to confirm that Mr. Barrett’s points have been addressed and his complaint was fully resolved four weeks ago. We would like to apologise to him for any inconvenience caused.
“We strongly disagree with the claim that our company encourages its employees to use pressure sales tactics as this is against our strict code of conduct. Upon joining Verisure, all new sales staff must complete a comprehensive onboarding program reflecting our standards. We have recently also refreshed our training program and delivered our strengthened mandatory training to all sales teams. Any complaints we receive, we investigate thoroughly and will issue disciplinary actions in case of any misconduct.
“Our terms and conditions are communicated multiple times in the customer onboarding process, including at the point of sale. To make this even clearer, we are now also proactively offering a printed version of our T&Cs at the quotation phase.
“We provide customers with the possibility to cancel their contract with us if they wish to do so. There is a 30-day cooling-off period upon signature, as well as a 60 days’ notice after that period.”
