A ten-month campaign by the British Oil Security Syndicate (BOSS) has finally succeeded in persuading the National Crime Recording Statistics Department to make changes to the Home Office's Counting Rules for Recorded Crime in respect of issues concerned with ‘making off without payment' from service stations.

New guidelines came into force as Security Management Today passed for press. At present, crime on Britain's estimated 10,000 petrol station forecourts costs the oil industry more than £20 million every year, but new guidelines issued by the Home Office in April last year resulted in many police services treating such crime as civil debt rather than criminal offences. A series of BOSS presentations to senior personnel at the Home Office detailed this and other key areas of concern, all of them backed by senior officers from the West Midlands Constabulary, Greater Manchester Police, Warwickshire Police and the Metropolitan Police Service.

Speaking to Security Management Today, Kevin Eastwood (pictured above) - executive director of BOSS - commented: "The Home Office has been receptive, and duly acknowledged the difficulties that some individuals have been experiencing in relation to the interpretation of the original guidelines. There was also a recognition that the majority of those areas experiencing difficulties with the guidelines do not have measures like our own Forecourt Watch in place."

Eastwood concluded: "Demand on police time and resources is significantly reduced by schemes like Forecourt Watch, which also help to identify prolific offenders with greater regularity. That also allows the police to take appropriate action, which is absolutely vital. This type of criminal is invariably involved with a host of other illegal activities, and simply must be stopped."

Source

SMT