There are risks in everything we do in life, what we have to do is minimise those risks as much as we can, and put them into perspective. Sometimes we can worry too much about an issue without looking at the facts. If a serious crime happens at one end of the country then the fear of crime in anyone reading or watching the story increases too.

Crime happens, it always has and no doubt it always will, sometimes we see a problem where there isn't one, we can go overboard on risk management. For example, working as a crime prevention officer I was asked to give advice to a business, where staff believed they were at risk of a robbery taking place, they were extremely worried about their personal safety. In reality, the property made a very unlikely location for a robbery, the premises were in a Town Centre location with good passing surveillance, well lit, the premises were open for passers by to see in, had CCTV cameras on the streets operated by the Local Authority, a personal alarm linked to a monitoring station and the premises were so laid out as to allow members of staff to take refuge quickly should a problem occur. In fact when the job was analysed further it was found that they had very little cash on the premises, in fact the majority of their transactions were by plastic.

Robberies are usually planned, the robber targets premises for a number of reasons, it could be isolated, little passing surveillance after hours, none or little vision into the premises from outside, a lot of cash transactions, poor CCTV, premises operate after 6pm, and the list goes on.

Remember - Personal Safety is common sense, we just need to waork at it to make sure it becomes common practice.

at a bar

car jacking

motorway breakdown

out shopping

safety online

safety driving

using an ATM safely

using taxis safely

walking at night