Tag Archives: Heavy Equipment Theft

Set up cameras to prevent theft of heavy equipment

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If you are operating a business, it becomes your responsibility to ensure that all your business equipment are safe and you prevent them from any risk of theft. Your equipment may have a value in the market but for you it is invaluable and you can’t afford to lose your priceless stuff just because you could not guard it against theft. This also indicates that you are not a good businessman. A person who stands in poor light when it comes to safeguarding his office equipment can never give a good picture of his business skills and therefore it is immensely important that you gear up against the miscreants and ensure that there will be no theft at your place. In the construction business where people deal with expensive machines the chances of it getting robbed is higher. This is why extra steps needs to be taken to make sure that you have the heavy equipment in a safe place that is constantly guarded and no one can get to it.

Install cameras at various points:-

The idea to install cameras at various points can certainly deter wrongdoers to a larger extent. It is evident that these guys are smart and we have to accept that. As long as we do not accept the fact that these troublemakers are smart we will not be able to tackle the problem effectively. Installing cameras can certainly outplay them and they will be apprehended to take a call if they should be going for you or not. Frankly no one wants to get caught and hence they might think of someone else’s construction site rather than yours. They just do not want to come under the lens as that will reveal their identity. You need to set up the cameras at all the important entry and exit points. Also set up a room for the security where he will keep a check on all the points with the help of the visuals. Thus you deploy fewer men to guard the machines and depend more on technology.

Buy cameras with good resolution:-

Since you are setting up cameras to protect heavy equipment from theft you make sure that you buy cameras with good resolution so that it can capture things with clarity. It makes no point in buying cameras that does not have high resolution as you will not be able to identify the face of the person who has committed the crime. It will also become difficult to trace the person if he finds success in stealing the machine. High resolution cameras are however expensive but certainly within the reach of a person who indeed wants his machine to be safe.

Buy branded cameras from designated stores:-

It is advisable that you buy cameras from designated stores and they should be of good brand. You may end up paying more for it but it will be really worth your money. Not all store will keep high end cameras and therefore check the ones that keep such cameras.

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Have some anti-theft measurements for your heavy construction equipment and be relaxed

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Heavy construction equipments are very much in demand in the recent era. They are the basic requirements for any construction work taking place all over the world. However, the extremely high price of these equipments makes the construction equipment subject to theft. If you are afraid of a theft of any part of your construction equipment, then taking some anti-theft prevention in favor your machine is very helpful and mandatory as well. When you think of the anti-theft measurements, there are either too many confusing devices, techniques that confuse the owner, or the owner becomes very threatened of the situation that he fails to follow the simple way outs. Here are some simple tips that can help any owner from having to lose his heavy construction equipment.

  1. When a part of your equipment gets stolen, most of the time it is brought to the manufacturer or a dealer of heavy construction equipment for repairing or servicing the part. So, if you inform the manufacturer or dealer of the equipment about the theft, it is possible that you will get to find it soon. So, if you face a theft, you must contact the manufacturer immediately after informing the police, so that the manufacturer can go through their stolen equipment servicing database and contact you.
  2. Inscribe your name, company name and phone number on the parts of the equipment, especially on the boom, bucket, engine, frame and the other parts of the equipment. Painting the names would also work, but painted names can be easily removed. So if you inscribe your contact details, it would be easier for the police to find the owner once they get the thieves finding difficulty in selling the equipments due to the inscription. As a result of this, the thieves will avoid stealing such equipments.
  3. To make sure that nobody can drive away your heavy construction equipment, you can weld a rectangular piece of steel plate on to the rim of the wheels. When you use the locking wheel lug nuts, this steel plate will work as a lock and no one can drive away your construction equipment.
  4. Installing the newly developed ignition key system is another excellent way of managing the safety and security of the heavy construction equipment. As the ignition key is a magnetic key system, without the unique code, the equipment cannot be accessed. The codes can be the same for every part of the equipment, or it can be different for different parts.
  5. A very helpful way of preventing the theft of the heavy construction equipments is to install a theft recovery device. This is a very sophisticated device that helps the owner find easily where the equipment is lying. When the device is equipped with a theft recovery device, unless and until the thief is technologically very sound, the equipment can be recovered within a few hours of the theft.

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Want To Protect Your Heavy Equipment From Theft – You’ll Find This Helpful

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You must have come across this many times when one fine morning, you are informed by your employees that a particular part of heavy equipment is missing. You get up in a state of shock and wonder how this can be possible and what use a part of an equipment would be for any person. Well, such thefts are quite rampant in the entire US and one got to be very vigilant to ensure that his things are at place. Many a times, the entire machine gets stolen and shipped to other country and you are left with miseries. Before we begin noting the possible solution for this problem, let us first understand the reason why one would steal parts of heavy equipment or the equipment as a whole.

The market for stolen equipment is very big in the United States and the money involved in this business is huge. Therefore, it has gangs that have the skill to open up equipment and carry away few important parts of the machine in no time. The people who are running this business never fall short of men and therefore in spite of the cops taking every possible action to nab them, their counts keep on increasing.

Let us now discuss what could be done to contain this problem so that you do not suffer loses.

Keep your documents in place:-  Ideally, most owners of construction companies lose the track of important documents pertaining to the equipment they have bought. Due to this, if the equipment is stolen, it could not be traced by the cops and they end up taking all the trouble for nothing. Hence, it is crucial to keep all your documents like model or the serial number, the manufacturing year of the equipment, photos etc. that will prove to be helpful to the cops to catch hold of the miscreants.

Conduct a sound background check of your employees:-  It is highly recommended to do a thorough background check of all your employees and employ only them who have a clean record with no criminal background. Alternatively, it is prudent to keep a watch on employees whom you find to be suspicious. Questioning them directly may not be the right way to deal with them but checking their behavior may give you some idea if not all.

Maintain a register:-  You should maintain a register where you can keep a record of people coming in and going out of the site. Alternatively, you can also employ security personnel who will check the employees every time they enter or exit the construction premise.

Install cameras at different locations:-  This should be really helpful in nabbing the culprits. If the thieves do not know that you’ve installed cameras would definitely make the mistake of not wearing masks and that will help the cop nab them. However, if at all the thieves know that there are cameras installed, they would rather look out for some other place and may skip yours.

Protect Your Heavy Equipment from Potential Theft

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The use of the heavy construction equipment is perhaps the very first requirement for the construction industry to operate perfectly. If you want your construction project to be finished off within the given deadline, then you have to ensure that your heavy equipment is in perfect order. However, heavy construction equipment theft can prove to be a major hindrance to the entire business.

When Is Your Heavy Construction Equipment Vulnerable To Theft?

The heavy construction equipment forms one of the core ingredients of your entire construction business. Needless to say the theft of the equipment can prove to be a huge setback to your construction project. Not only does it affect you economically, but also damages the repute that you have in the construction arena. It is quite obvious that your heavy equipment is quite expensive and this makes it a sure target for swindlers all around. Your heavy construction equipment is most susceptible to theft when left unattended at night or during break times. It is quite likely that the heavy equipment will be stolen if you do not have enough equipment security measures up your sleeve

Preventing Heavy Equipment from Theft

Taking preventive measures to stop the heavy equipment from being stolen seems to be the best thing to do since they form such an important part of the whole business.

  • Installing anti-theft security and tracking devices are perhaps the very first equipment theft prevention measure that you could take. There are a number of geo-sense equipment tracking devices that you could use to track the location of your stolen heavy equipment.
  • Registering your equipment at the national equipment registration office is another thing that you could do in order to protect your heavy equipment from damage due to theft. By taking this measure you will ensure that your equipment is registered in the database of the law enforcement squad, thereby, making the tracking part a hell lot easier.
  • It is not possible to carry the heavy construction equipment about when there is no work going on at the construction sites. It is best to arrange for certain security measures in order to protect your heavy equipment when it is not in use. Increasing on-site security can thus, protect your heavy equipment from theft to a great extent.
  • You could also consider immobilizing the heavy equipment at the end of the day in order to ensure that burglars don’t get to drive it off.
  • And last but not the least- keeping an up to date record of your inventory is another thing that you could do in order to ensure that your heavy equipment is well protected from theft and to make tracking the devices easier. You could also consider painting your equipment in a way that makes it stand out from the rest of its lot. This too, enhances the tracking of heavy equipment in case it falls prey to theft.

The robbery of heavy equipment can be the cause of a huge set back to your construction organisation. Not only will it prove to be a great hindrance in meeting the deadline, but it also spells a heavy economic loss for the company as well. Hence, preventing them from potential theft is the best thing that you can do.

Tips on How to stop Heavy Equipment Theft

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Theft of an essential commodity especially something that comes handy in your day to day activity can be really irking and then you got to leave your work and run from pillar to post to lodge a complaint with the police, try to work things out with the insurance company and to add salt to the wound, you are out of work till the time you seek a replacement for the stolen equipment. This is something which you would never want to happen in your business but these things happen unwillingly and the owners pay the price for it.

Let us first understand what makes stealing heavy equipment a lucrative business for the thieves. How much do they gain from the deal and what do they do with the stolen equipment. We all know by now that heavy equipments are the most expensive equipment required in the construction domain and they always have a resale value attached to it. Moreover, if the machine is in good working condition, then the value simply multiplies. Stealing heavy equipment can give them good deal of money in a single shot, which means that they do not have to work hard in stealing things which are less valuable and for which they are more at risk of getting caught. All they have to do is make a healthy plan to steal heavy equipment from a construction site and find ways and means to sell it off to a buyer in a different city or ship it to a different country.

In this bargain, they earn more with minimum effort and also take less risk. According to the National Insurance Crime Bureau and National Equipment Register, it has been estimated that equipment theft differs from 300 million USD to 1 billion USD on an annual basis. This is indeed a huge figure. Reading this, many would want to leave their existing business and join the thugs. (Said on a lighter note) Well, it has become very important to ensure that you discourage the thieves stealing your stuff by training your staff on how to prevent robberies of heavy equipments, installing cameras at different places of the project site, installing other devices that will throw signals to you confirming its current location. This way you will be able to track the machine and in this process may also catch the thieves’ red handed.

Register your equipment to make it identifiable:-  It is not mandatory to register your equipment and this makes the work simple for the crooks. You have your stuff unregistered and once it gets stolen, you have no other means to get it back as there is no record of that machine. This also gives a hard time to the cops to trace your machine. You should therefore register your equipment and also try to engrave some markings on the equipment which will help the cops to indentify your machine.

Install cameras around the construction site:-  As heavy equipments are big in size, no thief can go unwatched from the eyes of the camera if they attempt to steal the machine. You can also spend on security personnel to guard the equipments during nights.