Charge rate for bike theft?

It's about £10 a time I think

Whatever it is only represents those reported stolen anyway.
Unless it's insured then I can't see why anyone would even report it stolen.

His article includes figures about the charge rate- so it seems odd that they won't just publish it

Probably because he struggles with non integer percentages?

I expect it’s due to the fact that nobody has been charged?

I bet it’s higher for e-bikes…

But seriously, it must be difficult to trace them. Even in the early 90s I remember mine was stolen from my garage and apparently immediately handed to a gang that would go from town to town collecting them. I told the police exactly who had stolen it and they just shrugged.

I think bike theft is a symptom of a wider social problem... you'd have to be pretty damn desperate to nick a bike.

What's a chav gonna get paid for a £2k bike? £300 if they are lucky? I dunno, I'm just making numbers up.

I supose it's different if people are driving around in vans and stealing several bikes per day.

you’d have to be pretty damn desperate to nick a bike.

No, you wouldn't. It's practically free money. There have been addicts, kids, and pros stealing bikes forever.

Probably about the same as that for burglary and rape.

Cyclists aren't special.

Gang of 5 with a van stole £10-£15k worth of bikes from me and my neighbour in one night. That’s not a bad couple of hours work for anybody.
Charge rate, don’t make me laugh. Police did nothing.
I recovered one, it was on FB. Bloke wanted to make a statement on where he got it, police failed to follow up.

I my experience I’ve had a bike stolen twice when I popped into a shop to get a drink. And a third I caught. It seems that a lot of people are prepared to steal a bike, as they walk past.
Never leave a bike out of my sight when out now.

Probably about the same as that for burglary and rape.

Cyclists aren’t special.

Actually bikes are special and have especially lenient sentencing (Theft of a pedal bicycle and all other section 1 Theft Act 1968 offences)

They also have special reporting procedures so police can bunch a load together and count it as a single theft to reduce the stats.

If you do know who it is the police can give them 2-4 weeks heads up by making an appointment to visit them (if they bother at all)

It seems that a lot of people are prepared to steal a bike, as they walk past.

Isn't that common knowledge? Always carry a small cafe lock attached to a bike for when you need to quickly nip into a shop, or a least leave the bike upside down outside.

What’s a chav gonna get paid for a £2k bike? £300 if they are lucky? I dunno, I’m just making numbers up.

a few years back admittedly, I heard the going rate for the actual thief was £50 a bike. Well worn Carrera from the station would be £50 cash in the pub carpark direct to them. £5k super bike that needed parting out, and ebaying; or shipped abroad, then the gang leader/mastermind would give the boots on the ground thief £50 for their efforts.

Scum of the highest order, as they don't care for others losses.
As an analogy - a starving man stealing a £1 load from tesco, costs tesco say 20p lost profit. smashing my car window to take the pound coin in the ash tray, and then buying the bread; costs me hundreds of pounds.

What’s a chav gonna get paid for a £2k bike? £300 if they are lucky? I dunno, I’m just making numbers up.

Back in 1999/2000ish I had my XTR equipped Zaskar nicked. Heard on the grapevine that a friend of a friend of a friend was offered it for £20 about 15 minutes after it was nicked. Bargain...

Unless it’s insured then I can’t see why anyone would even report it stolen.

Eh? I had my Cotic Roadrat nicked from the station. Pretty much worthless to most people but I loved that bike. Was insured but the cost for a replacement beater station bike was low enough for me not to bother (picked up a Specialized Tricross SS which looks like a POS but is brilliant!). I reported the Cotic stolen though with the police in the hope that the CCTV riddled station car park would pick something up that might help the popo identify the culprit (must have been someone local) and help me get my bike back. I'm not one for police bashing but they were absolutely useless (in fact I think it may have been palmed off onto the transport police).

Probably not easy to establish. Any bike stolen as part of a garage or shed break in may not be coded as bike theft.

The crime, in Scotland, would be recorded at theft by housebreaking which covers any roofed building from a factory to a garden shed.

Though my experience with dealing with this stuff is 15 years our of date. Maybe crime records are more searchable now?

I recall crime managers having to do workarounds. You could search for witnesses. There wasn't a specific code for bogus workmen fraud. So they added a dummy witness - Mr Bogus - to crime reports of this kind so they could search for bogus workmen crimes.

irc - I think a garden shed is Theft from Lockfast Place rather than Housebreaking, but it kind of highlights the issue - do we want the cops trying to detect crime or enter data correctly in a computer system so that MPs can ask questions they already know the rough answer to?

Gang of 5 with a van stole £10-£15k worth of bikes from me and my neighbour in one night. That’s not a bad couple of hours work for anybody.

There's no way you are turning 10-15k worth of nicked bikes into lots of cash quickly.   Spread between 5, with the potential to either get hurt or do time... I think I'll stick to my office job!

Is it not petty theft, hardly the crime of the century.

@poly There was a debate at times whether shed were HB or OLP. However they are a "roofed building " as per the definition of house for housebreaking.

Current recording guidelines include shed as part of non domestic housebreaking.

Page 268.

Perhaps some places recorded shed break ins as theft by OLP to reduce their housebreaking count?

Is it not petty theft, hardly the crime of the century.

To the police, yes. It's *just* a bike, *just* let insurance deal with it. It's simply not worth the investigation and court time.

And actually they apply this to vehicle crashes too. If they actually bothered to investigate vehicle incidents in the same way as (say) plane or train crashes, you could probably get a whole ton of convictions for all sorts of offences. As it is, they'll run some basic checks and if you don't come back drunk, drugged or uninsured it's a case of closing the book and letting insurance take over.

To the person who is suddenly deprived of their cheap and easy transport or their top of the range leisure activity, it's anything but minor.

Sort of related, a mate was knocked off his bike; the driver (wanting to avoid insurance) offered £200 compensation and he told them it was a £10,000 custom build - not the sort of thing you could replace within a couple of days at Halfords.

The police simply don't apply any sort of differential. It's *just* a bike. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Actually bikes are special and have especially lenient sentencing (Theft of a pedal bicycle and all other section 1 Theft Act 1968 offences)

Is that true? The sentencing guidelines bracket theft of a bicycle with pretty much all other thefts of physical goods, don't they? Am I failing to click a dropdown...?
https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/magistrates-court/item/theft-general/

Obviously "plain" theft is different from robbery, fencing, going equipped etc...

As an hourly rate I don’t think £100 is bad at all. It took blokes less than 30 mins to do my garage and next door.
What does frustrate me (other than finding my bikes all gone) is that any number of other crimes of Similar value would be treated in a very different way to bike theft. If you swindled £10k on a vat return or tax evasion, you would hung drawn and quartered. It’s a £1000 fine if you don’t have a TV licence!
Even when given tangible evidence or a direct lead, nothing happens.
Edit. Not Condoning either of the above obvs.

any number of other crimes of Similar value would be treated in a very different way to bike theft. If you swindled £10k on a vat return or tax evasion, you would hung drawn and quartered. 

There may be some truth to this. If you filed a false vat return causing £10,000 loss as a one-off, your starting point is 26 weeks custody or a medium level community order.

If you steal a £10,000 bike your starting point is a high level community order or a band C fine.

https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/magistrates-court/item/revenue-fraud/

As an aside, Cadbury didn't ask for the "charge rate" in her question. She asked how many charges for theft had been brought in relation to bike thefts, which is different...