Shopportunist:
How to guard your home, and purchases arriving by delivery, from ‘‘porch pirates.”
Avast ye, online shoppers! There’s a growing band of scurvy miscreants skulking about the streets: porch pirates. They don’t wear eye patches and wield swords, however they do plunder precious treasure from the porches and doorsteps of unsuspecting homeowners.
Porch pirates are thieves, plan and simple, who steal delivered packages before recipients retrieve them from the doorway.
Nearly 1.7 million packages are stolen or go missing daily, according to figures compiled by José Holguín-veras, an engineering professor and director of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Center of Excellence for Sustainable Urban Freight Systems. That equates to about $25 million in lost goods and services annually.
Before the pandemic, an estimated 36% of people had been the victim of porch pirates, according to a 2019 C+R Research report. There’s no telling just yet how many online consumers have fallen prey since the pandemic began, however porch piracy concerns have soared during the pandemic.
In May 2020, during the height of stateissued stay-at-home orders, more Americans were Googling “stolen package” related keywords than at any other non-holiday time since 2004, according to data collected by Hippo Insurance Services. Search interest in “package tracking” has never been higher in the U.S. than May 3-9, 2020 (in 16 years of Google Trends data).
“The pandemic has pushed homeowners to make drastic adjustments to their daily lives, including buying a majority of necessary staples and groceries online,” says Yuval Harry, vice president of Partnerships at Hippo. “The increase in packages landing on doorsteps and next to front gates comes with more vulnerabilities for homeowners,” says Harry.
In April and May alone, as cases continued to climb, Americans spent more than $153 billion online, according to the Adobe Digital Economy Index (DEI). That was 7% higher than the
$143 billion spent online during the 2019 holiday season, a time when ecommerce is typically at its peak. In June 2020, online spending totaled $73 billion, a 76% increase from June 2019, according to the same report.
In addition to transporting more packages, delivery drivers also changed the way they handled (or didn’t handle) goods. There was a swift shift to contactless delivery. Delivery companies stopped requiring signatures and reduced contact with handles and doorbells leaving more packages exposed, which likely helped set the stage for more theft, according to Harry.
“Luckily, there are a number of ways to reduce the risk of package theft, from encouraging delivery drivers to hide packages out of plain view to using smart home technology like cameras and smart locks that can alert homeowners to exactly when a package is delivered,” says Harry.
Remember to track your package through shipping companies’ online portals. Encourage delivery drivers to place packages behind a plant, piece of furniture or other structure on your porch. Leave a note with special instructions if you have to or ask for deliveries to be placed at a side or back door.
You can also place an empty container, like a wooden crate or deck box, on your porch to conceal packages. Requesting delivery to an alternate location, like a neighbor’s home, is also an option.
As far as cameras go, a team of researchers recently studied 67 videos of porch pirates and found that gates and cameras don’t deter thieves since only about 8% even care to shield their identity, even when they see cameras. However, home cameras can still be useful.
“In the unfortunate instance of package theft, smart cameras provide additional vantage points that can help police identify suspects,” says Harry.
If you think you’ve fallen prey to porch piracy, you should contact the seller so see if they are able to locate the package or issue a refund or replacement. You can also reach out to the shipping company. Many have online portals where you can file a claim and determine where your package is and if it’ll be delivered. “If a valuable item is involved, contact your home insurance provider who may be able to file a claim on your behalf, if your item’s total value exceeds your deductible,” recommends Harry.