Masonry Magazine August 2006 Page. 21
THEFT OF CONSTRUCTION EQUIPMENT AND TOOLS
IS AN ESCALATING PROBLEM ACROSS THE COUNTRY
AS EMPLOYEES, small-time thieves and sophisticated crime
rings are ripping off contractors right on their own job sites.
While hard numbers are not available, most experts agree that
annual losses now exceed $1 billion.
"If you combine tools, equipment, heavy equipment and
building materials, it's over $1 billion a year," said Ed DeMoss,
CEO of Total Risk Management Inc. in Kansas City, Mo. "It's a
problem, and it's growing"
Worse yet, stolen equipment is rarely recovered. In its "2005
Heavy Equipment Theft Report," released in January 2006, the
National Equipment Register (NER) stated it had received
77,492 theft reports. According to the report, "As little as 10 per-
cent of stolen equipment is ever recovered."
Likewise, most contractors are concerned about or have
been victims of theft, according to a study by DEWALT.
"Ninety-seven percent of everyone we talked to is worried
about it, and 75 percent have experienced up to five thefts each
year," said Bill Pugh, the Baltimore-based company's director of
marketing. "It's not just about filing insurance reports and
police reports; it's fronting the cash to buy the stuff."
"If there's a market for it - and there generally is - it's just a matter of loading it up and driving it across the border." - Frank Scafidi, NICB
Easy to Steal, Hard to Trace
A HOST OF FACTORS make construction sites attractive
targets for thieves, not the least of which is the ease of stealing
unprotected equipment.
"We have thefts of big machinery, and it's mostly occurring
on job sites. Everything is being stolen - compressors, genera-
tors, skid loaders, forklifts, heavy equipment. They're easy to
heist," said Frank Scafidi, director of public affairs for the Des
Plaines, III.-based National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB).
"If there's a market for it and there generally is it's just a
matter of loading it up and driving it across the border."
Another problem is that one key will usually fit most con-
struction equipment, so thieves with a master key can start and
steal the machinery.
Also, when people see the equipment being loaded onto
trucks, it typically doesn't raise concern. "No one thinks it's
suspicious when someone loads up equipment and drives
away. They think that's what's supposed to happen," said Glen
Sider, operations manager for NER in New York City.
Thieves are also getting more brazen, Sider said. He cites a
contractor who drove by his job site on a Sunday morning and
saw a piece of heavy equipment being loaded onto a flatbed. He
stopped to investigate. The men showed him paperwork from
the leasing company, saying they were bringing the equipment
in for servicing. Since the paperwork and explanation seemed
legitimate, he let it go. The next day, when the equipment was-
n't returned, he called the leasing company. He found out the
equipment had been stolen right in front of his eyes.
The theft problem is further compounded by the lack of a
single source for identifying and tracking equipment. Unlike
vehicle identification numbers for cars and trucks, construction
equipment has a variety of number and letter codes, and their
placement on the machine often varies by manufacturer.
"It would be a lot easier if there were a standardized way of
reporting these," Scafidi said. "What allows construction theft to
be so lucrative is the ease of disguising a piece of hot equipment."
The use of incorrect equipment names when filing a theft
report also adds to the confusion. The same piece of equip
ment may be known by a dozen different names, which can
also change by region.