Smoke Detector Dunce

[surreal20]

Alright. I'm putting this in Off topic because I really can't tell WHERE to stick it. It's most likely supposed to be here anyway.

I can a complaint about my apartment complex. To be fair, I very much enjoy being in this complex. It's rather safe, and quant. Kinda close to some stores, but not too close you have traffic going by all the time.

No, my issue is with their emergency maintenance. Yet again, to be fair, it technically did not fall under their guidelines to emergency. I'll explain.

I believe it was Monday night(1/31/11). Around 10pm eastern when I walked into my bedroom to put another blanket on the bed, and then go to bed.

The smoke detector is right behind me, as I am doing such. As soon as I snap the blanket to help it cover the bed, the detector goes off. Not the signal that it's going to die and you need to change the battery. No. Full on "OMG SMOKE!" alarm.

My husband has a bad shoulder. It was injured at work. (he's in the navy) So both of us are trying to climb this chair and try to figure out how to take the detector down so we can change the battery, or at least take it out so we can go to bed for the night.

Well...after a round about 10 mins of us seriously not being able to get it off the wall. I call the emergency maintenance line. It goes through the whole speal of what they consider an emergency and then gets to the voice mail thingy.

I call them, leave the info and explain our smoke detector is going off, we can't get it off the wall to do anything about it and we really could use some help.

Surprise, surprise, when i get a call back stating that we're pretty much SOL.

So we fiddle some more, and we finally can get it sorta off the wall..by sorta i mean..it's connected by WIRES to the wall. Because two people who have only lived in this one apartment and have always lived in homes with our parents...we were all "ummm...now what?"

My husband calls his father and tries to see if he knows anything. His father was pretty much the same way we were...after nearly 30ish mins of this thing going off, I had enough.

I called the 911 service. I was at my wits end, and my only other reasoning was, if we don't call them, someone else will for disturbance of the peace..or worse, thinking there really IS a fire.

I call them, explain that we have a smoke detector that is going off, and we can't get it to stop. They said they'd send the fire department out to check it out.

I apologized for calling about something so small and explained we had tried all other options and i felt really dumb for this. She was really nice and told me it really could be something else and it was safe to get it checked anyway.

5 mins later, two fire engines arrive with their lights on. TWO. *hides in shame* At this point, i feel even worse...they really could be doing something better with their time.

They come in and rip it off the wall. O.o They change the battery, and find that it's acutally a faulty smoke detector. So they issue us a new one and advise us to call the main office tomorrow to explain to them it's not connected by those wires.

(those wires apparently connect all the alarms together, so when one really detects smoke, it will set the whole building off) Who knew...

So i call them the next day..and pretty much the guy said "they issued a new one? Hmm, well i dont' see anything wrong here then. I'll let maintenance know." And we hung up...

The whole issue is... this was a broken smoke alarm...and maintenance didn't care...at all...and i had to call the fire department to fix it so late at night...and they still don't care...

(FYI, i live in a town where there is NO 24 hour ANYTHING except Mcdonalds.)

[BlaqueKatt]

I call them, explain that we have a smoke detector that is going off, and we can't get it to stop. They said they'd send the fire department out to check it out.<snip>

5 mins later, two fire engines arrive with their lights on. TWO. *hides in shame* At this point, i feel even worse...they really could be doing something better with their time.

Pretty sure if you asked-they'd rather come and check it out prepared if it wasn't just malfunctioning, than ignore it. Most FD people I know prefer stuff like that-than having to attempt control/rescue of an out of control fire.

Heck I remember in a large building I lived in( 50 units-another in the complex had burned down on x-mas eve two years prior*-loss of life, one cat that ran back into the building, loss of belongings/property-total), fire alarms went off, we all gathered our pets and stood outside for 30 minutes while they checked EVERY apartment, just to be sure. When we asked for the "all clear", the one firefighter laughed and replied "ask apt XXX, it was his toast". Yup they knew it was just burnt toast, but still checked every apartment.


*someone had been using their electric oven to heat their apartment rather than turn up the heat, the wires in the walls overloaded and burned.

[BookstoreEscapee]

Sorry, but maintenance should have been over to check that out. Especially if it is wired to the rest of the building, maintenance of the thing is their responsibility, and if it is malfunctioning they need to fix it. It is illegal for an apartment complex to not have working smoke detectors in their buildings, and if the thing is going off for no reason, they need to figure out why. Especially since they should very well know that it is actually wired into the wall and is apparently not intended to be removed by the tenant. They can't seriously expect the tenant to just let the thing blare all night until normal business hours.

We have a regular battery-operated detector inside the apartment, just outside the bedrooms, and there is also one in the stairwell which is connected to the rest of the building. Last summer one night it went off around 11:30pm, apparently there was a short in the main unit due to moisture after several particularly rainy days. The fire department and police showed up, and the maintenance guys were all out, and they checked everything out and got it fixed.

[surreal20]

That's just it. It seems to me, that nearly everyone i have confided this incident into, has been on my side. Yet the maintenance still have not come over to check ti out, or give me one that connects to the wires.

Now, the wires don't really make it work, but it connects to all the other smoke detectors in the building. And we also have this "in case of a fire, pull this" lever in our main stair well, also. So i really don't understand the concept of the wires if we have one of those...

I dunno...my parents told me that we might get a fee for having them come out and "change a battery" so to speak...but since they did give us a new one, my parents also state that it's possible they wont. They are only speaking from prior knowledge of events they were told. And we live in two different states now, so what is true in one, may not be in another. *shrugs*

It just bothers me, as i said, that maintenance has done nothing sense...and that the manager guy didn't seem too upset that we had to call 911 and get something in THEIR building fixed. I could bring it up to them, and tell them i'm not happy..but what good will it do?

[BookstoreEscapee]

Find out what department in the city/state oversees those sorts of things (probably either the health department or housing department), and call and find out what the rules actually are (or see if they have a website with information). Or you could try asking the police or fire department (call the non-emergency number). Tell the complex that you will report it to whatever state agency it is if they don't fix it. (I suppose they may be waiting until Monday since you technically do have a detector, but if that's the case they should tell you when to expect it to be done.)[

[surreal20]

They aren't waiting...they have had since Tuesday Morning to get their shit together. I know in my OP that i said this was Tuesday night, but i actually had to look up something a few mins ago and realize it was Monday night. 1/31/11 when this happened. At 10 PM.

The FD didn't leave until 11PM

[BookstoreEscapee]

Oh, sorry, I didn't reread the OP before I posted that; forgot what day it was. So scratch that last line.

[surreal20]

lol no, i changed it after i saw your post to help clarify, however, the OP DID state Tuesday...and it's just now Saturday, so even IF it happened tuesday night and i called them Wednesday, they would have had Thursday and Friday to do something about it.

Further more, the main office and maintenance are open every day. Just Saturday and Sunday hours are slightly different to M-Fri. So they still have NO excuse to wait to get this done...they just don't care.

[BookstoreEscapee]

lol no, i changed it after i saw your post to help clarify, however, the OP DID state Tuesday...and it's just now Saturday, so even IF it happened tuesday night and i called them Wednesday, they would have had Thursday and Friday to do something about it.

Further more, the main office and maintenance are open every day. Just Saturday and Sunday hours are slightly different to M-Fri. So they still have NO excuse to wait to get this done...they just don't care.

My complex office is open on Saturdays until noon I think, and maintenance doesn't do anything on the weekends unless it is urgent (apparently huge cracks in your wall letting in cold air, which was are their own fault, is not urgent ). But I think they would respond to a faulty smoke alarm on the weekend. I have had to call them for heat, too.

[surreal20]

Yea, since it's been replaced, i bet they wont care if i call them. No, i know they wont care, since i did call them and they knew it's a new one. *shrugs* at this point, i just don't care for them anymore. I wont be living here much longer, because my husband will be getting out of the navy and we'll be moving out.

[lordlundar]

Now, the wires don't really make it work, but it connects to all the other smoke detectors in the building. And we also have this "in case of a fire, pull this" lever in our main stair well, also. So i really don't understand the concept of the wires if we have one of those...

Redundancy. If there's a short in the linked alarms, then the pull alarm will still work.

I dunno...my parents told me that we might get a fee for having them come out and "change a battery" so to speak...but since they did give us a new one, my parents also state that it's possible they wont. They are only speaking from prior knowledge of events they were told. And we live in two different states now, so what is true in one, may not be in another. *shrugs*

Calling them just to replace a battery is silly and a waste of time. Calling them to ensure that everything is alright is what they are there for. Yes, it did happen to simply be a malfunctioning unit, but it could have been much worse. Would you prefer that there was an emergency and told "oh it's probably a malfunctioning unit"?

It just bothers me, as i said, that maintenance has done nothing sense...and that the manager guy didn't seem too upset that we had to call 911 and get something in THEIR building fixed. I could bring it up to them, and tell them i'm not happy..but what good will it do?

Call the fire marshal (non emergency line of course) and let them know. They could demand the system be investigated.