What is needed in a school bus camera system to make the “Best Value” choice for your school bus video camera system purchase?

Basic knowledge of what the school bus surveillance camera system needs to do is important.
The foundational functions include; recording video and audio for future use in case of an incident or accusation.
To accomplish this the system requires a bus video DVR, which is the brain of the system, that connects the optical eyes (cameras) to the Digital Video Recorder where the files can be stored on the 100% Solid State SDXC or SSD.


More important is how the system performs its functions in the present and far into the future.

Unless you are Nostradamus, predicting what will be needed in the future and how any product selected today can meet those goals might prove challenging, like unpredictable seas are difficult to navigate.
Thankfully there is past history to help illuminate your current choices and provide a metaphorical compass and how they may reflect on future needs and circumstances.

Often the best indication of what you might face in the future is from what happened in the past.
In my 30+ years of Mobile Video Surveillance Camera Systems sold and installed on:

School Bus Camera systems
Special Needs Wheelchair Bus Camera systems
Paratransit Adult Care Transport Camera Systems
Forklift Pallet Lift Truck Camera systems
Alternative School & Juvenile Detention Bus Security Camera
Transportation Ministry Youth Activities Church Bus Camera System
Waste Collection Recycling Video Camera Surveillance Systems

We have provided the equipment and fleet driver risk management tools to digitally document, without bias or prejudice, the sequential events as they occur with expert witness video evidence in case of claims, events, or incidents that may require verification, denial, or verification in court.
American Buis Video Inc. has offered the highest degree of product protection coverage possible in our Testudo Lifetime System Warranty Bus Camera Systems to assure should anything ever fail with any purchased system component, it will be replaced free of charge for the life of the product.

The Free Market driven by Capitalism can be a hostile place for the weak-willed who are offering mediocre products at inflated pricing. Those who lack conviction in their products often find themselves unable to justify the high cost of their low-quality products when asked to justify that product in the face of competition.

There are many strategies a company may choose in efforts to increase sales in light of the stronger competition in a competitive Free Market. Some strategies play to their product strengths; other strategies try to veil their product weaknesses.

The strongest strategy would be to demonstrate to all the superior design, development, and manufacture of their product by offering a Lifetime System Warranty, something that American Bus Video Inc. continues to offer on the below products:
Private Contractor School Bus Camera systems
Wheelchair Special Needs Video Camera Systems
Paratransit Adult Care Transport Camera Systems
Industrial Lift Truck Camera Systems
Police Prisoner Transport Camera Systems
Armored Vehicle VIP Transport Video Camera Systems

Those who lack conviction, doubt their product's marketability in a Free Market or are embarrassed by their product pricing often opt for the “Crony Capitalism” Strategy to do what their product cannot do, beat the competition by excluding all competition through some obscure feature requirement.
One of the most recent incarnations of this type of strategy to overcome strong compassion involves software programming.


Custom Programming = Future Failure
Providers of School Bus Camera Stop Arm systems often try to create the desire for some unique feature or ability of a system they can then coerce the district into making a requirement for the BID or RFP to create a School Bus Stop Arm Camera “Lockout specification” for a BID or RFP to eliminate the ability of other competitors to compete for the district business.
Aside from this being unAmerican as it blatantly undermines Capitalism and the Free Market System as you now create a single-source provider for a system with the said novel feature, and they know they are the only source, so they are free to offer their system with a much higher price knowing no other company can compete.

Example #1- GPS Mapping
A manufacturer chose not to integrate the Free Google Mapping software used by almost every school bus camera system provider and instead decided to sell a licensed mapping product with their Students With Disabilities & Special Needs Transportation Video Camera systems.

Systems generally that have GPS hardware receive free GPS satellite info to provide the vehicle speeds and location on GPS map tiles during playback on a PC connected to the internet.

Those Private Service Contractor Charter Transport Compliance Bus Camera System that was not interested in paying their annual fees for their mapping program did not get the benefits of the GPS mapping that their system had the hardware to use because they did not pay the annual fee for what others are basically getting free of charge for life. When Custom Programming systems are no longer supported, the seller goes out of business as happens frequently; the purchaser is left with a useless feature that does not work that provides no value to the customer in the future.
Had the customer NOT opted for a non-standard GPS system, they would have had functional GPS even if the seller went bankrupt, as it uses standard industry technology.


Example #2- RFID Tags
One of the more creative ways to offer something unique is in the way of RFID Tags, as small magnetic cards are worn by the passenger, in this case, a child, so that the DVR can be connected to an RFID tag reader and the student's card can be logged on the bus and off the bus each day. Aside from the Orwellian nature of tracking every movement we make and privacy issues, this process offers a false sense of security.

I have heard of so many accounts of children swapping backpacks, swapping tags themselves to trick the School Bus DVR Camera Recorder into believing they came home or went to school for the day when in reality, they just gave their card to a friend, so they could do something that did not involve school that day. The only thing worse than not knowing something is being deceived and led to believe something that is false.

To be continued in the next Blog, “The Value of Backwards Compatibility Part 2”


Should you have any questions or concerns or require more information about Testudo Lifetime System Warranty Bus Camera Systems, various applications or School Bus Student Transportation Video Camera Recorder configurations, we encourage you to let us know and we will be happy to offer our 35+ years of market experience in sales and service of digital recording devices to respond to your concerns or questions.