Armed Police Showed Up...

[powerboy]

Oh how I loathed the silent alarm that was at my old job. It had been right under the desk. So whenever we moved just a certain way at the register, we would tap it. And the only way, it could be shut off, was by a special key. Which of course we could not find.

[edible_hat]

A place I used to work at had a silent alarm button that hung on a cord around your neck (in case there's a robbery when you're away from the till). Once somebody dropped it, it landed button side down and the cops turned up.

[karma_gypsy]

I have a silent alarm switch attached to my desk. Along the edge on the side. Occasionally, I drape my hand over the side of my desk, well, apparently one time, I must have accidently touched the button. I think the police phoned us first though because I didn't actually find out about this until a couple of weeks later when someone happened to have of *mentioned* it.

[king4aday]

I had something similar happen...but not with gas pumps or silent alarms. I worked at a waterpark over the summer, and spent most of the time in our 4d theatre running the control pannel for the movie. Well...one day I was kind of tired....and leaned up against the control panel.....and hit the emergency stop button....stopping the movie in the middle portion of the movie. problem is...I had no clue how to reset the emergency stop so I had to call the park GM I was sooo embarassed.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

False alarms cost us xxxx. Cops called for nothing are irritable. Cops come less quickly to places that have many false alarms. Emergency calls get the owner/manager called at 3:00 am, etc. etc.

Happens all the time at my store, thanks to our very special cleaning crews who love to open the doors and leave or empty the outside garbage while the alarms are on.

Then we try to tell them "Don't open the door! The alarm is on!" and they pretend not to speak English and/or bluff comprehension.

And then the situation repeats the following day.

Store manager says any more false alarms are going to be billed to the cleaning contractor, assuming we figure out just who the hell the cleaning contractor is.

[Jpurple]

Interestingly enough, our apartment has an emergency button on the intercom system where we can buzz people in. The other day, my husband hit the WRONG button trying to let me in, and about 15 minutes later we had to try to explain what happened to a security guard who spoke no English. As we don't speak very much Japanese yet, it took us a while to explain to the poor man that there was no emergency. Fortunately, one of the things I do know how to say is 'I'm Sorry' !

[mscrybaby]

When I worked the C-Store we were training a new girl who thought the alarm remote was a garage door opener. I wasn't paying much attention to her and trying to work when she tapped me and asked whose remote it was cause she was opening and closing their garage door. Let's say I told her what it was and called the police to tell them not to show up.

I hated the next store, same chain, I was at cause when I did get robbed I was hitting those panic buttons like crazy and the cops got there AFTER I picked up the phone and called 911. It was almost 2 hours later that the alarm company called to see if I needed the police to show up. They got an ear full at full volume. The cops that were there were all ones I saw every night so they just laughed. I was really irate cause the security company took so long to call I could have been dead for 2 hours before they would have thought to send the cops. They never did notify the manager.

[Nutjob R/T]

Just remember: Every story is made so much better when it ends 'And that's when the cops showed up in riot gear.'

[TryNotToBeThatOne]

not a silent alarm, but....

The conference room down the hall from my desk has a phone, for conference calls, etc. One day the cops showed up because someone had called 911 from that phone but had not answered when the dispatcher called back. We went & looked but nobody was in there, and no emergency. So we unplug the phone (what the hey, until it's needed, who cares) because there must be something wrong with it. Two days later, phone still unplugged, it calls 911 again. We called for service at that point.