LOCKSMITH SERVICE

Post Burglary Services

A break-in leaves two problems and they need dealing with in different orders. The first is that the property is open — a broken window, a forced door, a lock that no longer holds. The second is that whoever did it now knows the address and may know how they got in. We deal with the first the same day, and we tell you honestly what is worth doing about the second.

Making it secure now. We board up broken windows and replace broken locks and handles, so the property can be left. Where a door has been forced, the damage is often to the frame and the keeps rather than the lock itself, and that is worth establishing before anything is ordered — a new lock in a split frame is not a repaired door.

Keys and cylinders. If keys were taken, or if the burglary involved keys that were in the house, the cylinders need changing rather than repairing. That is normally a smaller and cheaper job than people expect, because it is the cylinder rather than the whole lock. If you are not certain whether keys are missing, assume they are.

How they got in usually tells you what to fix. A snapped cylinder on a uPVC door points at the cylinder standard rather than the door, and an anti-snap replacement is the sensible answer. A forced timber door points at the lock, the keeps and the screws holding them. A window points somewhere else entirely. It is worth spending five minutes on how it happened before spending money on the wrong part of the house.

The doors nobody looks at. After a break-in most people upgrade the front door. Entry is very often at the back, where the door is older, on lighter hardware and out of sight of the street. A house is only as secure as its weakest door, and that is almost never the front one. If we are already there, it costs very little to look at the rest of them and tell you which ones actually matter.

For your insurer. We can put what was done, what was fitted and what it cost in writing, which is generally what an insurer wants to see. If your policy specifies a lock standard — usually a five-lever mortice lock to BS3621 on a timber door, or the anti-snap standards on a uPVC or composite one — we will tell you whether what you have meets it, including when the answer is that it already does.

A word about the part nobody mentions. Being burgled is unsettling in a way that has very little to do with what was taken, and people often want to change everything at once. Some of that is worth doing and some of it is money spent on feeling better rather than on being safer. We will tell you which is which, and there is no pressure either way.