The Locksmith Journal May-Jun 2014 - Issue 32 | страница 46

ACCESSCONTROL SPONSORED BY ALDRIDGE SECURITY AVOCET SECURES MIRFIELD COUPLE’S HOME AFTER INSURANCE COMPANY LET-DOWN Brighouse-based Avocet Hardware has come to the rescue of a Mirfield couple after their insurance company stated it would only replace locks that had been snapped by burglars with like-for-like replacements – a settlement that meant their home would have been left at as much risk as it was before the burglary. Mark Davies and Ruth Harrison had their home broken into and ransacked by burglars using the increasingly popular lock-snapping form of forced entry on Saturday 22nd March and a host of prized possessions stolen, including Ruth’s £8,000 Mini Cooper. Avocet, which is actively campaigning for the scale of the lock-snapping problem in the UK to be officially recognised and properly tackled, read of Mark and Ruth’s plight in the Huddersfield Daily Examiner and quickly offered to upgrade their home to its ABS snapsecure locks. At the time Mark was dealing with his insurance company and assumed the settlement would see their home being fitted with locks that would withstand any future lock-snapping attack. “Ruth and I knew next to nothing about lock-snapping before the burglary, but did our research straight afterwards and we were staggered to discover the sheer scale of the problem,” he said. “I was even more astonished when our insurance company said the locks they would fit would be the exact same ones that the burglars had snapped so easily in the first place.” Lock-snapping is now one of the most popular means of 46 Raymond Pearce, Avocet Hardware with Mark Davies of Mirfield, West Yorkshire – the Brighouse company upgraded Mark’s locks to ABS for free after his insurance company only offered like-for-like replacements following a lock-snapping burglary on his home in March. forced entry into UK homes, with some police forces estimating that it accounts for over 50 per cent of all breakins. The problem, according to Raymond Pearce of Avocet Hardware, is that not enough people are aware of the issue and so millions of homes across the UK are unwittingly at risk of a lock-snapping attack. “Lock-snapping simply hasn’t been given the kind of THE MAY/JUN 2014 ISSUE SPONS ԑQ