A few questions... my A4 Black Edition was stolen last night
- Thread starter lukus89
- Start date
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
So the police came, collected the car, and it's now got an appointment with a garage tomorrow to see if it'll be repaired or wrote off. I was told there is little to no chance of catching these people... but tonight al be going and parking up where the car was to see if anyone turns up to collect it.... I have my reasons for doing this... mainly that in the boot of the car was a bag with 2 MacBook pro laptops in, and a whole load of kit totalling around £3000. I can't claim for any of it. - You should be able to claim this under your away from home house policy, i've done this previously with Iphone & camera
Anyway, my questions are this:
1. Going from the pictures (I know they aren't great) or from peoples experience... (and please, only speak if you have experience, I don't want to know about what the general people think will happen, I want to know someone whos had this!) would the car be wrote off for this kind of damage? - No personal experience with this one, although my Audi dealer said due to the heavily censored A4, electrical damage is not worth their while tracing/repairing, so they'll advise a write off most times
2. Do the insurance garages tend to do a decent job of a repair, or am I going to get my car back as some rattling mess that I will hate forever. - I was with Swinton when my wife decided to argue with the ar$e of a corsa, yes the A4 came off worse, anyway, the insurance used these cowboys http://www.nationwiderepairs.co.uk/centres/list , stay clear, mine came back a ****** mess. A complaint to the insurance did not fair well either.
3. Being that these cars are targeted, and clearly the people stealing them have a decent method of programming a key quickly, is there any security devices that don't cost an arm and a leg that could be fitted? I considered a streering lock, simply because you can see it a mile away.
4. Do peoples insurance premiums go up drasticly for this? my insurance is ****** high as it is, and i'd hate to think something that wasn't my fault had caused it to rise? - Mine went up £100 even though i've protected bonus with max years and 20yrs driving, this was down to "an increased number of uninsured drivers!"
5. Finally, when they do a repair, is it proper? as in, will I get my OBD2 Port back in place, will everything work, or is it just the minimum? - My car was away for 3 weeks, shoddy workmansip but mine was getting traded so not to much of a fuss kicked up by me
View attachment 76886
Thanks.[/QUOTE]
hope the above helps
hope the above helps
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
I'd say stupid old you... Why would someone try steal a car they know theres a tracker in?
The car was replaced with plates that were from the exact same model car.
It's clear what it was stolen for.
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
hope the above helps
hope the above helps[/QUOTE]
Cheers kev, it does.
The car is at KAG Accident repair center, from the people I've spoken to, they're decent lads and it should be fine.
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
Not really... it's silly comments like that, that put people off and distract people from real issues. Buying a GPS tracker for your car is a great idea for some extra security.
You should think before you speak.
I've just got one, fitting it seems simple enough, but I think that you would need to think long and hard before finding a reason to remove it, seems that I'll need to get some adaption maps generated soon, fit the blocker then leave inquisitive look-seeing alone for a while, which is fair enough.
The OBD Saver gets taken apart, first stage fitted to block the OBD socket and the remainder refitted to it and locked.
I had a look on that site and did not see a list of products they sold on, what exactly is it that you are buying from them, broadly speaking?
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2015
- Messages
- 1,850
- Reaction score
- 864
- Points
- 113
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
I wouldn't get one, i'd get the new solution from Paul @ OBD Security.
His site isn't up yet as he's waiting to get Thatcham approved.... but I've got one coming, and al be posting a review of it with some detailed pictures and testing on here. I think he said he should be approved this week, which means he'll be selling next week i'd expect.
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
any way. my were only based on. You but a tracker, you potentially tell some little scrote that you have something worth tracking. They rip your dash apart looking for something.
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
So,
Lets figure out the logic here.
I buy a £35.00 tracker from eBay.
At no point do I mention what i'm doing this for.
The tracker is shipped to my business address, picked up by my secretary, and dropped round at my house.
The people who sold the tracker, travel from London where it's shipped from, 4 hours in the car to West Yorkshire where I am, to steal what ever I've decided to track.... "because it's worth tracking"
They arrive at the office to find around 50 vehicles, and 26 businesses in different units.... but it's fine, they whip out the crystal ball and follow my secretary to my house where they see my her come to my door and hand it to me.
A few hours later I code the new tracker to respond to my mobile number only, and fit it to my car.
After sitting outside my house for 3 hours while I stuff my face they watch me do this.
They then whip together a number plate that also matches the exact spec, year of manufacture and colour of my vehicle, that's off the road. That night they take my car and swap these plates to there new one. They then park the car up, 2 miles from my house.... and leave it... also leaving inside the GPS tracker that I bought from them... active, and working.
I'd love to have your imagination your life must be incredible.
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
Not wasting my time. No offence but you're just writing utter **** now. Moving on.
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
So, maybe being dumb here, what exactly happened here, as far as you can make out? Was it - targeted "correct/matched" car stolen for future resale, but thieves were equipped with a scanner to detect an active tracker so stopped to disable it but run out of ideas as to where it was, or ???? If it was the first option then they were properly kitted out all that was missing was a steel box truck to run it into quickly to screen the tracker transmitting signals. I would have thought that as they were working at that level, they would also have had a "noise generator" running at the tracker frequency band to blot it out - maybe that is the next level up of working!
Trouble is, I think that these gangs only "collect" cars, if they damage them, the reward vanishes and the car needs to be dumped and the plates used for the next one??
Trouble is, I think that these gangs only "collect" cars, if they damage them, the reward vanishes and the car needs to be dumped and the plates used for the next one??
_Zerocool_
Registered User
Its been raised already but I do think it is interesting that the car was stolen 2 weeks after you had the tracker fitted...
I'm not saying it was but I would be suspicious of an inside job.
It does seem to me that they knew it had a tracker.
They've taken the car from your house and stopped not far away to try and find and remove the tracker. They use scanners for this. Thats possibly why your glove box and the cowling around the steering wheel had been removed.
They've either not been able to find it or they've been spooked and run off.
Its quite common for a nice car to be stolen and then parked up in a street in plain view. Its a test to see if it has a tracker. If the Police find it within a few days then it may have a tracker and they move onto the next one. If it is still there then they are still game on.
I've found a few cars in this way. (tracker sent me a nice pin badge when I found my first one a few years back. It was a nice blue M5)
FYI a cloned plate wouldn't have to be from a car that is shown off the road. It would actually need to be shown as on the road, taxed and insured ideally. It also doesn't need to be the same model exactly, just similar.
So for example the car in front is a stolen audi S3. It has the plates of a genuine cloned audi A3 TDI in the same colour.At night they do look similar from a distance. A check on the cloned plate would reveal that it wasn't stolen and was taxed, tested and insured, and looks pretty much the same. The Police have ways of identifying the car but I won't go into that.
I'm not saying it was but I would be suspicious of an inside job.
It does seem to me that they knew it had a tracker.
They've taken the car from your house and stopped not far away to try and find and remove the tracker. They use scanners for this. Thats possibly why your glove box and the cowling around the steering wheel had been removed.
They've either not been able to find it or they've been spooked and run off.
Its quite common for a nice car to be stolen and then parked up in a street in plain view. Its a test to see if it has a tracker. If the Police find it within a few days then it may have a tracker and they move onto the next one. If it is still there then they are still game on.
I've found a few cars in this way. (tracker sent me a nice pin badge when I found my first one a few years back. It was a nice blue M5)
FYI a cloned plate wouldn't have to be from a car that is shown off the road. It would actually need to be shown as on the road, taxed and insured ideally. It also doesn't need to be the same model exactly, just similar.
So for example the car in front is a stolen audi S3. It has the plates of a genuine cloned audi A3 TDI in the same colour.At night they do look similar from a distance. A check on the cloned plate would reveal that it wasn't stolen and was taxed, tested and insured, and looks pretty much the same. The Police have ways of identifying the car but I won't go into that.
This was my thinking. But with the OP's explanation of how his tracker was delivered, it is incredibly unlikely. But without knowing the ins and outs of his tracker delivery. You can only comment on what you see.
Editted: to be less petty.
Last edited:
Tut Tut, I was just looking for clarification and not wanting to re-open old wounds! Basically the more we can gather/learn from other's misfortunes the better we might be equipped to avoid the same happening to us - I know that the only way to avoid this is to buy an old Lada, well maybe not, they have probably come up in value as they are needed in films/TV series it seems.
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
To reply to all of it:
It's definitely a targeted vehicle. I'll go through everything that happened in detail below so you can get an idea of how I know it was targeted.
- Car Stolen during the night. I discovered it missing around 9.
I tracked it to 2 miles away, parked next to a bush as you can see on the picture. The copper ran the plate and found it was the exact same model, colour and such, but registered near Coventry.
My old plates were in the boot. In the front, the OBD panel had been removed with the OBD wires cut. The glove box had been ripped out entirely. It was clear to see the car had been searched. I disagree about a scanner being used, simply because if they had they'd have found it.
The boot panels, all were removed (including the metal clip that the boot lid hooks onto to lock.. I found that quite thorough!) side panels (including the left side panel, where my tracker was) were all removed.
The car was stolen Wednesday, and on Friday I got a call from someone asking If i'd lost a bag. That was my laptop bag from the car... it's actually a ruck sack as it carries screw drivers, 2 laptops, loads of discs and cables and such. Laptops, and screw drivers, and some other stuff were gone but some stuff was left.
This was found in a field literally 2000 yards from my house. I know the guy who's field it was in, so I now knew that they took it that way, and I looked over the weekend to see if I could find any more of the stuff from my boot but there was nothing.
I strongly believe the reason the car was left so close to my house was because it had such low fuel... I fill it up completely normally, but I'd decided that night i'd do it in the morning.. I think if I hadn't the car would have been a long, long way away.
I think it's clear to see it was a targeted job. The coppers told me they buy a car, that's going to be wrote off, take the plates, and stick that on my car. They then change the VIN and sell it on. Most people never see the car again, or if they do, it's after it's been sold to some unlucky sod for a really low cash price.
I've known about this since getting the car, I knew they were targeted and that's why I put the tracker in.
To say a GPS seller has targeted this car is beyond retarded. These trackers are sold for hundreds of different uses. At no point do you put in any of your vehicle details, you don't even have to say its for a vehicle.. no info is taken. They had the plates with them for the exact car, they knew exactly what they wanted.
There are audis up and down my street (in fact there is one directly behind where mine is parked... like 5 foot away.) and they haven't been touched... it's a planned job.
Anyone in the trade also knows that plates have identification marks to show where they were made. This can link you to a garage and you can often then find out who made it. These plates had all that information removed.
1 - Find a car, that's damaged, and going to be wrote off. Buy for cheap.
2 - Hunt for exact model.
3 - Find it, steal it.
4 - Park it up, wait to see if it's retrieved.
5 - Change vin, put advert up for it, around 2k cheaper than anything else.
6 - sell on to unsuspecting person.
My advice...
Get a tracker. If your so scared of you being targeted (my god it annoys me off to even write this) by the company selling it "because you must have something worth nicking" then get it delivered somewhere else.... Christ.
Fit it, but fit it well. Mine was magnetically attached to the car, hidden in the side panel. Once I get the car back, it's going to wired into the car electrics and hidden way way way below where it was.
Get an OBD blocker. As I've said I've ordered from Paul at OBD security and his new product is on its way... i'll post some reviews and i'll be testing it (as I've agreed to with him) to see if I can get it broken or to work... when I say testing, I mean properly.. it will be put through the paces).
If possible.. don't park it on a road. I'm also getting posts put in the drive way that mean it won't be going anywhere.. I know some people don't have that choice but thought it was worth putting.
And finally... keep an eye out. A day before my car got stolen another car drove up next to it and stared at it for a while... enough for me to notice... if you see that, take the number plate, and park it more securely than you normally do if possible.
Hope that helps.
It's definitely a targeted vehicle. I'll go through everything that happened in detail below so you can get an idea of how I know it was targeted.
- Car Stolen during the night. I discovered it missing around 9.
I tracked it to 2 miles away, parked next to a bush as you can see on the picture. The copper ran the plate and found it was the exact same model, colour and such, but registered near Coventry.
My old plates were in the boot. In the front, the OBD panel had been removed with the OBD wires cut. The glove box had been ripped out entirely. It was clear to see the car had been searched. I disagree about a scanner being used, simply because if they had they'd have found it.
The boot panels, all were removed (including the metal clip that the boot lid hooks onto to lock.. I found that quite thorough!) side panels (including the left side panel, where my tracker was) were all removed.
The car was stolen Wednesday, and on Friday I got a call from someone asking If i'd lost a bag. That was my laptop bag from the car... it's actually a ruck sack as it carries screw drivers, 2 laptops, loads of discs and cables and such. Laptops, and screw drivers, and some other stuff were gone but some stuff was left.
This was found in a field literally 2000 yards from my house. I know the guy who's field it was in, so I now knew that they took it that way, and I looked over the weekend to see if I could find any more of the stuff from my boot but there was nothing.
I strongly believe the reason the car was left so close to my house was because it had such low fuel... I fill it up completely normally, but I'd decided that night i'd do it in the morning.. I think if I hadn't the car would have been a long, long way away.
I think it's clear to see it was a targeted job. The coppers told me they buy a car, that's going to be wrote off, take the plates, and stick that on my car. They then change the VIN and sell it on. Most people never see the car again, or if they do, it's after it's been sold to some unlucky sod for a really low cash price.
I've known about this since getting the car, I knew they were targeted and that's why I put the tracker in.
To say a GPS seller has targeted this car is beyond retarded. These trackers are sold for hundreds of different uses. At no point do you put in any of your vehicle details, you don't even have to say its for a vehicle.. no info is taken. They had the plates with them for the exact car, they knew exactly what they wanted.
There are audis up and down my street (in fact there is one directly behind where mine is parked... like 5 foot away.) and they haven't been touched... it's a planned job.
Anyone in the trade also knows that plates have identification marks to show where they were made. This can link you to a garage and you can often then find out who made it. These plates had all that information removed.
1 - Find a car, that's damaged, and going to be wrote off. Buy for cheap.
2 - Hunt for exact model.
3 - Find it, steal it.
4 - Park it up, wait to see if it's retrieved.
5 - Change vin, put advert up for it, around 2k cheaper than anything else.
6 - sell on to unsuspecting person.
My advice...
Get a tracker. If your so scared of you being targeted (my god it annoys me off to even write this) by the company selling it "because you must have something worth nicking" then get it delivered somewhere else.... Christ.
Fit it, but fit it well. Mine was magnetically attached to the car, hidden in the side panel. Once I get the car back, it's going to wired into the car electrics and hidden way way way below where it was.
Get an OBD blocker. As I've said I've ordered from Paul at OBD security and his new product is on its way... i'll post some reviews and i'll be testing it (as I've agreed to with him) to see if I can get it broken or to work... when I say testing, I mean properly.. it will be put through the paces).
If possible.. don't park it on a road. I'm also getting posts put in the drive way that mean it won't be going anywhere.. I know some people don't have that choice but thought it was worth putting.
And finally... keep an eye out. A day before my car got stolen another car drove up next to it and stared at it for a while... enough for me to notice... if you see that, take the number plate, and park it more securely than you normally do if possible.
Hope that helps.
Last edited by a moderator:
One bit that confuses me is that they cut the OBD socket off, why, or are you convinced that that was done purely to get the panels off quickly, surely they would need to keep the OBD socket active to continue to being able to use their kit to bypass the immobilisers fitted to the car by Audi and drive it, this is a serious question as it blows away any benefit of blocking the OBD port with any device, back to tracker I suppose, if you can't stop them at least you can find the car - that is if you still want it after it has been messed about with.
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
Oh,
And the people who target these cars are often not the ones who steal them. They generally pay people to nick it and such.
I thought the same... apparently, one of 2 reasons:
1 - When the smashed the window, and reached in for the socket they couldn't get to it, instead the ripped the panel up so it was easier to get to the socket (the socket is part of the panel) and then when they drove it away, the panel was now in their way.
2 - When they parked the car up they didn't want me to come back, and reprogramme my key to the car and drive it off?
Asked around and that's best explanations people can come up with. I personally think it'll be number 1.
And the people who target these cars are often not the ones who steal them. They generally pay people to nick it and such.
I thought the same... apparently, one of 2 reasons:
1 - When the smashed the window, and reached in for the socket they couldn't get to it, instead the ripped the panel up so it was easier to get to the socket (the socket is part of the panel) and then when they drove it away, the panel was now in their way.
2 - When they parked the car up they didn't want me to come back, and reprogramme my key to the car and drive it off?
Asked around and that's best explanations people can come up with. I personally think it'll be number 1.
Okay.
As an answer to someone's question "was it an insurer approved tracker?", one reply might be, "do you want to save £30 a year by spending a huge amount of money and also £150 a year maintenance? - or do you want to spend a sensible amount of money and save nothing in insurance but can track your car?" remember the tracker does not stop the car being removed, it only earns it keep afterwards - maybe more relevant to commercial vehicles with sealed and expensive loads that would take a few hours to unload. I'll add that I would consider a tracker of the sort the OP used for my S4, so I'm not knocking the concept of using a tracker. I'd think in tracker terms, the ultimate is a system where you securely log into and register your journey every time you jumped into the car, and logged out securely at the end of that journey or after any stop in that journey - how many of us would bother using that? Probably that is where the fleet of Lada runabouts comes into its own?
Side note:- We have a very good security alarm fitted to our house, we did not fit it so the security company will not discuss anything regarding it with me the next owner, what they would do is to fit another system and support that - also, my house insurer will not accept that system as they did not agree to it being fitted. In the security world, evolution seems to be getting used for updating approval standards and it is us mugs that are paying it, it is a business after all, and so in wonky UK it is not there to serve and earn its keep, but there to prosper and forget the buyer? Gone is the real world of ACTION > REACTION = SORTED, it is more like INCIDENT > BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY = SORTED!
As an answer to someone's question "was it an insurer approved tracker?", one reply might be, "do you want to save £30 a year by spending a huge amount of money and also £150 a year maintenance? - or do you want to spend a sensible amount of money and save nothing in insurance but can track your car?" remember the tracker does not stop the car being removed, it only earns it keep afterwards - maybe more relevant to commercial vehicles with sealed and expensive loads that would take a few hours to unload. I'll add that I would consider a tracker of the sort the OP used for my S4, so I'm not knocking the concept of using a tracker. I'd think in tracker terms, the ultimate is a system where you securely log into and register your journey every time you jumped into the car, and logged out securely at the end of that journey or after any stop in that journey - how many of us would bother using that? Probably that is where the fleet of Lada runabouts comes into its own?
Side note:- We have a very good security alarm fitted to our house, we did not fit it so the security company will not discuss anything regarding it with me the next owner, what they would do is to fit another system and support that - also, my house insurer will not accept that system as they did not agree to it being fitted. In the security world, evolution seems to be getting used for updating approval standards and it is us mugs that are paying it, it is a business after all, and so in wonky UK it is not there to serve and earn its keep, but there to prosper and forget the buyer? Gone is the real world of ACTION > REACTION = SORTED, it is more like INCIDENT > BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY = SORTED!
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2015
- Messages
- 230
- Reaction score
- 34
- Points
- 28
Agree entirely. Insurance approval is just a modern way of bribery. GPS company bribes insurance to say only approve ours = here's a load of money.
The GPS is a good shout.. just remember, if you never see the car again, your insurance will go way higher than if you recover it. Plus... what if you happened to catch em stealing it? you can give live updates to the cops as you follow it on your GPS...
Cheers kev, it does.
The car is at KAG Accident repair center, from the people I've spoken to, they're decent lads and it should be fine.[/QUOTE]
i wish you all the best man - hope it's sorted soon.
xpoweruk
TTTS 8J Smile Machine
- Joined
- May 10, 2015
- Messages
- 2,436
- Reaction score
- 1,770
- Points
- 113
Once they have used the kit they have a working key fob,so no need to plug back in
Isn't it insurance that covers you the difference on your car? So you get back what you paid, rather than it's current value. Ideal if you buy a new car and it loses 2k driving off the forecourt, someone bumps into you and you're down.
xpoweruk
TTTS 8J Smile Machine
- Joined
- May 10, 2015
- Messages
- 2,436
- Reaction score
- 1,770
- Points
- 113
My GAP was £265
Car is covered till 2020
They will pay out up to £15,000 shortfall on my car insurance pay out
Car is agreed at £20,000 value
so for example
car written off,insurance pay me £12,000 GAP pay me £8,000
So I still have £20,000 to buy a new car
Car is covered till 2020
They will pay out up to £15,000 shortfall on my car insurance pay out
Car is agreed at £20,000 value
so for example
car written off,insurance pay me £12,000 GAP pay me £8,000
So I still have £20,000 to buy a new car
- Joined
- Sep 19, 2015
- Messages
- 1,109
- Reaction score
- 2,286
- Points
- 113
Since your car is fairly new, It just covers you if the car is stolen or written off. Which I think is a good buy if/when things go wrong. I paid £85 for cover 'return to invoice' of £23,300.
