ASAP Ready to Expand Beyond Charter Members
CSAA International, one of the voices for central station monitoring companies, announced that the Automated Secure Alarm Protocol (ASAP) is ready to move into the next phase of its deployment.
To date, the 100 members of CSAA that have helped fund the program roll-out have had the ability to contract and connect to the system. These “Charter Members” of the program have been the test bed for deploying central stations.
“Today we are ready to extend the invitation to participate to non-charter members of CSAA,” said Ed Bonifas, co-chair of CSAA’s ASAP Steering Committee. “Currently there are seven Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) on the system: Richmond, VA; York County, VA; James City County, VA; Washington, DC; Houston, TX; Tempe, AZ; and Morgan County, AL. And later this year, we expect Boston, MA; Seattle, WA; and the entire state of Delaware to come on board. We invite CSAA members that have accounts in any of these jurisdictions to contact me or Committee Co-Chair Pam Petrow if you have interest in getting involved in the program.
“Currently 10 of the Top 11 alarm monitoring companies in the nation are contracted and under various stages of deployment and testing on the system,” continued Bonifas. “We are proud to announce the completion of final testing and active connection of Protection One last week. P1 is the largest participant to come online and should add considerable traffic to the participating PSAPs.”
Altogether there are 42 companies contracted for connection (however, some of them are in areas that do not yet have an active PSAP).
ASAP was launched in 2011 as an initiative by the alarm industry to increase the efficiency and reliability of emergency electronic signals from central station alarm companies to Public Service Answering Points (PSAPs). It was developed as an American National Standard in a cooperative effort between the Association of Public Communications Officials (APCO) and the Central Station Alarm Association (CSAA).
With ASAP, critical life safety signals and accurate information is processed in seconds, not minutes, through the NLETs system of state-to-state PSAP communication, insuring that critical time is not lost, and that complete and accurate information is transmitted to the PSAP every time. The ASAP program also helps reduce false alarms, saving the PSAPs and emergency services potentially millions of dollars.