Nine years after its 2011 launch, The Monitoring Association’s (TMA) Automated Secure Alarm Protocol (ASAP) service is slowly — but surely — creeping into monitoring centers everywhere. As the most efficient way to process information from alarm monitoring stations needing emergency dispatch, it won’t be long before it becomes the standard for the industry, according to those already using it.
“From a central station’s perspective, ASAP-to-PSAP is a game-changing technology — from a customer service perspective, a 9-1-1 dispatch partner relationship development perspective, and from a central station perspective — because you’re delivering emergency services to people more carefully, you’re saving lives and property more quickly and you’re saving so much time,” says Steve Crist, director of monitoring, ADS Security, Nashville, Tenn. “For all those reasons, ASAP-to-PSAP is the gold standard for how we dispatch and how we do our jobs. Our anticipation is that all the dispatch centers we communicate with will eventually be on ASAP-to-PSAP, and we’re willing to create partnerships with them to get them there — it’s that important to us.”