The importance of establishing a NIGHT TIME LOCK UP ROUTINE
The well-known Criminologists, Marcus Felson and Ronald V Clarke, once said “There is no single cause of crime that is sufficient to guarantee its occurrence: yet opportunity above all others is necessary and therefore has as much or more claim to being a root cause.”
Thousands of Night Time burglaries occur each year, needlessly. Many householders don’t stick to a set routine in the first place or they think they do but get distracted or make a mistake thus leaving them vulnerable.
To avoid being a Night Time burglary victim make the following part of your Night Time Lock-Up Routine. Once I started to put some points together I realised each point needs greater detail which I will follow up within future posts but I hope this will give you a suggested routine to follow without getting too paranoid.
A few points concerning the outside of your property, not necessarily in your Night Time routine but to be secured. Make sure any outbuildings are locked. Make sure any steps or ladders are put away or locked & chained up and garden tools have been put away so they cannot be used by the burglar.
Your routine should include:
Locks & Keys
Staying with the outside for a moment – Make sure your vehicle is locked and nothing of value left inside or at the least not on show. Now to the inside, go to each external door and make sure it’s locked and remove the keys from the locks, get into the habit of doing this even when you are in the house for example watching TV. Many people have become a victim of burglary even when they are up and about in the house and they haven’t heard a thing.
Make sure everyone in the house knows where the keys are kept in case of an emergency.
However, we realise, there are some who like to leave a key in the front door at night to escape quickly in case of fire. It has always been a tricky thing balancing security & fire.
Get into the habit of always putting the keys in the same place. Side note – this will help with that ‘where did I put my keys’ as you are about to go out the door too!
Do the same with the windows. Yes, your windows should have locks on them too.
Burglar Alarm
If you have one USE IT !
So many people say they don’t set the Burglar Alarm at night because they or their family need some movement around the house, any good alarm system will be tailored to take your individual requirements into account, so no excuses!
Close the curtains / blinds / doors
From dusk close your curtains and blinds to make sure thieves can’t see through your windows to see what you’ve got to steal or maybe that you’re on your own. With the curtains open and the lights on inside you are on view and showing those outside what you have.
Close internal doors at night to help prevent the spread of fire and smoke. As a side note – periodically check your smoke and carbon monoxide detectors.
Outside Lights
This one is a bit of a double-edged sword, which I plan to discuss in much greater detail in a later post. So keeping it simple for now, if you have them, make sure they’re working.
Valuable daily items
Get into the habit of putting your valuables out of sight and somewhere secure, consider taking certain things like handbags, cash, car keys & phones into the bedroom at night. Side note – a phone may prove essential should you need to call any of the emergency services, but we hope you’ll never need to.
