On a summer afternoon I was working in my garage with the door open. At the time I lived on the corner of a main thorough fair and a side street in a suburban neighborhood. A young well dressed man approached me as I worked. He explained that he was the representative of ProAlarm, a home security company. Normally I would have politely turned him down with no further conversation, but I had recently been considering getting a home security system, so I figured I would at least hear what he has to say.

I invited him into my house and offered him a bottle of water. As he drank he explained that 'his company' was trying to 'get their name out there' so they had a special offer for people that lived in high visibility locations, such as my residence. His offer was this: all the system hardware (control panels, motion detectors, window/door sensors etc) and installation is free with a 36 month contract. The monthly fee was about $40 give or take a few cents.

As I mentioned, I had been looking into security systems for a while, and I felt this was a fairly good deal, but being fairly skeptical by nature, I wanted time to think it over and talk it over with my wife. Faining understanding the salesman explained that there is a three day no-cost trial period. If at any time during that three day period the customer would decide that he/she did not want the system, he/she simply had to call ProAlarm and the system would be removed free of charge. Still skeptical I asked what would happen if I decided I didn't want the system after the three day trial period had lapsed. The salesman said there is an early cancellation fee 'just like with a cell phone contract'. I asked how much the cancellation fee was. The salesman said he wasn't sure, but he knew it was between $250 and $500 dollars.

I didn't feel this was a good enough answer. The salesman assured me a company representative would call me with this information within the three day trial period, giving me the option to cancel for free if I didn't like the answer.

I am sure you can all see what happened. The three day trial period came and went. I received no phone call. Two weeks later, I received a phone call and the company representative told me that early cancellation is not an option. The only way to end the contract would be to pay off the entire amount that would have been paid over the life of the contract: about $1500.

I calmly explained that this in not at all what the salesman had said. They told me they would check with the salesman and get back to me. Two weeks later, they called again. They said the salesman denied ever suggesting there may be an early cancellation fee, and since it is just my word against his, they won't allow any early cancellation.

Needless to say, 6 months later I moved. The new owner of the house refused to take over the payments, so I was stuck paying for a security system on a house that I didn't even live in anymore!