Nope, you got it right! That's how crappy
products work!
Keychain remote WILL work outside the home
BUT!!!.....You'll never know if the system
was succesfully armed!
Nobody's in your home, so no zones should be
tripped, right!? WRONG!
A lot of times the sensors stick on, you need
to walk in front of them to reset the status
of that zone on the system which is stuck on,
preventing you from arming. If you use the
big remote in delay mode, you'll hear the
fast dinging which means there is a zone
tripped. If you use the keychain inside,
you'll trip it, right, but if you use it
outside, you won't know if the alarm is on or
not..
You COULD try (right before leaving) arm with
keychain, if it arms successfully (without
walking by any sensors) immediately disarm
system, open door, exit, and then arm with
keychain.. You should be safe..
Otherwise, you'll need to hide the big remote..
Sorry! I can't believe they don't even disarm
with a code or anything, I know it seems kind
of dumb.. That's all you can do with this
system anyway.
Cheers!