By
Doree Armstrong wasn’t worried
about the package she’d ordered arriving on an early December Saturday. An
email from Amazon had confirmed it would be delivered later that day, and—in
response to previous thefts—Armstrong and her husband had installed front- and
back-door cameras that alerted their phones every time a camera’s motion sensor
was triggered.
So she was surprised when a
neighbor showed up at her door holding an empty box addressed to the
Armstrongs. The neighbor had found the box in front of her own home several
blocks away. Cameras captured images of a hooded woman snatching the box from
the family’s porch, and Armstrong was able to share that video with readers of
her neighborhood blog as well as the police. But the Christmas present for Armstrong’s
son was nowhere to be found.
“The very next day someone
stole a package from my neighbor’s house down the street,” said Armstrong. “I
was being especially watchful and talking to everybody who walked by, so I
don’t know how I missed it. Yesterday, I saw a package on the front steps of
another neighbor and I texted them to say I was bringing it into my house for
safekeeping!”
Armstrong and her neighbors
are hardly alone. According to a recent study from
August Home, Inc., a provider of smart locks and smart-home access
products, some 11 million U.S. homeowners had a package stolen in the last
year. Fortunately, there are ways to refund or recover your pilfered parcels,
and steps you can take to keep your packages out of the hands of thieving
Grinches altogether.
Recoveries and
refunds
When a delivery doesn’t arrive
when expected, your first instinct might be to assume it was stolen. But
delivery companies process thousands of orders a day, and items do fall through
the cracks. Whether or not you’ve received a delivery confirmation from a
courier, contact the delivery company to confirm that your package was actually
dropped off when their tracking services said it was. In the case of a mistake,
your package may still be on the way.
Next, check with neighbors.
Some drivers find a neighboring house to be a safer delivery option. Some
friendly neighbors (like Armstrong) go out of their way to store others’
packages for safekeeping. And some parcels are simply delivered to the wrong
address.
If nothing turns up, contact
the seller. Many retailers will opt to refund or replace your purchase
immediately and deal with the delivery company themselves, saving you the
legwork. If the package was instead sent by a friend or family member, contact
the sender to confirm that the address was correct and everything else was in
order; if so, your best recourse is to file a theft report with the delivery
company, be it USPS, UPS, FedEx, DHL, or Amazon.
How the carriers
can protect your package
There are two ways major
carriers allow consumers to bypass a parcel dropped on a porch: by having
customers use the web to schedule delivery windows, or to re-route packages to
a different address as needed. Having packages sent to a work address, for
instance, could be one solution.
USPS, UPS, and FedEx use the same model for
residential customers: accounts and some basic services, like notifications of
an impending delivery, are free. Customers must then pay for other services,
such as setting a precise delivery time or having a package re-routed to a
different residential address.
Amazon has led the effort in
trying out a new option: package delivery to a central location. Their rentable lockers allow customers to pick
up their package from a secure space. Others are getting in on the act as well,
with USPS currently test-marketing
GoPost, its own system of package lockers. Meanwhile, UPS AccentPoint pairs consumers with
nearby businesses that will accept and store your packages.
Stopping
pilferers at the porch
Emily-Ione Kinney, a Salt Lake
City veterinary technician, says a rash of neighborhood porch thefts led her to
begin redirecting packages to the office. But it was a stolen car and a swiped
supply of her father’s homemade jam from the porch that finally led her and her
boyfriend to shop for webcams.
“Porch theft is actually a big
problem in my neighborhood,” Kinney said. “There are a lot of people with porch
and carport cams. We’d rather place them overtly and deter any more theft than
tempt someone and hope to catch them.”
With a crisp enough image,
security cameras are a tool for aiding law enforcement in identifying thieves.
Live-streaming cameras, such as the Blink or Nest Cam notify you immediately
via mobile phone that a crime has been committed.
For a bigger investment — and
some sizable porch real estate — lockable parcel boxes offer superior package
protection. The Landport Lock Box (starting at $499) is a
steel container that bolts to any surface and is opened via a code you share
with your delivery service.
Finally, there’s the Package Guard, a sort of car alarm for your
porch. This Frisbee-sized, wifi-enabled device notifies your smartphone when a
delivery is placed on its surface, and it must be disarmed before the package
is moved. It’s a lower-tech approach, but if it works, that’s all that matters.
Anything to scare off a porch pirate intent on putting a humbug in your
holiday.
No comments:
Post a Comment