I had a Vivint system installed in my house last week and so far I have been pleasantly surprised by the quality of the service provided and the technology installed. I write this review in hopes that it will clear up some confusion on the products offered and the contract as I found the online website perplexing and devoid of information. The Contract: When you consummate a contract you must be well aware of the implications and act accordingly. Having done a tremendous amount of research, here is a summation of my findings. First, every customer is required to sign up for either smart home monitoring for $39.99 or smart home video monitoring for $49.99 a month. What these do is give you access to the mobile app, alarm notifications, and real time monitoring by the company. For the few customers that buy their equipment outright, they have the option of going month to month for the monitoring service so they can cancel at anytime. However, the vast majority of customers will most likely end up financing the equipment. Unlike ADT who gives you the technology and alarms for free and charges a montly monitoring premium, Vivint charges you the retail price of the devices you install and finances them at 0% interest through Citizens Bank. What this means is that you will be taking out a loan that will show up on your credit report as an installment agreement and you will be responsible for the entire balance of the products regardless of whether or not you cancel, move, etc. The term of this agreement is five years so you will most likely be locked into paying between $20-50 for the four or five year term. Now, here is where it gets tricky and some confusion sets in. If you do opt to FINANCE the equipment, you are also locked into paying for monitoring for the entire life of the installment agreement for the equipment. What this means is that now you have two payments every month for four or five years: one to Vivint directly for their "smart monitoring" and the second to Citizens Bank for the equipment. What is unfortunate about this arrangement and the cause of innumerable bad reviews is that even if you pay off the equipment loan early, you are still on the hook for the monitoring even if you are dissatisfied with the service. Hypothetically, if the cost of the financed equipment is $2,500 and you sign up for the premier smart video monitoring for $49.99 a month, over the course of five years you will be required to pay $5,500 regardless of your satisfaction with the service or a change in circumstances. Please note: all of the contracts I signed had a relatively bulletproof ARBITRATION clause which means that you will be sacrificing any opportunity to go to court or take part in a class action should something go seriously awry or you wanted to take legal recourse to break your contract. Sales Experience: A life-long friend of mine was my salesman and did a fantastic job of outlining the program including the features and benefits. Everything is done on an ipad and I will say that I was impressed by the level of the presentation performed and the interface for which to on-board new customers. My recommendation for new customers is that if you are going to be locking yourself into a monitoring contract that is fixed at $50 a month for the life of the loan, you might as well get everything you want as they service it no charge and it doesn't raise the monthly equipment finance payment drastically. The Install: I was impressed by the professionalism of the technician and the pride he took in his work. He was prompt, let me know when he was coming, and took his time to make sure that I was absolutely satisfied with the placement of the products and the installation. NOTE: If you are tall, please tell your technician to install the sky-panel higher up on the wall as it it may be installed too low to use comfortably. The Products: I had a hard time finding information on the outdoor cameras and even customer service seemed unsure of many of the finer aspects and features. First, Vivint DOES offer 24/7 monitoring (meaning your cameras record and store footage 24 hours a day for 30 days straight). To have this functionality you MUST buy the Smart Drive for $250 (Smart Drive is a physical device that connects to your router and physically stores up to 30 days of video). For me, it was confusing that the Smart Drive used to be called Space Monkey but for your purposes just know it is a magical little box that connects to your router and holds all your recordings for 30 days. While many tech's will tell you that your cameras only record "motion," this is not true: all you need to do once you have the smart drive is click on the camera in your app and hit playback. Once there, you can select the calendar day and scroll through every minute of every day and watch what was happening with helpful blips showing motion etc. For me, this sold the product. read more

Shocked and amazed by the severe and intrinsic problems of this company. Took over a month to try and transfer an account, which never happened. Vivint also said we were never covered for the entire month, which is what made me ultimately cancel and go to a competitor. Stay far far away. read more

Beyond terrible customer service. I bought a new home that already had a fully equipped (and paid for) Vivint system installed. I needed the front door code changed and the former owners removed. In order to do this, they wanted us to pay for a full service and each person I spoke with told me a different story of how the process worked an how much the monitoring would cost. I ended up speaking with TEN different agents to eventually find out that there would also be a $562 dollar fee for equipment, EVEN though the system is already paid for. Nope, sorry, not paying for that. I wrote a very detailed email to the cancellation department over 2 weeks ago and have not heard a single word or apology back for for the service I received, rather... didn't receive. Over priced, terrible customer service (minus the two out of the ten agents I spoke with were actually able to answer some of my questions) disappointed to say the least. read more

BEWARE. If you make an appointment for a salesman to come over it is really an installation date. They are very sneaky!! It took 4 days and numerous hours on the phone to finally have the system work. None of the "sales" people advise me that their system is geared for a single family not a multiple dwelling. Their on line site is thew worst and their app is more terrible. I f i knew then what i know now, there is no way I would have switch. Terrible service and equipment read more

I have had multiple issues with this company. I am paying over $70 a month for a system that doesn't work in my town. I had an issue where my alarm went off. Town police never showed up. When I called the company, they simply stated that they have no control over how quickly a response will happen. While that is true, they sought me out and solicited their system to me. It was not the other way around. A company should know the average time it takes for police or fire to respond to a call. If it is 20 minutes, that is not protection! Thieves would have all my valuables out the door in less than half that time. Or worse, we could be murdered and the killer would be over state lines before the police even showed up! When I explained that this system doesn't work and I wanted to cancel they told me I would still owe them close to $2,000 to finish out the contact. This company is a scam! They scare you into more than you need and if your town has a slow response time the system is useless. DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY! read more

I've had Vivint for almost two years or more. I have had nothing but problems with my system and every time I call they just want to "Walk Me Through it". I am forever calling back with the same problem but instead of them trying to fix the problem they just want to walk me through it. How many times does the same thing have to happen before they realize it is a REAL PROBLEM.. Today I called twice and pretty much was told the same thing. WE WILL WALK YOU THROUGH IT.. When I insisted that this has gone on long enough I was told. One, they could send me out a new sensor, but not only would I have to pay for it, I will have to put it on myself. Or two, I can pay for a Tech to come out, or NO LESS Three, they could just disarm that door and hope that if some one brakes in the house they brake the glass so that will set off the Alarm. So what part of that Customer Service was helpful... Twice I asked to speak with a Manager and they never put one on the phone, they did put me on hold for another 30 minutes. If it wasn't for the fact that I was locked into a (4) year contract, that by the way I didn't know it was for four years, I thought it was for two, At any rate, Having this company for the next two year, I guess I will have to live like I DO NOT HAVE AN ALARM SYSTEM on my house and just continue to through my money away and pretend like I do. They didn't even bother to give me a sign for my yard so at least I could fool people. But maybe they knew that if people knew that I had Vivint, it was open season on my home read more