PSA – life hacks…key safe…!

FWIW my grandma and grandad had one of these that was installed for the home help person, we wanted it off the wall before we sold the place, it took one gentle tap with a coarse grade hammer and the entire thing fell apart. Probably faster than putting in the code never mind using that crack. Maybe it was just particularily bad but it was the recommended one.

A lot of old people don’t have things that are attractive to thieves

On the contrary, they generally keep money as cash, so are considered good targets.

As has been said – I’d definitely confirm the house insurer was happy with this arrangement (and if they had a list of approved key safes you need to use). Whether or not you think they’re as much security as a front door lock isn’t the issue if you get burgled, its whether the home insurer policy t&c’s allows them to get out of paying up if you used one.

Like it, no ones going to break in if all the burglars think your worldly possessions amount to a carrier bag of broken biscuits, some slippers with zips on and tin of chappie dog food.

Like it, no ones going to break in if all the burglars think your worldly possessions amount to a carrier bag of broken biscuits, some slippers with zips on and tin of chappie dog food.

Have you been round Dr P’s as well?

I was quite shocked the first time…..

A few years ago a lady police officer got given a rock with slide off base to hide keys in, we spent an hour hunting round the garden looking for it, with torches, in the dark, before a neighbour called the police, how we all laughed.

Never did find the thing, she needed new keys after.

We use supra c500 Keysafes on client doors for work. Police and insurance approved. You need serious hardware to get into them so you might as well just chuck that same hardware through a window. I have one myself and find it really useful.

We use supra c500 Keysafes on client doors for work.

Turn unlock handle, press buttons, watch for handle deflecting when you press the right buttons.

Done.

We use supra c500 Keysafes on client doors for work. Police and insurance approved. You need serious hardware to get into them so you might as well just chuck that same hardware through a window. I have one myself and find it really useful.

Good shout, just ordered one!

Hidden in the garden / on a faraway wall.

You could of course do the same with an actual key to your house.

Here’s another nice video of a dirty-fingered weegie casually figuring out the code and opening on one of those “high security” Supra C500 locks in roughly sixty seconds. (Watch from 4:40)

Personally I wouldn’t touch them.

He might struggle with that technique when its mounted on a wall as it will be harder to get the vibration feedback he used to crack it.

I think he is using the same technique as in the first Supra C500 video, feedback on the unlock handle. Except he does it by touch instead of sight – which is better for burglars as it can be done in the dark.

About as secure as a combination lock on a bike and bustable by the same technique.

We have one at work, the only people who knew the code had left the company. I sprung it in maybe 20 minutes using the ‘bike lock’ technique. Using a shim to ‘feel’ the wheel positions though I can pop it in about ten seconds.

If you’re going to have one, mount it out of sight.

Except he does it by touch instead of sight – which is better for burglars as it can be done in the dark.

Pretty sure no one has ever used this in anger, most burglars are just opportunist and force their way in. After all, a decent locksmith can pick any lock, but it is never used for domestic burglary.

Great show of lock picking skills here: http://www.safe-cracker.co.uk/safe-opening-gallery01.htm

Just cancelled my order for the C500. Chap at Keysafe did say they’ve changed the design to circumvent that method, but I’m not wasting £60 to find out.

Would that not void you home insurance?

Nope.

I would be extremely wary of assuming that it would be acceptable to an insurance company (and similarly be very wary of any product with the blanket assertion that it is ‘insurance approved’ – what insurers will accept can vary greatly between companies, and the fact that one insurer may have accepted something (possibly only in a very specific application/circumstances), does not mean it is always going to be acceptable to the same insurer or others.

My first advice would be to check your household insurance policy: many of them now state that doors must be fitted with locks meeting the relevant British Standard (usually easily identifiable by a Kitemark on the lock) or be of an equivalent standard, e.g. the multi-point locks fitted to many UPVC doors don’t meet the British Standard (or didn’t when I last looked) but are obviously widely used and generally accepted by insurers.

These key safes will provide much lower levels of security than the British Standard, and I suspect that there is a real risk that an insurer that was faced with a claim where a burglar gained entry by breaking open a key safe to get hold of the keys, would turn down the claim. I certainly would not chance it.

Note that the use of the keysafes by elderly or infirm people who are completely housebound, and therefore will always be in the house, is not the same as an unattended house. Even though the occupants could not be expected to put up resistance if anyone broke in, the fact of their presence is still a deterent, and any such claim would be for robbery, rather than burglary, i.e. the risk is little different to a situation where a scrote knocks on the door and then elbows their way in when the occupant opens the door.

My missus had one of these (left over from when her parents owned the place – they thought it might be handy one day, just in case…) & it definitely voided her insurance – I told her to double check the policy wording & there was a section specifically regarding key safes, can’t remember if there was anything regarding the visibility of it, but hers was right next to the door… 😐

I removed it fairly easily with a handy blunt axe, which was lying about 3 feet away…

All this talk of lump hammers, picking locking locks by touch and various vulnerabilities of the location of the keysafe I use. The reality is that half the time I don’t even lock my front door!

I removed it fairly easily with a handy blunt axe, which was lying about 3 feet away…

So the real vulnerability there was not the key safe but the blunt axe. That same axe would very easily break a window.

My first advice would be to check your household insurance policy: many of them now state that doors must be fitted with locks meeting the relevant British Standard (usually easily identifiable by a Kitemark on the lock) or be of an equivalent standard, e.g. the multi-point locks fitted to many UPVC doors don’t meet the British Standard (or didn’t when I last looked) but are obviously widely used and generally accepted by insurers.

Given you’ll struggle to buy one (in the UK) which isn’t approved, this is pretty trivial to meet.

These key safes will provide much lower levels of security than the British Standard, and I suspect that there is a real risk that an insurer that was faced with a claim where a burglar gained entry by breaking open a key safe to get hold of the keys, would turn down the claim. I certainly would not chance it.

Unless it’s specially prohibited by the policy, you’ll have a valid claim.

That same axe would very easily break a window.

True but breaking a (probably double-glazed) window is loud, very suspicious and leaves an obvious external sign that someone is currently robbing the house.

Fiddling with a key safe for less than a minute and then opening the door with a key is pretty discrete. Pretty low chance that anyone would notice and even if they did they might not think it suspicious. Especially if a lot of visitors use the key safe.

I think the best solution is a very obvious key safe, right next to the door, with a primed concussion grenade inside 😀

we have one as i got fed up with the teenage antigee offspring losing front door keys and ending up sitting on the doorstep – i’m usually at home but useful on the odd day when not or running late

now I know it’s a lifehack will have to reconsider or get with it and sort my sh1t

They’re really not very secure at all dead easy to work out the combination, no loud banging or glass shattering to alert others.

I think the best solution is a very obvious key safe, right next to the door, with a primed concussion grenade inside

Or just wire it to the guts of a cheap tazer bought off Amazon 😉

I’d have a concealed one at home, but not in plain sight.

I’ve never heard of one getting broken into, but they scream vulnerability to me.

Best in plain sight for carers though, it’s amazing how often you don’t get given the relevant info. Add in a dodgy phone signal and your stuck.

I’m possibly going to get something like that.

Do you also have one of those big grab-rails next to the toilet?

And probably one of those as well, as my step-dad is 92 and is suffering from low blood pressure, posture hypertension I believe it’s called. He’s currently in Bath RUH, and will have regular careers when he comes home, so the careers will need access when I’m at work or out. I’ve already got grab rails fitted either side of the front and back doors.

We have one of those. We keep it out of sight, but importantly where it’s illuminated. So you can see what you’re doing at night.

Maybe talk to your neighbours and get them to fit one to but you have the combo for and keep your key in the one by their door

I’ve never heard of one getting broken into, but they scream vulnerability to me.

At that is the crux of it. through work we install around 200 per year and have around 1500 out and about in the local community and I am not aware of one of them ever being broken in to or used as the security weak point to enable a burglary.

Perhaps that is more of a reflection on the low crime in our local area but I still think it is a pretty good evidence base.

“Maybe talk to your neighbours and get them to fit one to but you have the combo for and keep your key in the one by their door”

or you could just park up outside each other’s houses and crack on with it

Perhaps that is more of a reflection on the low crime in our local area

Could also be an example of confirmation bias though:

you’re not aware of any of the 1500 keysafes being used during a burglary, but how many non-keysafe related breaking & entering burglaries are you aware of at the same properties?

franksinatra – Member

So the real vulnerability there was not the key safe but the blunt axe. That same axe would very easily break a window.

Ahaaa – but it’s an upper cottage flat so they’d need to bring a 20ft ladder to get to those in the first place 😉

The axe was actually the neighbours – he’d been out cutting mashing firewood into splinters with it earlier & I couldn’t be bothered going back upstairs for anything less appropriate to tackle it with.

I leave my key outside the front door, not even in a box… but like DrP, I live in the south. 😆

If you lived in the north then you’d be friendly enough with your neighbours to leave a key with them 😉

True but breaking a (probably double-glazed) window is loud, very suspicious and leaves an obvious external sign that someone is currently robbing the house.

You would wouldn’t you? Our neighbours were deaf to the rear double glazing being put in on a small window one Sunday night. House one

They all missed our car being shunted 20m down the street during morning traffic too.

At house 2 they all missed the noise of some youth putting a brick through the leaded light on the front door one mid-week night. The partially deaf neighbour saw the damaged window in daylight and reported it. Worst Centre Parc holiday ever. (We were in Elveden when it happened).

Neighbours don’t hear or notice much normally, unless they happen to see it go down.

I leave my key outside the front door, not even in a box… but like DrP, I live in the south.

That explains why you need to lock your door.

At that is the crux of it. through work we install around 200 per year and have around 1500 out and about in the local community and I am not aware of one of them ever being broken in to or used as the security weak point to enable a burglary.

That’s possibly because there’s weaker points. Euro-cylinder locks, for instance.

Euro-cylinder locks, for instance.

Are they weak points Cougar?

I know they can be picked with some skill (as can pretty much all locks), but as others have said burglars very rarely pick locks.

Cheap euro cylinder locks are incredibly easy to break into. They don’t need picking, you just need a battery operated drill. We learned the hard way. Now we have these:

http://www.brisant-secure.com/ultion.php

And these:

http://www.euro-secure.com/milaprosecure.asp