STOLEN - OY60 GDJ

[MagpieMatt]

Hi

Last night in between 12-6am I unfortunately had my car stolen off my driveway, I have the keys, the window drivers side was smashed and car was gone. God knows how they've got anyway, the steering lock was on full lock also.

I live in Tamworth Staffordshire about 20mins from Birmingham. Can everyone possibly keep an eye out or let me know if any of the following parts for the car show up on selling sites or have any sitings.

OY60 GDJ
Audi A4 B8 1.8 TFSI
Had the following mods:
AP coilovers
19" 5 segmant Rs6 alloys wrapped in new Uniroyals all round
Front splitter
Rs grill
Windows tinted
Wind deflectors

Sorry mods if this aint in the right section

 

[jdp1962]

Awful news, @MagpieMatt , so sorry to hear about this.

 

[gary_a4_quattro]

Really sorry to hear that, hope some positive news comes your way. I'm just south of Birmingham, will certainly keep my eyes open. Worth looking on gumtree etc for things like the wheels, grill etc, you never know. Did yours have the 'advanced key' ?

 

[V6_Man]

Aweful news mate and I feel your pain. I had an 'attempt' made on my S4 last night at precisely 1:10am. CCTV captured it, luckily I woke at the same time and took the keys with me upstairs. The did manage to open the car and took few bits but nothing else. Not sure how they couldn't start the car maybe because I took the keys upstairs and put in the box in my wardrobe? Lucky escape. Looking at security options ATM.


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[jdp1962]

Aweful news mate and I feel your pain. I had an 'attempt' made on my S4 last night at precisely 1:10am. CCTV captured it, luckily I woke at the same time and took the keys with me upstairs. The did manage to open the car and took few bits but nothing else. Not sure how they couldn't start the car maybe because I took the keys upstairs and put in the box in my wardrobe? Lucky escape. Looking at security options ATM.


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Blimey @Tashfeen, mate, any damage?

 

[V6_Man]

Blimey @Tashfeen, mate, any damage?

Luckily not much @jdp1962. Cigg burnt driver side alcantara, charger cables and an aftershave. Don't keep much in the car anyways. I have spoken to two my neighbors (corner houses), explained what happened last night and asked them that I would pay and wanted to instal two CCTV camera on their walls. I will pay for cabling and will connect them to my house no matter how much it costs. They said they will 'think' and let me know. Lets hope they agree to it as I would said yes straight away if someone was only asking to install the camera on my walls and willing to pay. Provides security to all 8 of us living here.


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[rum4mo]

Sorry to hear about your bad news!

Just when I had come to think that a "60" reg car was too old for that sort of threat!

I have a physical barrier/lock on my OBD2 port and it sounds like it was via that that they managed to get that car away, also, when well South of the Scotland/England border I always fit my disklock to try to improve its chances of being ignored.

Finally, even although it was "just" a 1.8TFSI, it might just have looked like something further up the range, so attracted more interest, I hope your insurer knows about all these extras you fitted to it!

 

[MagpieMatt]

yeah im still in shock a bit, feel physically sick knowing someones rummaging through my personal belongings lol.

No I didn't have any advance keys etc, I literally have no idea how they've got it started, I had the bedroom window open slightly and the dog slept in the room and he goes crazy at anything literally and not even a creek, so bizarre. Tbh its looks very similar to an S4 so they'll be presently surprised when they hear the roar of all 120bhp.

Police were useless unfortunately they literally just gave me an crime number thats it. Yeah im fully insured with all mods declared etc just waiting for payout now over the next week or so hopefully.

I am slightly worried though as my car was robbed from my mother in laws drive and not my home address and also worried a bit regarding the payout amount

 

[rum4mo]

I'd think that the place it was stolen from will not change anything, proper insurers allow us to occasional visit other locations and maybe even leave the car there overnight.
I always thought the plan for taking these cars was:- quietly break driver's side front window, reach in and plug your "bad boys/scum" lead into the open and easily reachable OBD2 port, generate a "key", open door start car and drive away. Please note here that the interior monitoring sensors are conveniently chosen and placed so that there is always a "dead zone" at the front doors - so no alarm would have sounded at any time - nice, and thank you Audi!

 

[gary_a4_quattro]

Its just a totally horrible situation @MagpieMatt , assume that there has been no further news ?

I entirely realise that its regretably too late for Matt , but thought it might be worthy to flag up this previous thread, in case anyone might find it beneficial, with regard to disabling the OBD port. Its not entirely foolproof, but may well save the car, or at least buy some time, if an OBD hack device was used:

http://www.audi-sport.net/xf/threads/disabling-the-obd-port-for-free.274952/

Don't think this is intended to replace either a physical or electronic OBD blocker, but its somethink that might be worthwhile.

 

[Meemo]

sorry to hear that, seems most of the thefts where no key is taken or glass, they have one person hold a signal booster plate to the door which boosts your key signal so that they unlock the car with your own signal, then once in they only need to plug in their vag com to code the key they brought with, then start your car and drive off... other cases with no key is flat bed and they just drag it off.. less comon but still happens sadly. See allot of cctv footage of both on the Stolen Cars UK.
For a few days after they steal them, there is a good chance they have parked it up on false plates not far away, so that they arent caught red handed if it has a tracker, worth a drive around your local roads incase you recognise it whilst it cools.

Recomend sharing on there if you havent already, seen a few actually get spotted by followers on flat beds being transported or parked on streets whilst they are confirming no tracker, get returned. they are hugely around Birmingham the users in that group.

Facebook group - Stolen cars uk
So sorry for you, fingers crossed!

 

[Meemo]

you say you had a steering lock on or you locked the steering by turning the wheel? sorry the way you put it has confused me a lil

 

[Seanchadwick2k3]

Best theft preventer in my opinion is a hidden switch cutting off the fuel pump. Not sure how difficult it would be to route into the cab but it would be practically free other than some cable a switch and your own time.

Hope you get some good news soon anyway mate.

 

[rum4mo]

you say you had a steering lock on or you locked the steering by turning the wheel? sorry the way you put it has confused me a lil

I read it as being surprised that it was moved as the car's steering had the wheels turned well away from straight ahead and the car's steering lock would be on.

The methods of "taking" a car that you mention refer, I think, more to the cars with full Kessy as the key is always transmitting and the car is always ready and waiting, not the cleverest bit of car convenience in my mind!

 

[LukeyC]

Sorry to hear of your plight OP.

I have keyless entry, and make sure I keep my keys away from the outside perimeter of the house to help prevent attacks using the "signal booster method".

From my tests, the advanced key broadcasts a range of about 3 feet, so in my mind as long as the key is more than 3 feet away from the outside walls/windows, they won't be able to detect & clone the signal to trick the car. However, to be extra safe I keep both the keys inside one of these too:

Amazon product

They are then locked in my safe overnight, and I've also removed the fuses that disable the ODBII port. As I understand it, the doors will be deadlocked so they won't be able to access the fuse box to reconnect the ODBII port to code their own key, and they won't be able to boost the wireless key signal.

My doors and windows are re-enforced, with high quality anti-snap/anti bump locks, deadbolts and a house alarm (plus a very friendly Cockerpoodle!). but if I find myself face to face with someone demanding my keys then they can happily have them - Frankly they'd have earned it!

No house is impenetrable, but I hope that gives people (cheap) some ideas and best practices to minimise risk.

At the end of the day you can only do what you can to make it more effort than it's worth.

 

[LukeyC]

OK I'm not sure why the link isn't showing, basically if you Google "faraday pouch" and head to amazon there are loads of options on there that will help reduce / completely block the signal.

Mine is the "defender signal blocker" which was about £7, and completely blocks the key even when it's right next to the sensor.

 

[scotty76]

More about the key pouches here:

http://www.audi-sport.net/xf/threads/rfid-pouch-wallet-for-keys.355676/page-2

(Page 1 had a bit of bickering hence starting at page 2)

 

[MagpieMatt]

No sign of the car still, police haven't had any leads either, I had my local newspaper contact me though, an editor who's also a car nut saw the appeals over facebook as ive had over 200+ people share the post through numerous pages. He knew way more than anyone ive spoke to regarding crime in the area and told me of loads of recent luxury/sports cars are being taken through OBD and keyless entry etc, however the support from local police has been appalling.

My insurance also are taking the driving me up the wall (Axa insurance) I put the value at 12k a bit more than usual down to the mods on the car and the recent engine rebuild done by Audi. As it still owe 4k on finance and don't have gap insurance im going to barely be paid out anything, the insurance will try offer me 7k ish ill of course refuse first offer but theres a chance ill just have 3k in my hand (after finance settled) and still no car, im also paying £150 a week to rent a courtesy car as my insurance only supplied me one if the car was in a accident and not stolen.

The whole situation is very demoralising to say the least.

 

[rum4mo]

Two(?) years ago, friends of us were away on holiday with their campervan and left their A6 and Golf parked at the front of their house on the driveway.
One of their sons went to the house a couple of days after they left to check everything was okay and mail etc - both cars gone, though on that occasion forced entry had been made at the rear of the house, so keys taken.
Police were informed immediately etc, police did confirm that both cars had been used to trap a taxi and wrecking bars were used to get into the taxi and remove all cash from the driver.
After a couple of months, the wife started getting threatening notices about unpaid parking fines for her Golf, she dug deeper into this for more facts and found her Golf parked in open view in the nearby city, seem that it had been just used to rob the taxi or taxis and dumped in that spot in a very public parking area, by this time it was no longer her car so she just let the authorities know who now owned it, ie the insurance company.
Maybe 15>18 months later the A6 was found about 100 miles South of where it was taken, the husband asked the police, out of curiosity what the final recorded mileage was - they were not interested in giving him any details about at all.
So, the wife has ended up with a C3 - a quick cheap, almost new buy and eventually the husband now has a well used Porsche 4WD thing.
One other thing that maybe they did not consider, when they saved a bit of money on changing insurers a few years before this point, they changed to "2 car insurance" - seemed like a good idea, but, it would only provide one loan car when a claim is made, and only provided it for maybe 7 or 14 days, something to watch out for if any of you have "2 car cover" especially if both people still work and need a car for that!
I think that the cruellest part of this sorry tale was that I had bought a safe to bolt into the floor and wall of our house a short time before that, and I had almost been laughed at for wasting money on that - I think that now they will have wished that they had a safe and used it, had adequate insurance over to allow them to continue as normal until they replaced their cars, and understood that police are not really allowed to bother with small time crime against private individuals. Quite a few lessons learned there!

 

[philbell]

Horrible to hear that bro, just got my car how I want it and i’m only down the road in Cannock, i’ll be sure to put my keys in the back of the house, we already have CCTV as my mom’s Macan was nearly stolen a few months back.. hopefully if mine was stolen they’d get stuck on a speedbump or loose it down a pothole and I could catch up with them haha, feel like a tracker should be on the list next if the crime rate is going up :/

 

[rum4mo]

Remember as said here and many other times, tracker stops nothing - and it is stopping the car being taken that you should be aiming to do.

Tracker works well for someone that just sees their car as being an easily replaceable standard lump of metal and plastic, if you, like many people on here, sort your car out to suit you and like it a lot, then stopping it being taken must be your plan.

 

[spartacus 68]

Horrendous to read this. Seriously looking at cctv for the front of my house.

Hope things work out with the insurance and you get a satisfactory resolution to this. I'd have these people locked up for minimum of 5 years with Shawshank hard labour to keep them occupied. Justice system is a joke which is why this type of crime will be repeated the length and breadth of the country.

 

[CarbonMike]

Gutted for you mate. Over the years Ive had 2 modified cars stolen & both found stripped days/week later.

Seems to be an epidemic of keyless thefts across the Midlands in the last 12+ months. Glad I now live on the south coast instead of the Black Country! Get it posted on "Stolen Cars Midlands" facebook page ASAP.

Altho every morning I check outside to make sure my A4 & Mrs's ST are both still there. Call it paranoia or whatever but can never be to careful. Even bought a steering wheel lock just to use when i go north to visit the parents!

 

[MagpieMatt]

Just a quick update! Car was found wrote off in Walsall, police had it for forensics for a week or so, come back negative no suspects etc.

My insurance is a joke only just had my 1st offer today which I turned down, nearly 4 weeks absolutely disgusting service. My broker was Adrian Flux who were great but my underwriters Axa and are the worst company ive ever dealt with. I would tell everyone to avoid them 100%

I should hopefully be picking up my 16' facelift A6 estate next weekend, ive learnt my lesson not having extra security, cat 1 with proxys, fake obd and a crook lock will be installed asap.

Thanks

 

[DAN@ADRIAN FLUX]

Just a quick update! Car was found wrote off in Walsall, police had it for forensics for a week or so, come back negative no suspects etc.

My insurance is a joke only just had my 1st offer today which I turned down, nearly 4 weeks absolutely disgusting service. My broker was Adrian Flux who were great but my underwriters Axa and are the worst company ive ever dealt with. I would tell everyone to avoid them 100%

I should hopefully be picking up my 16' facelift A6 estate next weekend, ive learnt my lesson not having extra security, cat 1 with proxys, fake obd and a crook lock will be installed asap.

Thanks

Hi.
I really appreciate that you've the positive experience you've had with ourselves however I does surprise me that you've had issues with AXA. If you wanted to PM me your details I'd be happy to have a word with our claims team to see if I can shed some light on what's been going on.
Regards,
Dan.

 

[MagpieMatt]

Ive had a really difficult experience with Axa at Birmingham, my car was stolen on the 16th of April, very long winded, going through switchboards constantly and going on hold for ages. Ive been having to chase them an unreasonable amount to get the ball rolling. Its now literally going into the 5th Week.

They made me an offer finally, however they didn't even include any of my modifications in the offer, which were all paid for, all listed fully comp with receipts and info and they had all the documents they needed weeks ago. They already have many photos of the damaged car via the company Copart.

Why would they make me that offer in which they didn't even include my modifications even though ive paid for it? I pay more of premium to insure my car fully comp with all my modifications.

Also I paid for courtesy car cover on the policy however they turned round to me and said because it hasn't been in an accident im not covered, which is shocking. That should be made very clear when taking the policy out. So far its cost me £700 to rent a car for 5 weeks plus my excess. The only good bit of service they've done is pay for my personal belongings that were in the car.

Because of the ongoing rental bill ive literally had to agree to take the low first offer as a intermediate payment and wait even longer for an 'in house' engineer to go out to the car for a 2nd evaluation.

Anyway yeah ive got to wait possibly 5/6 weeks to be paid out fully for a car thats fully comp and you don't get provide courtesy car, its a shambles

Its been that dire a team leader is having to deal with it. Like I said Adrian Flux have been great but the underwriters have been really poor.

I will be sending a letter and getting advice from the FOS

 

[MagpieMatt]

Has anyone else ever had a bad experience dealing with insurance after their car was stolen? Is this a normal period of time? Also can anyone suggest anything regarding the courtesy car situation?

 

[Chris90]

Surely it should be Flux who should be dealing with AXA? You pay your insurance premium for them to sort out any hassle with chasing people up etc. You shouldnt have to be inconvenienced with having to run about chasing people.

 

[rum4mo]

Surely it should be Flux who should be dealing with AXA? You pay your insurance premium for them to sort out any hassle with chasing people up etc. You shouldnt have to be inconvenienced with having to run about chasing people.

I am considering breaking free from Admiral as they have increased my premium by roughly 25% this year after 18 years of being with them and only one incident where the other party was 100% to blame 9 years ago, so I am very interested in how these insurance brokers perform when you need them, very interested indeed!!

 

[MagpieMatt]

Surely it should be Flux who should be dealing with AXA? You pay your insurance premium for them to sort out any hassle with chasing people up etc. You shouldnt have to be inconvenienced with having to run about chasing people.

Flux have managed to get me all contact details and put me in touch with the relevant people they've always left me messages or rang me back etc, but Axa that are extremely slow with the claim itself and have been holding things up. That courtesy car term is disgusting one, literally everyday longer it takes it costs me money for the rental. They even flat out denied they wouldn't cover any of the bill at all or supply me with one themselves. A quick search on google shows bad reviews regarding claims with Axa.

Ive been driving now for 10 years, never claimed in my life, clean licence, NCB etc. I don't deserve to be treated like this by a company.

 

[MagpieMatt]

I am considering breaking free from Admiral as they have increased my premium by roughly 25% this year after 18 years of being with them and only one incident where the other party was 100% to blame 9 years ago, so I am very interested in how these insurance brokers perform when you need them, very interested indeed!!

I am 100% looking into underwriters reviews when I take out my next policy, I feel like ive been left in the dark and fobbed off completely by Axa, I guess Flux could do more to help in ways but yeah its Axa im very disappointed with.

 

[MagpieMatt]

But yeah been driving 10 years, never claimed, 7yrs NCB (1st 3yrs named driver) Clean licence. I pay fully comp with all mods declared 'with' courtesy car cover.

My car gets stolen off the drive literally vanishes, through OBD port most likely. I have it shared on social media by hundreds of people, Ive even had a spread about it all in my local paper. Numerous police forces involved, even had contact from my local MP and chief inspector of Staffordshire police.

Then my insurance says NO no courtesy car provided due to you not being in an accident, which is ridiculous and technically it has been in a accident as it was wrote off buy the thieves in a RTC and there still not budging. Leaving me to fork out a massive £700 bill 'so far'

And in the mean time its been 5 weeks! and the claim isn't even fully completed yet. Ive had to accept a low offer (which I first declined) an intermediate payment just so I can get money to pay the rental bill.

Plus they offer me a figure for my car without even considering the list of modifications ive paid fully comp for! Now there telling me a Axa 'in house' engineer, god help me, has to go out to the car which will take another week!

Literally disgusting service, I will get this story out across as much social media as possible. As you can imagine theres a lot of cars now being stolen with minimal effort and there will be thousands of people across the UK in similar positions! Everyone needs to be aware of these underwriters and there work ethics.

I know im banging on about it but im not being unreasonable, am I?

Ive messaged Dan @ Flux my details, hopefully he can sort something out.

 

[Chris90]

Get flux to chase AXA. Thats what you pay them for.

 

[Lavis89]

These underwriters all mostly scumbags, always willing to take money off you but very very slow in giving any back then imposing loads of hidden fees and terms buried in small print.

 

[MagpieMatt]

Get flux to chase AXA. Thats what you pay them for.

Yeah ive pm'd Dan hopefully it'll all get sorted

 

[MagpieMatt]

These underwriters all mostly scumbags, always willing to take money off you but very very slow in giving any back then imposing loads of hidden fees and terms buried in small print.

I feel like its been all a delay tactic which has forced me into taking the first low offer, I understand i've had an intermediate payment but I should of had a full offer with all my mods all paid to me at once weeks ago.

 

[rum4mo]

I'd think that is the plan - and folk that work in insurance get annoyed when we call them nasty things! Anyway, so there is another thing to look out for, ie when does the "loan car" clause come into play. I can see that most of us would consider it would come into play as soon as you had an accident that immobilised the car , ie you are carless, or the car has been stolen - with the proviso that if it turned up okay the next day and the police had dusted it and returned it, you would be back not needing that loan car.

Twice I or my wife have had loan cars - on different insurance companies years apart, probably with the extra cost "legal aid" or what ever you call it, so indirectly provided by the policy, and both times the cars get handed out and the deal you seem to end up getting is "car is free if 3rd party accept full responsibility for claim - if it transpires that they do not, we bill you £50 a day for the loan car" - that £50 a day is just a stab in the dark figure - but normally it is way out of proportion to the going rate for a hire car hiring by the day/week. So, my point being, in both cases well before the cars which were still very road worthy, were handed in for repair, plenty time had passed to allow both insurance companies to agree to who pays for what - and still these clouds hand over the loan car hire business to someone that only exists to milk people dry, ie bandits, so what is that all about?

To sum up, who in governments allows bandits with licenses to operate out there, typical "legalised crooks" are, lawyers and insurance companies. No one expects a free ride, but when you are a "good" customer and you, in the whole do not need to use your insurance cover, and this relates more to car insurance than house or personal property insurance, when you have an accident, your troubles really do start and you get to try out or test your insurer or insurance broker - and things go badly wrong, not good, not smart, not clever at all.