AS the population grows all over the world, so do crime rates.
From snatch&run and burglary to car theft, criminals are always finding new ways to target the public.
Car crime has always grabbed the limelight. Whether it’s the valuable items inside or the car itself, cars remain a target for thieves.
Cars have always been one of the favourite targets of thieves. The market for stolen vehicles never diminishes, and the thieves are getting better at dismantling the cars for selling the parts on the black market.
But lately vans are becoming more of a target for criminals: £150m worth of commercial vehicles are stolen from the streets of the UK every year. Ford Transit is on the top of the list of the most stolen vehicles beating expensive and highly desirable cars from prestigious brands such as Mercedes-Benz in 2015 according to National Vehicle Crime Intelligence Service. Over 30% of these vans are never to be seen again.
The number of van owners has increased significantly over the last decade as demand from businesses booms, particularly double-cabs, which offer room for the family at the weekend, but with the load space for delivery and on-site services.
Vans are a costly investment for anyone whether you’re an individual or a business, that’s why van owners are always on the look-out for upgrading their existing security systems.
The good thing is, criminals aren’t the only ones benefiting from technology; as a direct result of the rise of vehicle thefts, there have been massive developments to help vehicle owners to protect their valuable investment.
Stealing the contents of a van is as common as van thefts in the UK. That is precisely why the owners need to make sure that their vans are not easy targets even though many vans have a built-in alarm. But experienced car thieves have already figured out multiple ways to disable these alarm systems long ago.
Before we get into the advanced security systems and GPS tracking technology, there are certain things to watch out for when it comes to improving the security of your van.
Here are a few simple ways to keep your van and its contents safe:
- Always make it a habit of locking your van and making sure to double-check it before you walk off,
- Keep your keys on your person at all times,
- If you have valuable goods in your van, make sure to keep them out of sight or store them in a safe location hidden inside the cabin
- Avoid parking in shady locations, pick visible and brightly lit areas to park your van,
- Make sure to Install an advanced alarm system with an immobilizer.
A more advanced solution is installing a GPS tracker for van to improve its security. These devices use GPS technology to transmit the exact location of a vehicle to a cloud-based tracking platform to display it on a digital map on-demand.
By fitting a vehicle tracker to your van, you will be able to monitor its location in real-time using a PC or a smartphone.
Van tracking technology offers the ultimate protection; not only it gives you the ability to track your vehicle in real-time but also provides effective tools such as immobilization, speeding alerts, and geofence zones. You can set up geo-fence zones around important areas on the map, and the software will warn you in case your van leaves the zone without your consent.
One thing to be careful is to place the GPS tracker in a secure location to prevent tampering with it. Old-school security measures are not as effective anymore, but a van tracker is your best bet if your vehicles are stolen.
In the worst case scenario; you can provide the police with the last known location of your van, and the tracker should enable you to pinpoint its exact location so it can be recovered by the police.
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