Q&A: National Home Security Month

MSE_Sarah

Is Neighbourhood Watch worth joining?

National_Home_Security_Month

MSE_Sarah wrote: »

Is Neighbourhood Watch worth joining?

Somehome insurance companies may offer discounts if you live in a neighbourhoodwatch area. However, regardless of whether or not yours is one of them it isstill worth enquiring to see if there are any community crime preventionschemes running in your local area, as these can play an important part inreducing the risk of burglary or vandalism.

Former_MSE_Andrea

We say in our Home Insurance guide that better locks pay for themselves. Would you say this goes for burglar alarms too?

National_Home_Security_Month

MSE_Andrea wrote: »

We say in our Home Insurance guide that better locks pay for themselves. Would you say this goes for burglar alarms too?

Alarmsoffer an effective visual deterrent and statistics have shown that around 60%of burglaries on homes fitted with burglar alarms are unsuccessful, suggestingthey are a useful deterrent. However, around 71% of homes still don’t have aworking burglar alarm so if yours is one of them it is definitely worthconsidering investing in an alarm system.

Former_MSE_Megan

And that's a wrap! Big thanks to Fiona for answering these questions for us! There's some great info here and hopefully it'll help to keep us all a little bit safer over the winter months!

Alleycat

We are looking at getting an external keysafe for my mother in law who is becoming increasingly frail. The meals on wheels service and a select few family members would have the code. How secure are they and what should we be looking out for when buying to make sure it isn't able to be tampered with?

Also, would this be likely to invalidate home insurance?

National_Home_Security_Month

Alleycat wrote: »

We are looking at getting an external keysafe for my mother in law who is becoming increasingly frail. The meals on wheels service and a select few family members would have the code. How secure are they and what should we be looking out for when buying to make sure it isn't able to be tampered with?

Also, would this be likely to invalidate home insurance?

It is important that the key safe is positioned in a discreet place (away from the public eye). As the keys are locked away this should not invalidate the home insurance.

jamesd

There are locks that have a keypad that can be assigned different codes for each user or that can have the normal code changed regularly. These might be useful as an alternative to a key safe or key left around somewhere.

weeowens

MSE_Frederika wrote: »

I keep a spare key under a rock in my front garden. Would that invalidate my home insurance?

We had one of these placed at Mum's house.

It is a lot better than placing a key under a rock or such.