LAW ENFORCEMENT
To share is to participate. To participate is to drive change.
At a time when the Deputy London Mayor for Policing and Crime has announced that business crime is being “woefully under-reported”, an increasing number of businesses are turning to collaborative partnerships like the National Business Crime Solution (NBCS) to report business crime and help prevent further incidents from taking place.
The NBCS, a not-for-profit initiative, provides businesses with an opportunity to join a collaborative partnership that spans the public sector, private sector and law enforcement agencies. It is supported by the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) and provides a central database repository where business crime data is submitted, shared and analysed to determine key threats, series of crimes and national targets’ to be investigated.
Collaboration not Isolation
Businesses working with the NBCS are asked to make data available relating to business crime incidents such as shop theft, burglaries and robberies. The collective business crime data is then analysed centrally, and used to deliver key updates and information on trends, prolific offenders and national hot spots to members, enabling them to adjust their priorities and prevent crime before it takes place.
In addition, members of the NBCS are benefitting from the operational support and managed services provided by the National Business Crime Intelligence Bureau (NBCIB), which acts as the private sector intelligence hub, collating and analysing crime intelligence perpetrated against UK businesses.
Through liaison with both the police and businesses alike, the NBCIB pulls all the relevant incident data together and presents this to show the level of offending and impact that these offences are having on the businesses involved. Often the NBCIB is collating details of offences that are affecting numerous businesses across several different police forces. This therefore supports law enforcement and other authorities to pull an investigative package together based on all the facts. This is hugely valuable to businesses, and the authorities, as it helps achieve a collective action on cross-border, serious and organised criminal offences that has historically remained unsolved.
This multi-agency approach is already proven to tackle business crime. In the first half of 2014, the NBCS dealt with over 70 investigations exposing cross border, serious and organised criminal groups. It has also provided support to more than 30 national businesses across 33 police force areas.
The NBCS has also met with a further 20 additional organisations interested in obtaining further details about the work undertaken by the NBCS on data sharing and tackling cross border crimes impacting on the business community.
Speaking about the benefits of the NBCS, Bruce Duncan, Retail Loss Prevention Manager at Greggs, said: “Earlier in the year we were suffering form a spate of burglaries which were having a significant impact on our business. Because the offences went across seven different force areas we were struggling to get an appropriate policing response. The NBCS provided us with the support necessary to collate these offences and engage with the various forces to prompt police activity, which subsequently led to the timely arrest of those involved. The ability of the NBCS to prompt action by the police and bring the series of offences to a rapid halt has more than paid back the cost of one year’s membership.”
Identifying emerging trends
Among the trends noted over the past six months, there has been an upturn in the number of refund frauds being reported while cigarette related offences, including theft from delivery vehicles, have also peaked dramatically. The NBCIB have already begun discussions with several police forces about a possible linked series of burglaries and robberies affecting convenience stores and supermarkets.
Speaking about the recent spate of offences, Dave Halsall, Head of LP Corporate Protection at Wm Morrison Supermarkets Plc, said: “Engagement with the NBCIB following the recent spate of burglaries and robberies has allowed us to put control measures in place based on intelligence we otherwise would not have had access to. The ability to share information with other businesses and for the NBCIB to engage with the police on our behalf has proved to be a great tool for our businesses.”
Extending the reach of the NBCS
As with any collaborative database, growing the NBCS membership is key to ensure businesses can be better informed about crime trends and possible risks to their businesses at all times. Over the past six months, there has been a significant upturn in businesses joining the NBCS with recent members including Morrisons, Booker and Greggs.
Following the re-launch of TruckPol, the joint industry partnership with the police and the road, freight and haulage company, the NBCS also attracted new members from across a wide variety of sectors including energy, retail and freight. By working with TruckPol, the NBCS is now in an even stronger position to identify trends that are impacting the wider UK business community.
As part of the re-launch, the NBCS wrote to all of the Chief Constables around the country requesting they share the data they hold on freight crime for comparisons with that supplied by businesses within the industry. Feedback to date has been overwhelming positive, with over 40 police forces around the UK and 150 officers now liaising with TruckPol on freight crime issues.
DCC Sue Fish, Nottinghamshire Police and National Policing Lead for Business Crime Reduction said, “We speak of collaboration not isolation. The National Business Crime Solution re-launch of TruckPol is welcomed as it adds the vehicle crime dimension that we need to provide the whole intelligence picture necessary to address business crime.
The fact that the business community is willing to support the re-introduction of TruckPol financially with a clear desire that it is run by the NBCS is testament to the developing momentum that the public private intelligence partnership is having on addressing business crime in all its forms”.
The re-launch of TruckPol was a significant development not only for the NBCS but also for the wider freight and haulage industry. Speaking about the development, CC Suzette Davenport, Gloucestershire Police and National lead for Roads Policing in England and Wales, said: “The use of the strategic road network is integral to the commission of serious organised crime and freight crime alone costs the UK economy an estimated £1 billion annually. I am sure that such information sharing between all partners will promote joint enforcement activity and provide cost-effective interventions as we strive to disrupt criminal organisations using the roads.”
Demonstrating the value of sharing data
TruckPol was recently contacted by the police following information relating to two incidents that involved the theft of goods from vehicles whilst in transit. The officers working on the incident were keen to explore whether this formed part of a wider series of crimes or whether TruckPol was aware of any similar incidents.
To find out, TruckPol circulated the details in an alert distributed to the police network and were subsequently contacted by officers who informed them of a method of operation (MO) prevalent in Eastern Europe whereby offenders illegally obtain goods while the vehicle is moving.
TruckPol subsequently alerted businesses to this MO and the possible link to comparable incidents and asked them to send in any details of similar unexplained losses that may form a part of this series of crimes. TruckPol collated all of the incident details and, thanks to close engagement with the Central Motorway Policing Group, provided detailed information on the recorded movements of the convoy of suspected vehicles.
The information gathered by the NBCS led to an organised police operation, whereby one of the suspected vehicles was stopped, and as a result 11 suspects were arrested, all originating from Eastern Europe. All of the suspects were remanded in custody on a conspiracy charge and are currently waiting to be sentenced.
John Traynor, Director of Security, TNT said: “I was particularly impressed at the speed which TruckPol was able to collate and disseminate information between the industry and the police. This ensured that these offences were stopped before this emerging trend became a significant crime series. The ability of TruckPol to co-ordinate the information led to a timely police operation and the successful arrest of those involved. This is clear evidence of the value of sharing data across the industry and bodes well for the future of TruckPol”.
Fraud Scoping
Another key area of focus over the past few months has been fraud. The NBCS recently established its own Fraud Scoping Group to work with its members to understand how to improve assistance from law enforcement to tackle the growing threat from fraud and online crime.
This is particularly important given recent statistics from Scotland Yard, which revealed that 81,631 cases of fraud were reported by London businesses in 2013-14, just 758 were considered ‘solvable’ by the City of London Police, 117 were referred to Scotland Yard and just nine resulted in successful judicial outcomes.
With these latest statistics in mind, it is of no surprise that businesses have been reluctant to report offences to the police due to a lack of confidence in the police’s ability to progress an investigation. The British Retail Consortium (BRC) Retail Crime Survey 2014 highlighted that a step change was required in the law enforcement response to fraud, with a greater proportion of these offences resulting in prosecution as well as increased capacity within police forces to deal with fraud cases.
Businesses benefit from collaboration
By supporting and working with the NBCS, businesses will not only help build a comprehensive profile of business crime in the UK, but gain access to their own crime data through a series of dashboards, accessible via PC. This enables businesses to more effectively determine how to place their resources in relation to identified risks as well as regional crime trends. Anonymised crime maps also help identify more widespread issues or concerns.
Collaboration is key
No one knows an immediate area better than the businesses and communities within it, and by working with the NBCS every business has the means to be heard, to get business crime higher on the agenda and to keep it there. Now, we need to continue to share information across platforms, engage with the relevant public and private sector parties to work together – in collaboration instead of isolation to ensure that the UK remains a world-class place to do business.
The NBCS has already made such strides in the reporting of business crime, with the support of the NBCIB yielding such significant outcomes including the recovery of power tools worth over £1,500 following interventions by the NBCIB to flag a vehicle involved in several offences against participating businesses. The NBCS has also seen the recovery of cigarettes to the value of over £2,000 following warrants for a team involved in six offences against one member business as well as 23 arrests resulting from interventions by the NBCIB.
In the first half of 2014, the NBCS has been able to evidence some tangible outcomes in relation to how it is working in collaboration with business and law enforcement to support businesses and the police to tackle the growth in cross border, serious and organised crime. However we choose to monitor and report crime, we know that there will be challenges ahead – but as we’ve seen, with closer collaboration between UK businesses and law enforcement officials we can build a national profile of business crime in the UK and help police to establish watertight, cross-border cases that result in real action.
For further information, contact Catherine.bowen@nationalbusinesscrimesolution.com
