This publish is a part of a collection sponsored by IAT Insurance coverage Group.
Late at evening within the Fall of final 12 months, thieves stole 13 ECM items from a fleet of business vans in Chicago. Whereas cameras recorded the theft, no one checked the feed throughout the hour-long crime. In consequence, the thieves acquired away with roughly $100,000 of stolen items.
An ECM, or Digital Management Module, is a pc in a truck’s engine that displays and controls its transmission, braking, and different methods vital for the truck’s fundamental operation. Vehicles received’t begin with out one and the prices are excessive to interchange. A brand new ECM can take as much as 30 hours of labor to put in and prices round $9,000 in supplies alone. The actual price of ECM theft should additionally embody misplaced income attributable to downtime whereas the truck is out of fee. A scarcity of substitute ECMs solely provides to the issue.
ECM theft is rising in frequency nationwide, notably in Freightliner vans, because it takes simply seven minutes to take away an ECM from beneath a Freightliner’s dashboard. Non-Freightliners’ ECMs are tougher to entry, however thieves have developed strategies to steal them as properly.
Luckily, ECM theft prevention is easier than you would possibly anticipate. Taking the proper precautions can probably save your enterprise 1000’s of {dollars} in enterprise interruption and direct monetary loss.
Defending your enterprise from ECM theft
Keep a step forward of ECM thieves by defending your fleet with these 4 measures:
Safe your automobiles
Take into account including these fundamental safety measures to your fleet:
Lock your automobiles when not in use, particularly in a single day.
Park your vans in a way that makes accessing the cab harder. As an example, park near a wall or one other automobile.
Rent safety for the vacations when extra vans are idle and on web site. Thieves typically goal business vans over holidays after they know they received’t be in use with much less on-site safety.
Set up cameras alerting your enterprise to exercise in your yard throughout non-operating hours. Rent somebody to watch it throughout these high-risk intervals and alert authorities after they detect suspicious conduct.
Hold parked automobiles in well-lit areas with restricted entry to unauthorized events. Take into account putting in fences round your lot and utilizing a gated entry system.
Use anti-theft bolts
4 bolts safe Freightliner ECMs. Thieves anticipate finding these normal bolts and are available ready with the proper instruments for simple elimination. Catch them off guard through the use of an alternate anti-theft bolt.
Anti-theft bolts are sometimes made to order. Customary instruments received’t work on them, so it’s tougher for thieves to steal ECMS secured by them.
Contain legislation enforcement
Hold legislation enforcement within the loop if ECM theft happens. The police can examine and probably recuperate the stolen ECMs in the event you alert them rapidly sufficient. It additionally helps in monitoring patterns of those thefts, which permits legislation enforcement to higher allocate sources towards stopping them.
Phrase will get round rapidly amongst thieves. In the event that they know your enterprise is reporting each incident of ECM theft, they may transfer on to a neater goal.
Name Freightliner
Right here’s one other potential deterrent towards future crimes in the event you’ve been hit by ECM thieves: Freightliner can remotely disable your ECMs to allow them to’t be offered. Name 1-800-385-4357 to report the theft. All you want is the truck’s VIN.
Remotely disabling the ECM renders it nonfunctional. This makes it ineffective to the thief and reduces the possibilities of them focusing on your fleet once more.
ASK A LOSS CONTROL REPRESENTATIVE
Have a query on how one can mitigate threat? Electronic mail losscontroldirect@iatinsurance.com for an opportunity to see your query answered in a future weblog.
By Tom MacCallum
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