Yet another tracker question!

[Barry Chuckle]

I had a very expensive tracker fitted to my Land Rover Defender ten years ago when I bought it. Within 8 weeks it had been stolen from my private drive and was never seen again. The tracker apparently went off line around the time of night that I think it disappeared based on the home CCTV footage. Could have been an inside job I suppose with leaked data from the local firm who fitted the tracker, but we will never know. Or possibly jammed somehow?

So I have a very jaded view on trackers.

I am sure that trackers do help in recovering many vehicles, so I can see why the Insurance Companies insist on them being fitted. Perhaps also the technology has improved making them harder to disable

However, if someone stole my Cali (or Defender), abused it and thrashed it to death on the way to wherever it was going to be broken for spares, exported or ringed, then I'm not sure I would want it back anyway.

My pal is a Police Officer and he tells me usual practice is when a car is stolen they leave them parked up for a day or two round the corner to see if it's recovered, if not they the come back a few days later and drive it off. The more sophisticated thieves use technology which blocks the signals emitted by the tracker. The Range Rover Sport is now the most stolen car in the UK and they all have Trackers as standard so clearly they're not discouraging everyone....

 

[Barry Chuckle]

An interesting article on post...

Range Rover Sport retains top spot of most stolen and recovered cars

The majority of stolen cars recovered by Tracker in the first half of 2023 were Range Rover and Land Rover models with the Range Rover Sport top of the table again.

www.fleetnews.co.uk

 

[Carabiner]

Thanks for that. We are planning on keeping the van for a long time, so perhaps a one off lifetime subscription is the way to go

Yeah, that’s what we did. Very happy with it so far. Invisible in daily use, check the app every so often, seems to record journeys accurately.

One off payment, job done.

 

[BaTmobile Ocean]

We are with LV. No tracker required.
We have a Eufy Smartrack hidden in the van.
£20 and no subscription.
Not 100% effective but does give you position of van - most of the time!

Uses Apple find my phone network.
Apple have equivalent device 'Air tag'

 

[mojo doug]

LV don't need a tracker.

Im with LV they are more concerned whether a dash cam fitted . Indeed such are thieves they can now block trackers ( and thats from an LV representative ) .

 

[AlfonzoBonzo1]

Are you confident in what they told you, I spoke to a very knowledgeable lady there and explained the above and she said I still need a cat 5 - 7 tracker installed ? My cali is also on order but I think week 43 build.

Just to post back here now my van is almost here ringing to get firm insurance quotes checked on comfort again this time they asked me the true value of the van without any discounts. If you had to buy one brand new a book price, this pushed it over the value I suspect, they need a tracker for now, insisting a tracker must be fitted so politely declined and now looking for another insurer refused to have a tracker fit to this van at the end of the day that’s why I pay insurance for. Might as well just make the policy more expensive and not have a tracker would make more sense. As a reference, I had a merge home before this was Comfort Insurance them tracker fitted for four years. It’s a cost that I’ve experienced and don’t need this time.

 

[GreenMissile]

We picked our van up on Saturday and had the same run around as you have experienced with insurance. Comfort were definitely pushing the £75k boundary when I spoke with them and made it clear I needed to get a tracker which I was reluctant to go with for a variety of reasons. In the end after calling multiple insurance companies and experiencing varying levels of customer service and knowledge! I ended up going with LV which was considerably less than Comfort and that is not factoring in the additional costs of a tracker/subscription.

 

[WelshGas]

We picked our van up on Saturday and had the same run around as you have experienced with insurance. Comfort were definitely pushing the £75k boundary when I spoke with them and made it clear I needed to get a tracker which I was reluctant to go with for a variety of reasons. In the end after calling multiple insurance companies and experiencing varying levels of customer service and knowledge! I ended up going with LV which was considerably less than Comfort and that is not factoring in the additional costs of a tracker/subscription.

Just make sure you have a Campervan/Motorhome policy with LV and not a " Car" policy.

 

[GreenMissile]

Just make sure you have a Campervan/Motorhome policy with LV and not a " Car" policy.

It is indeed a Campervan Policy with LV

 

[AlfonzoBonzo1]

Well couple more quotes Safesure £571 and surprisingly NFU £368 both no tracker both CV policies. I say surprisingly with NFU as 4 years ago they wanted £1600 for my motorhome insurance vs comfort at £371. Will try A-Plan later but they say pays to shop around.this whole tracker thing is a con in my view. Peace of mind maybe but guessing with VW app it knows where the van is? Or can use a limited ability AirTag but out side of that a tracker is only benefiting the insurance company in recovery, that’s what I pay insurance for ! If it gets nicked honestly I don’t want it back anyway