Preventing Package Theft At Your Home

In 2017, online shopping sales grew 17% and accounted for 49% of the retail economy. The obvious result to this is the number of packages left on porches in Virginia-Highland. With this increasing trend comes a higher rate of package theft in our intown neighborhood. There is an actual term for someone who follows package delivery trucks and looks for a pile of packages to steal; “package pirates.”

Here are a few tips that could help prevent packages pirates from taking your online purchase as their treasure.

Have packages sent to your workplace 

I have a tech junkie coworker who sends his online purchases to the office so his wife doesn’t know about them. He also does this because he doesn’t want his high tech/high dollar purchases sitting on the front porch all day. Most offices have a mail room that is staffed during the day. One thing to keep in mind is if the packages arrives after your office mail room closes, you may not get your needed item until the next business day.

Consider mail box service

For frequent online shoppers or for people who work out of their homes and have work related parcels and documents coming to their home office, look into a PO Box or Amazon locker. The UPS Store, USPS and Kinko’s offer delivery boxes for monthly rates.

Sign up for delivery notification, rerouting and rescheduling ability

Both UPS and FedEx offer web apps to help reroute parcels to another address and reschedule your package delivery (UPS My Choice and FedEx’s Delivery Manager). These apps also give you delivery tracking, delay notifications and package status.

While on vacation…
If you are away from your home during the holidays or on vacation, look into rerouting or rescheduling delivery. You can also request a delivery hold from the USPS: You can do this on their website with the option of pick up at the post office or deliver all mail once you return. Also, if you ask a neighbor to look out for your home, remind them to check for packages as well.

To quote Julie Andrews, “Brown paper packages tied up with strings, these are a few of my favorite things.” A few simple precautions can help ensure that you get your favorite things.

Submitted by: Troy Murray