TOLEDO, Ohio — Since Black Friday and Cyber Monday, holiday shopping is in full swing, with data showing U.S. retail sales are expected to be over $1 trillion this year. While many of those purchases can be delivered to your front door, making for an easy shopping experience. But it's also easy for thieves to steal them right from your front porch.
One of the easiest ways to stop porch pirates from taking your plans is to have a plan for when your packages arrive. This is more than just being able to track your packages after they're delivered and cameras watch over the items. Wood County Sheriff Mark Wasylyshyn said a good plan will help keep your packages safer longer or at least until you're able to get to them.
By having packages delivered to a location where someone will be there to watch over them at your job, or local police stations (who offer the service), or at the store you purchased it for pick up, is best. Wasylyshyn said the goal is to make sure they're not unattended and out in the open for too long.
"Removing temptation. Thieves see the packages there and maybe seen them there for hours. Temptation," Wasylyshyn said. "The less we tempt the better. If there is a drop area where they can put it on a back porch, or giving other instructions, and certainly with technology today. Have them [delivery personnel] open the garage door."
He added while cameras are great, they aren't true deterrents from thieves walking onto porches to steal things.
"It may make it a little bit easier to find out who's doing it. But, certainly the camera is not gong to stop someone who's stealing the package. If they have a hoodie on to cover it up, it's difficult to catch them. So, the key is to come up with an ulterior plan of where else can I have the package delivered," Wasylyshyn said.
Check in with the delivery options to see if you can choose for the packages to be signed for, versus having them dropped off. He said think about investing in a lock box or bag for your packages allows your items to be securely dropped off on your property.