Most condo boards stay with bad security vendors longer than they should. The reasons are predictable: switching feels risky, the property manager is comfortable with the existing relationship, and nobody wants to spend three meetings on a vendor transition. So things get tolerated that shouldn’t be.

The problem with tolerating a vendor’s drift is that the cost compounds quietly. Insurance premiums creep up. Resident complaints accumulate. Incidents that should have been prevented start happening. Here are nine specific signs your current vendor isn’t delivering — each diagnostic on its own, and any three together usually meaning it’s time to evaluate alternatives.

1. You Can’t Remember the Last Time a Supervisor Visited the Site

Supervisor visits are the single biggest predictor of consistent security delivery. Weekly on-site visits are the industry standard — anything less than monthly is a problem. If your property manager can’t tell you when the last supervisor visit happened, or if visits aren’t documented in writing, the vendor is operating without oversight at your site. Officers without supervision drift, standards slip, reports get sloppy. None of this is the officer’s fault — it’s a vendor management failure.

2. Daily Reports Are Vague, Repetitive, or Templated

Pull the last seven days of daily security reports. If they read as interchangeable — same phrases, same “all clear,” no specific observations — the vendor is treating documentation as paperwork rather than a real operational record. Real reports vary day to day because real buildings vary day to day. A propped fire door, an unfamiliar visitor, a contractor running late — these things show up in honest reports. A week of “nothing to report” usually means an officer who isn’t being asked to report.

3. High Officer Turnover at Your Site

Continuity matters in condo security more than in almost any other vendor relationship. An officer who knows your building delivers a different quality of service than someone in their second week. If you’ve seen three or more officer changes at your primary post in the past year, the vendor is either underpaying, under-supervising, or both. Ask for your site’s annual turnover rate. The willingness and speed of the answer tells you nearly as much as the number itself.

4. Incident Documentation Is Thin or Late

When something does happen — a break-in attempt, a medical event, a resident dispute — incident documentation should be detailed, timely, and submitted to property management within the shift. If reports are vague, incomplete, or arrive days late, the vendor lacks the operational discipline to handle a serious incident if one occurs. Worse, in litigation or insurance situations, weak incident documentation creates direct liability exposure for the corporation.

5. Officers Don’t Know the Building

Ask the officer on duty about a recent building event, an upcoming contractor visit, or the location of a specific resident amenity. A properly onboarded officer can answer. An officer thrown into the post without site-specific training will hesitate, guess, or admit they don’t know. This isn’t a personal failing — it’s a vendor failing to invest in site orientation. Buildings where officers don’t know the building are buildings where security gaps go undetected.

6. The Property Manager Has Become the Vendor’s Manager

If your property manager is fielding scheduling problems, mediating between residents and officers, or running quality control that the vendor’s supervisor should be running, the vendor has effectively offloaded their job onto your management team. You’re paying for vendor management infrastructure that doesn’t exist. The property manager’s time is also a real cost — both directly (their hourly rate) and indirectly (the work they’re not doing on other building issues).

7. Patrols Are Unverifiable

Modern security operations use patrol-point verification — GPS check-ins, NFC tags, or similar systems that prove patrols actually happened. If your vendor still operates on “trust me, the patrols are happening,” the patrols are at best inconsistent and at worst nominal. Without verification, the entire patrol component of your security service is unenforceable. You’re paying for activity you cannot confirm occurred.

8. Pricing Increases Without Specific Justification

Annual cost increases are normal — wage adjustments, insurance renewals, and operational cost inflation are real. But every increase should arrive with a specific justification: minimum wage changes in your jurisdiction, documented insurance premium increases, scope changes, or training investments. “Industry standard increase” is not a justification. If your vendor raises rates without explaining what drove the increase, they’re either disorganized or hoping the board won’t push back. Both are problems.

9. Residents Are Complaining and It Isn’t Stopping

Resident complaints about security are noisy and often unfair — that’s normal. But sustained complaints about the same issues (officers on phones, slow response to lobby calls, unfriendly interactions, missed deliveries) signal something the vendor isn’t fixing. A serious vendor responds to complaint patterns with documented changes: officer coaching, supervisor intervention, schedule adjustments. A drifting vendor explains complaints away. The test isn’t whether complaints happen. The test is whether they stop after they’re raised.

What to Do When You See Three or More of These

Any one red flag is worth investigating. Two warrants a serious conversation with the vendor’s leadership. Three or more usually mean it’s time to evaluate alternatives. Practical steps to start:

  • Document what you’ve observed in board minutes — this creates a paper trail and demonstrates the board’s diligence in case of future incidents or insurance claims.
  • Request a meeting with the vendor’s senior leadership (not the account rep). Outline the specific concerns with  documentation. Ask for a written remediation plan with timeline.
  • Begin a parallel evaluation of alternative vendors using the Vendor Evaluation Checklist linked below.
  • Review your existing contract’s termination clause — most require 30–90 days notice. Knowing your exit terms before you need them prevents being trapped if you decide to switch.

If the vendor delivers a credible remediation plan and follows through within 60 days, the relationship may still be worth keeping. If they don’t, the path forward is structured.

The Bottom Line

Vendors don’t usually fail dramatically. They drift. The board notices a few small things, then a few more, and one day the gap between what’s being paid for and what’s being delivered is unmistakable. The nine signs above are the early warnings that let you act before that gap becomes a serious incident.

If you’ve recognized three or more of these signs in your current vendor, the Condo Security Vendor Evaluation Checklist is the structured next step. It walks you through 22 specific questions to ask of any vendor — current or new — and produces an objective scorecard your board can act on. [Download free]

Frequently Asked Questions

Q1. How long should we give a vendor to fix problems before switching?
Ans. 60 days from the formal remediation meeting is reasonable. That’s enough time for the vendor to implement supervisor changes, officer coaching, and reporting improvements, but not so long that the board’s tolerance for drift becomes a habit. Document the meeting and the deadline in board minutes.

Q2. Can the board terminate the security contract immediately for poor performance?
Ans. Usually no. Most contracts require 30–90 days written notice and specify cure periods for performance issues. Review your contract before initiating termination — and document specific performance failures in writing so the cure period can run formally.

Q3. What if the property manager defends the underperforming vendor?
Ans. Property managers sometimes have established relationships with security vendors that make them resistant to changing providers. The board has the authority and the fiduciary duty to evaluate vendor performance independently. If the property manager won’t engage in good-faith evaluation, that itself becomes a governance issue worth flagging.

Q4. How disruptive is a security vendor transition?
Ans. A well-planned transition takes 30–60 days from notice to full handover and is usually not disruptive to residents. A poorly planned one creates fob reprogramming chaos, security gaps during handover, and resident frustration. The difference is in the incoming vendor’s transition methodology — not luck.

Q5. Can we keep the same officers if we switch security companies?
Ans. Sometimes. Officers can apply to the incoming vendor and be hired directly, preserving site continuity. This requires the officer’s willingness and the incoming vendor’s openness. It’s worth raising explicitly when negotiating with the new provider, especially for long-tenured officers your building values.

Q6. What if our security is on a long-term contract?
Ans. Long-term contracts (3+ years) typically include performance clauses that allow termination for documented non-performance. Review the contract carefully — most vendors won’t fight a documented case of underperformance because doing so creates worse precedent than letting the contract end cleanly.

Q7. Does switching security vendors affect our condo insurance?
Ans. Most insurers don’t require notification of a vendor change as long as coverage standards (licensing, insurance limits, training) are maintained. A vendor with stronger credentials than the incumbent often improves the building’s insurance posture, particularly for buildings that have had security-related claims.

Q8. What’s the single best signal that a new vendor will deliver?
Ans. Direct, specific, written answers to evaluation questions — produced quickly. Vendors who hedge, defer, or refuse to put answers in writing during the evaluation will do the same once they’re under contract. The vendor’s behaviour during evaluation is a remarkably accurate preview of their behaviour during delivery.