According to recently released South African crime statistics, in 2016/17 there were 22 343 recorded incidents of house robbery. This means that, on average, 61.2 South African households were robbed each day. Within this, the festive season is recognised as driving an up-tick in crime levels. This presents a challenge for many South African home owners as they leave their houses unattended whilst they holiday in other parts of the country. “The festive season is definitely a time to take extra precautions, but the focus should be on using basic common sense,” says Richard Sambaza, Marketing Manager at Trellidor Johannesburg South, one of South Africa’s most prominent security brands. “Home owners who follow basic precautions are generally well protected.”
Tip #1 – Community matters
There is no better protection than knowing your neighbours. In the walled-off suburbs of Gauteng this is often easier said than done, but, nonetheless, the safety rewards of community interaction are significant. “Community WhatsApp groups have become increasingly popular in recent years, because they offer immediate communication regardless of where anyone is,” says Sambaza. “And of course, the better people in a neighbourhood know each other, the easier it is to form and manage these groups. The bottom line is straightforward. Get to know your neighbours.”
Tip #2 – Understand your risk profile
Criminals clearly target some neighbourhoods specifically – especially those featuring a lot of new construction and development. “When a lot of construction is taking place in a small area, gaps in security can occur, which makes access easier than usual. If the area you are living in is recognised as becoming increasingly affluent, it becomes attractive to crime syndicates.”
According to Sambaza, home owners who understand their area’s current risk profile put themselves in a good position to take appropriate action. “This could be improving your alarm system, asking for regular drive bys from an armed response provider or teaming up with neighbours on a WhatsApp group. Regardless, you can’t take the right action if you don’t understand the risk level in your area. If you don’t know where to start, try speaking to security professionals operating in your immediate neighbourhood.”
Tip #3 – Don’t forget the fundamentals
Sliding doors and large windows are go-to points of access for criminals, and must always be fully secured.
“The most common mistake home owners make is prioritising a single-entry point at the expense of others,” says Sambaza. “At Trellidor most of our customers make use of the T500 and T700 range of fully framed galvanised steel retractable gates. These are popular because they slide away easily while the house is in use, but provide major security when locked. But one should never be fooled into thinking that protecting the biggest sliding door on the property is all you need to do. You have to cover all the possibilities.”
The best approach is to work with a security professional to audit the entire property, and to install the appropriate protection in each relevant access point.
“The chain is only as strong as its weakest link,” adds Sambaza. “This applies to selecting which sites to protect, and to the quality of the protection you use.”
Tip #4 – Store valuables off-site
In today’s world, our valuables extend from family heirlooms through to laptops and external hard drives containing vital information. According to Sambaza, every South African family heading for a holiday should do two things: 1) decide on what qualifies as a valuable item, and 2) store these with friends or family for safekeeping.
“The cost of a robbery is already very high, but you can keep a cap on the risk by ensuring your most valuable items are not in your house while you’re away. In our experience, family heirlooms and data almost always top this list. Gather these up and ask friends or family to keep them for you. If anything does happen, this simple action saves a huge amount of pain and bother.”
Tip #5 – Your identity is valuable too
With cybercrime at an all-time high across the world, personal identity information is very valuable to criminals.
“It’s a good idea to do a once over of the house before you leave to make sure you haven’t left any documents or print outs with ID numbers and other vital information on them lying around,” says Sambaza.
Equally important are passwords and log in details. If you like to write important access details into a book, make sure you take the book with you on holiday.
“Again, this is common sense,” Sambaza concludes. “These things are simple, but the key is to ensure you think about all the aspects of safety in good time, not just the one or two that cross your mind the day before you leave. As with most things in life, a little bit of planning goes a very long way.”
Alan Straton
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