As time has gone on, modern life seems to require more and more things that involve monthly charges. And even if you do nothing, those monthly charges will keep going up and up. I hate them.
Back in 1998, I paid Ranger American security $1200 for a new security system. I wanted to be sure I paid for the whole thing, and had a local monitoring company.
Back then I had a plain old telephone system which cost about $30/month. I was still using it as my primary phone service then (and until 2009). My new security monitoring with Ranger American cost about $25/mo.
About a year later, Ranger American was bought by ADT. When ADT took over, the monitoring charges went up to $30/mo.
Now, in 2025, my plain old telephone system, which the security system still requires, costs $95.76. I never make landline telephone calls, in fact because the security system telephone device is slightly broken, and won't let go of the phone line anymore, I can't. I only need the landline for my security system, which normally uses it about once a month for testing only (unless there is an alarm event, which there hasn't been in 19 years).
My ADT monitoring service now costs $83.36. I have a very basic system not unlike what I installed 27 years ago, but just a few more sensors and an extra keypad. No cameras, home automation, or anything like that. Just the basics. The price I'm paying seems to have nothing with the "standard" ADT rates you may see published, for which basic monitoring might cost $40.
Since I need both, the total monthly charges I am paying for security system monitoring is $179.12. If that rate were to continue, I'd be paying $21,494.40 for the next 10 years of monitoring. But it wouldn't continue at the same prices even if I let it continue, instead it would likely be increasing, just like before, so I'd be paying more like $50,000 for the next ten years of monitoring.
I'm beginning to feel like I felt when I summarily emptied my first storage building after ten years of storage. After paying thousands of dollars for storage, all the stuff I stored went straight into the trash, since at most it would be worth about $100 at resale and I didn't have the time to bother with that. I said "never again" but indeed, I rented another storage room a decade later for a few years until I built my own storage building (and don't ask how much that cost).
My phone system has never needed "service" in 27 years (and if it did, and if it were past my entry point, I'd have to pay for it). I have called ADT for telephone help about ten times (in 27 years) and gotten repair service (included) twice. I've had ADT installers out 4 times to add new sensors. For that, and monitoring which has called police twice in 27 years, I've paid many thousands of dollars in monitoring fees.
ADT has simply raised the price every year, and tacked on a new monthly charge for each extra sensor added to the system, even if I pay for the sensor as completely as they allow me to do.
In truth there is no standard basic monitoring rate at ADT. It's all negotiable and under a unique contract (or not) for each person. If you want to keep your rates low, what you have got to do is call ADT every year, and ask for a lower rate. You can only do this once a year. Then, ADT will at most knock down the price at most about 15% so long as you sign a 1 year contract. That's how you get the lowest rate they will choose to offer you. You must stay "in contract" to get the lowest increases, otherwise they increase rates with a vengeance. That's what it means whenever you have a service that has contracts that may expire.
If you don't continually negotiate the rates down, your rates will go up as much as 15% a year. By continually negotiating the rates, they'll still go up, but not as much. If you have failed to negotiate the price down every year, you'll be stuck with a higher price because they simply won't negotiate it down very much at any one time. You have baked in a permanently higher price than new customers and there is nothing you can do about it except move to a different company.
With AT&T, I actually have no idea what they are charging me "for." I haven't seen a paper bill in 25 years (I rue the day I told them they could send me bills electronically) because, it seems, it goes to an expired email. But generally what happens is that they add new fees and pricing tiers and if you do nothing your tier continues to rise in the stack of pricing tiers as they add new ones. I've been told I need to keep calling them to ensure I'm on the lowest service level tier I need.
It's this opaque pricing and lack of real standard rates, not to mention sky high prices for basic service that hasn't changed in decades, that has made me incredibly angry at both ADT and AT&T.
(I'm equally if not more infuriated at cable TV companies like Spectrum but that's another long and sad story. Cable companies are infamous for all their tricks, including promotional pricing, contracts, tiers, and bundling (programs you detest are always included with programs you want), which keep your monthly charges endlessly increasing. Combined with endlessly needing repairs, replacements, and mandatory upgrades. Meanwhile, they're constantly trolling at your home and elsewhere for new suckers with the pitch, "who is providing your service now"? And, I have discovered, they may endlessly send you bills for service you never ordered and they refuse to read their returned mail no matter how many times you try to tell them, "not at this address." Would I ever chose to do business with a company like that again? Never.)
It seems like most of the service here is the service of requiring you to call the service company annually to keep the service charges from spiraling through the roof. IOW, the lower cost service might cost them more, as it includes handling the required incoming phone call to get the lowest cost service. (This reminds me of how computer systems are often dumbed down for the lower performance levels, thus the lower performance levels actually cost them more because of the required dumbing.)
I could have upgraded my ADT system so it doesn't require a landline anymore but uses cellular service. That costs $250 for the equipment (when I asked) and would add at least $12 to the monthly charges. And, of course, a new 1 year contract.
I did not do that because I've been planning to get out of these spiraling costs altogether for some time. I just couldn't figure out how to do it. I might have stayed with ADT if there really were a "Basic" rate around $40. I told them I only had basic security, but they refused to lower my monitoring cost more than 15% from $83.36, and that would only be for 1 year.
Today I purchased a SimpliSafe system online. There, too, people complain that the monthly charges have kept going up, and the "core" plan (virtually required for the first month of a new system) is $31.99. There is a $21.99 plan...but guess what...you have to call them on the phone to get them to change it to that. (It seems more and more stuff works this way, you have to call to get lower charges, and of course some telemarketer on the other side will try to convince you not to, if you can even get through to them. I've had lots of trouble with such things in the past, it took a month to get ahold of XM radio by phone to get my XM radio service canceled, and there was no other way to do it)
Anyway, I put together a system virtually identical to my ADT system, with quite a few motion detectors and even glass break detectors. It doesn't need a second keypad because it has a dongle. The cost of all the parts was $800 which was reduced to $400 if I accepted a "free month" of core monitoring (and then $31.99 per month after that).
I had figured those sensors and other parts would come to about $3000 based on my experience of buying security system parts for my current system, and looking at name brand parts.
SimpliSafe parts are cheap enough that if they break you wouldn't feel too bad about just getting another one. But they're supposed to be good, I've seen reviews that rate them #2 or even #1.
(SimpliSafe gets a higher score than ADT in these test, but they still rate ADT higher.)
Even with having to make a phone call to get the lowest rate, the SimpliSafe approach is far more transparent than ADT. And if you need to, you can run the system you purchased with no monitoring and no monitoring charges at all.
**** Update
Have been using new SimpliSafe system for 5 days. I have tested and re-tested every important feature. It normally uses my Wifi to communicate with the monitoring center, but I tested cellular backup communications by unplugging modem, and still got an automated call when I entered test mode. Success! (I will have more to say, the good and the bad of SimpliSafe, in a review I am writing on my ComputerCritical blog.)
So I called 1-800-ADT-ASAP to cancel my ADT monitoring service. This took 28 minutes on the phone. The first agent verified my identity, location, phone number, and password, then I was to wait for second agent, who picked up 5 minutes later. Second agent also verified address and passcode. Both thanked me for my 27 years. Second agent first offered $58/mo, then $29/mo. I declined both offers and was told cancellation on June 14 (30 days). I was warned my system would no longer work and would not dial emergency numbers. (Of course, and btw I have never used those anyway.)
Both offers to extend current system were worthless because I'd immediately have to update my connection from landline to cellular, costing $250 and raising monthly price at least $12/mo, in order to cut out the now $95/mo landline charge from AT&T. But I didn't discuss that issue. I like the greater transparency of my new SimpliSafe system and my ability to add more devices and control them. ADT could have offered me a lower price in January, which might have retained my business for another few years, but they only offered to knock down the price by 15% then, down to about $70, which itself would only get raised up again by the cellular device monthly charges. Now it's too late, and I'm tired of their "negotiable" prices anyway. It's clear you have to be very insistent on leaving to get their "best" price.
I was happy they didn't ask me if I was switching to another service and how much I was paying for it. (Cable sellers typically do that). ADT has the Olympian view that nothing else is comparable. Fine, I can and will be the judge of that.
A few days later I canceled my AT&T landline service. Despite making me very tense (getting rid of the now useless $95.76 monthly charges being on the line) it only lasted 12 minutes (seemed more like 40). First I answered questions to the automated system, then I answered mostly the same questions again to a human agent. They asked me the 3 digit account code on my bill. But here's the rub: I haven't seen my AT&T bill for over 25 years, ever since I opted for electronic billing. It must have been going to a defunct email address or spam filtered. The fact that I was being charged $95 for a landline, and not knowing exactly what I was being charged for, has made me very very angry at AT&T. As with ADT, I will likely avoid doing business with them in the future because of this unhappy era.
I rue the day I opted for electronic billing for ADT and AT&T. DO NOT OPT FOR ELECTRONIC AND "AUTOMATIC" PAPERLESS BILLING, ONLY FOR ACCOUNTS YOU ACTUALLY PAY ONLINE AND THEREFORE CONTINUE READING THEIR BILLS (like credit cards). The online AT&T agent was able to take the last 4 digits of my social security number in lieu of the 3 digit account code on my "bill" which I've never seen. So they canceled my account as of today. I got a confirmation code. I hope this is the end of that (btw, 35 years of service at the phone number).
In theory, since SimpliSafe has only monthly contracts, pricing is transparent because everyone should be paying the same rate for the same service. There aren't some people getting lower "rates" while their equipment is being paid off, then suddenly much higher rates afterwards, the usual trick which makes you think your long term costs will be low despite high initial charges.
The only way to go is to buy your own equipment, and get month to month service at a published rate.
