Met Police, a rant

[br d]

This is all a waste of breath but I just want to vent.

I have a fleet of vehicles for work, I have one 'spare' parked up in a secure yard owned by a storage company that I pay a monthly rent on. It's just there in case we get silly busy or a couple of the normal vans break down simultaneously and I need a backup.

One of my teams phoned me to say that driving through Canning Town they've spotted a van parked up on a driveway with my spare van plates on it.
They've stopped to have a look and the van has all it's dash and ignition pulled out and a neighbour says that the vehicle comes and goes at all hours. Over the years I've had plenty of vans stolen, crashed and used in robberies so it's clear what this is, they're using it for dodgy st and it'll eventually come back on me.
The plate has a Halfords E6 stamp on it which is Becton, so first thing I want to know is why are they supplying plates without the proper documentation.

I'll ring the store.
Yeah, forget that, you can't ring. So I'll try the 'Chat'.
Endless repetitions of a bot asking me if I want to buy a bike and is this helpful later I keep saying I want to talk to a person as it's regarding a crime.
I finally get a human being who assures me this couldn't have happened, when i press he says I have to go into the store and cuts the chat.
Cheers all the best.

The Police next,
I ring 101 and ask for the Met. Obviousy, they don't answer. A message that says if it's an emergency ring 999 otherwise go on their website.
I try this. A hundred fking questions and a "Can you show on a map where the crime occured". The map doesn't work, I can hover the pin but then no other options and going back drops me straight back to google.

I ring again and wait. Lot's of bks about crimes on Trains which obviously doesn't apply but if you stick out all this telling you to go to the website ste you eventually get "Press 9 for an operator".
This I do and then to no surprise whatsoever I get "We are experiencing a high volume of calls go to the website blah blah blah".

Now firstly, this is a number for reporting crimes, not buying a fking mattress, if you don't have enough people to answer the phone to victims of crime then employ some more, it isn't a mystery.
And secondly your website doesn't even work properly ffs.

I waited 40 minutes listening to the same crap.

I'm not anti Police at all. They've got the st end of the stick all day long and I get that but fking hell.
I've been around long enough to just put up with this kind of st and pull through, it isn't poor me I'm concerned about.

But lets say you're an old person who comes home from shopping to find someone has tried to break into your house. You're worried and vulnerable so you ring the Police and this is what you get? How the fk can they deal with this? You can't speak to a human and the website will just confuse you, there are hundreds of thousands of people like this in London, what are they supposed to do?

I told you I was just venting but this really fking annoys me. This is the Capitals Police Force for Christ sake. You have to struggle to report a crime?

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krisdelta said:

I think that is about the size of it... unfortunately. I believe they load balance across the 101 call handler group if the 999 lot are overwhelmed.

I had a similar issue when I couldn't get an ambulance to attend a woman who'd been knocked off her bike, was laying IN THE ROAD and bleeding profusely from a head wound, with traffic trying to pass the entire time.. We had to go and buy first aid stuff from Tesco to try and do what we could. This was on "The Cut" - right in the centre of London.

I feel you mate, was she okay?

Thing is they specifically tell you 999 is only for serious stuff happening now, my theoretical terrified old lady has to go 101, can you imagine her trying to sleep at night after this fiasco?

Pisses me off.

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DaveTheRave87 said:

The easiest way to get crime reports numbers to go down is to make it almost impossible to report crime.

You know what Dave, there's a lot in what you say.
I used to listen to people spouting all the "There are more crimes that go unreported" stuff and think "Well yeah, maybe some" but after this I think it is definitely a thing.
It's actually very difficult to get this done, I think a lot of people will not follow this through if their experience is like mine.

This isn't aimed at any PH Coppers, they get enough st, but somethings wrong with the system.

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qwerty360 said:

WRT the online map for reporting crimes;

If it is anything like the one for reporting cycling incidents (and I am fairly sure it is the exact same system)
1. you have to position then move the pin
2. It will only let you proceed once you zoom in fully (and plausibly move pin at maximum zoom)
3. It provides no feedback as to why it won't work...

So the fact that the incident was on a bridge that you can pick out on the first click doesn't matter. You still have to zoom in and move it for some crazy reason...

And how many old people are going to suss that out?

Saying it's deliberate sounds like conspiracy theory nonsense but that map could be rewritten to make more sense in a heartbeat.

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Tommo87 said:

Nothing to add to the police experience, but when it comes to protecting your business.

You should frive the van away if it has no ignition lock, park it up and take the plates off.
Obviously, you are insured for that registration.

Or,

Stick a cheap vanity plate on the van in the lock up, to mitigate all the speeding and parking fines you are likely to get.

Lads ripped the plates off, also found what they think is the original V5, we've taken that too and will be happy to give it back to the original owner.
Some of my guys are a little rough and ready and had many ideas at the scene that I had to talk them out of!

Your point about a vanity plate makes sense but just feels like Kowtowing, fk them frankly.

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The big yin said:

I think you can go to the Met website and report anything on line , then you have a note that you reported it.
You could also complain online .

Oh right, is that where I went wrong?

You could try reading the post.

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To answer a couple of posts, I trust my guys completely, the three that were at the scene have 30 years between them with me.
They did remove the plates and the V5 from the vehicle.

It was parked in the entrance to a small car park that serves a block of flats, the neighbour they spoke to said a couple of guys always come up the street and take it so it's not anyone living there.

It is the East End and we do a great deal of work in the area so this sort of stuff is part and parcel and to be expected.
My frustrations are as I stated, for somebody old, or vulnerable, or just busy, getting anything done about these things is made too difficult.

Calling for help when somebody vulnerable needs it should be straightforward.