micklplus: I was a victim once and I don't pray to be a victim again. I was given a toyota corolla in the office on friday and the car was stolen sunday morning!(Oct 2011) Funny enough, I saw the car 6:30am and by 7:45am, the car was gone! So sad but then I got other car and I am still paying for the car till today.

I am wiser now oo. Pedal lock, steering lock, immobiliser!!! They are always in place even inside my compound.

goldincome: How Vehicle Tracker Works and Why you should have it installed.

Let me use this opportunity to enlighten us on how vehicle tracker works

A vehicle tracker works with a SIM card inserted into it and GPS which is satellite to locate your vehicle if it is installed on it.

It is installed in a hidden and very difficult to locate position in your car and works underground without anybody knowing that it is in your car.

Once it is installed, 4 phone numbers of your choice will be configured on it to track the vehicle should your own phone is stolen with the car - Note, the phone numbers must be of the people you trust with your life.

What a tracker can do
-A tracker can stop or demobilize a car and the car will stop and may not be started again.
-A tracker can get the exact location of your vehicle and send it to your phone
-With a tracker, you can listen to the voice talk within and around your vehicle
-You can know the driving speed of your car at any time.
...and more.

A tracker is not costly to install and you can manage it yourself if you choose to.

I will discuss more on why a tracker is different from ordinary car security.

If you have any question concerning vehicle trackers, drop it here and I will answer all your questions
Cheers

What a tracker can do
-A tracker can stop or demobilize a car and the car will stop and may not be started again.

-A tracker can get the exact location of your vehicle and send it to your phone

-With a tracker, you can listen to the voice talk within and around your vehicle
-You can know the driving speed of your car at any time.
...and more.

Pesuzok:
Too bad, sorry about that. Assuming you had a tramigo car tracker installed, it would have sent you an sms immediately your car starts, or moves; depends on the configuration you set. All you would have just sent an sms to the tracker in you car to lock down the ignition, and nothing can make the car start untill you send another sms to unlock the engine. Cool!

micklplus: I was a victim once and I don't pray to be a victim again. I was given a toyota corolla in the office on friday and the car was stolen sunday morning!(Oct 2011) Funny enough, I saw the car 6:30am and by 7:45am, the car was gone! So sad but then I got other car and I am still paying for the car till today.

I am wiser now oo. Pedal lock, steering lock, immobiliser!!! They are always in place even inside my compound.

femionasan: While following this thread, i have noticed that Toyotas and Hondas are the most commonly stolen vehicles. My General manager at work was killed on tuesday 10th of July cos of his 2010 Toyota Camry and he didnt even struggle with them.

femionasan: Actually there were other cars being snatched at the time. One other person who had his car snatched right there saw the whole incident, the car was found at the border Idi-iroko. The police flagged them down but they refused to stop, they eventually shot at the car and injured one of them but as usual they still escaped. Nigeria keeps getting scarier and scarier every passing day.

Connoisseur: My Nissan Murano jeep was snatched at gunpoint this Sunday th 8th of July. I wish I had Tia mtntracking installed. A 3 weeks old car

gReenmAn: Very interesting thread.
I lost my Toyota Camry 2000 model on 26th of February this year.
I had gone for a child dedication party at a friends place after church.
I had packed on a street adjacent to his house and came back less than 30 minutes later to find an empty space where my car had been.
An eye witnesses later told me he saw a passanger alight from a taxi cab that came to a stop beside my car, casually strolled to the parked car and simply unlocked the it and drove off. All the while the taxi was parked right behind the car, they both zoomed off afterwards at the same time. The witness said there was nothig suspicious about the whole operation because it was done so casually and without any visible force.
Of course, the car was locked with the keys still with me till this day. Car has not been found till date despite having angraved the reg numbers on all available space on the body of the car.

Lesson I learnt is; always value what you have, cos you wont know what you've got till it's gone.
I say this because I had just degraded my insurance from "Comrehensive" to "third party" just a month earlier when it fell due. I had also stopped using my leg pedal locks, all because I felt the car was too old (12 yrs!) to be of any any interest to any thief.
How wrong I was.

jp philips: i dont want to undermine the guy above who is advertising his tracker but lack of knowledge sells every jargorn in the market.
The present day robbers operating in abuja, lagos and portharort are no longer those ogogoro kinda petit thieves, they are real professionals and graduates who have waiting clients in cotonou for those vehicles,
for every car they wish to steal, the car is placed under surveillance for a long time before the hit is done.
In a place like port harcourt due to poor road network, snatching at gun point is not usually the norm but picking it from where u parked it in nite clubs, joints, supermarkets etc.

The tracker today is equally no threat for this set of sophisticated robbers because most trackers are wired to the BB (brain box) of the vehicle.
By default, all the wires coming out from the BB are usually similar with a cellophane strap round it, firmly secured. Because our tracker installers lack ingenuity, they run a new wire different from the ones used in the BB by default thereby making it easy to identify.
This is the bane of car trackers in Nigeria, the thieves call themselves professionals because each is able to identify the position of the BB of the car in his specialty.

Once the car is snatched, they drive a reasonable distance and pull over, the specialist id's the brain box, hand held battery powered drills and screw drivers are their favorite tools, in less than 2 mins, the tracker is useless and the car is gone.

Insurance on the other hand is the most legal fraud in Nigeria, if you are in doubt, visit any high court in ur jurisdiction and ask for their case files, the second highest on the list is insurance claims after land dispute. The big questions any insurance agent need to answer is this;

1 why do we need to go to court to settle our insurance claims even when our premiums are paid regularly?
2 why do we need insurance brokers to mediate between the client and the insurance company if the insurance guys re not unscrupulous? Or do we need brokers to withdraw money from the bank?
3 when you are signing an insurance agreement in Nigeria, do you see the caveat where they say "Natural disasters" are not covered by comprehensive insurance premiums? Did you see the interpretation of Natural disasters? Well, i don't think so till you have an insurance case, if your insured car is parked close to a building that eventually catches fire and it affects your vehicle, most insurance companies classify it as natural disaster, no claim.

4, no insurance company in Nigeria insures ''mob-action'' and in their agreement, there was no interpretation for that in other words, they can call it anything, eg 4 kids playing football on the street is a mob to the insurance guys cos if they burst your wind shield, you are on ur own with ur comprehensive insurance.

5 If boko haram attacks close to ur residence and the shock wave of the explosion affects your car and it is established that the attackers are more than one, insurance calls it "mob action", therefore no claim.

6 thieves without guns are "Mobs" in the Nigerian insurance books so no claim.

When you use a good broker, the insurance will pay not because of you but to maintain the good will and customer base of the broker, even at that, the criteria is still terrible, for a venture that charges between 8 to 10% of your car's worth annually.

From my experience so far, insurance against theft, devaluation of assets to pay lower claims has never been as reassuring as the most sought reprieve.

I will advise every car owner, even with ur tracker, use steel pedal locks and anti theft alarms, there is a hand held battery powered metal cutter that can cut the locks no doubt but it takes time and very noisy, will easily attract attention and difficult to procure in Nigeria.

The other option is engrave, yea people believe that they can pull out the reg. Number of their vehicle, show case it again and sell after using it for a while, well, the bad news is that the new reg process will give you a kick so engraving is an option now.

Engrave not just the replaceable parts but equally on the chassis boldly, that will deter thieves alot who want to pass it on as "direct Belgium" to the dealers.

jp philips:





the best tracker is any GPS enabled device that doesn't have any contact with the brain box, it doesn't shut down the vehicle, it doesn't listen to conversations but it keeps the gps signals alive with rechargeable batteries where i can charge it and return to my hidden corner only known to me that way i can track its signals on the day of emergency, anything short of that is useless in my books dont forget to assist it with steel pedal locks simple

laoma15: I had my first car stolen in 2000(Toyota Carrina 11) while attending a sunday morning service in far away Kano.
It was a terrible experience. When I came out from the church, I was looking under another car that had parked exactly where mine had been parked some hours before.

I reported the matter to the Police and parted with some money but no show.

After three weeks of rigorous search, I got a call from Lagos from a family friend that he saw a car that looks like my car.
The car was put on display for sale.
He requested that I send them the car chassis number and the Engine number.
Not quite long when I got a call back that the chassis number was the same but they couldnt search the Engine number because that was a bit hidden.
Had to fly down to Lagos for identification.
When I got to the spot, I hardly could recognise the car cos the sellers had turned it to ''Tokunbo" and got all documents perfected.
I play a role of a buyer and carefully examined the documents and other features to convince myself that it was actaully my car.

I eventually recovered my car.

It was a big testimony.

I will advise that people inscribe the registration number on the glasses and other strategic places to discourage them atleast from reselling.

Pesuzok:
Sorry for my duplicating post earlier. Connecting and wiring the tracker to the BB is just to shut down the car when you send an sms. For tramigo tracker, you can decide not to wire it or connect it to the car BB. Just place the device anywhere in your car and you can track ur car with ur phone. You can bring out the device from the car to recharge in the house

Pesuzok:
Tramigo is the answer. It has an inbuilt rechargeable battery that last for 2weeks on sleep mode and you can recharge it in your house. The device sends you an sms when the battery is low. Just place the device in a hidden place in you car and you can track your car, but cannot stop it. Tramigo has inbuilt landmark of nigeria, so it sends alert letting you know the name of the road or street you car is.

goldincome: @jp philips

I don't want to quote your post because it will be occupy space here.
I can understand the point where you are coming from because you have been a victim.
Most of the points that you raised are very important and I that you for that.

Let me explain some things here.

I am not a marketer and i did not advertise in my post. Did you see any phone number or other advertising gimmick.
I have been in this business for years and I make bold to say that I know a bit more about vehicle trackers.

Straight to the things you raised because it will help others to learn here.
The trackers i know and use, does not use brain box and I will not explain the technicalities here because it is a security issue but i will explain salient things about it.

If a good tracker is installed in your vehicles, it will have a backup battery that will last from 7 to 60 days even when the battery of the vehicle is cut off.

If a thief managed to bypass the tracker and start the vehicle - which is possible for experienced thieves that are auto technician, you will still be able to track the car even if the power that supplies the tracker is cut off.
Mind you that the tracker will alert you once the power of the car that supply power to it is cut off.

The wiring of the tracker is not always visible and it will take you time to detect the wiring of the tracker.
Also there is no light that flashes, even if you have one that flashes, it is for your installer to know how to hide the flash light.

The best tracker is a tracker that has a backup up between 30 to 60 days. It is not good to have a tracker you can be touching and be changing the battery. If a vehicle tracker and not ordinary tracker cannot stop your car then it is not a good vehicle tracker. Listening to the voice is good if you like it.

Mind you, most thieves are just after the car and if the car stops, and they have time, they will try to start it or bypass the security which will take them time and if they managed to do that successfully, you will still be able to track your car and recover it otherwise, they will abandon the car and look for another one.

I have several vehicles that my company have recovered.
In as much as we agree that no system is totally perfect but i will advice you not to drive your car until you have a vehicle tracker installed otherwise you will regret it.

If you have any more question, I will be willing to answer here

acidtalk:

Every single insurance company will insist you get a vehicle tracke or some kind of security if the insurance is to cover theft.

jp philips: i dont want to undermine the guy above who is advertising his tracker but lack of knowledge sells every jargorn in the market.
The present day robbers operating in abuja, lagos and portharort are no longer those ogogoro kinda petit thieves, they are real professionals and graduates who have waiting clients in cotonou for those vehicles,
for every car they wish to steal, the car is placed under surveillance for a long time before the hit is done.
In a place like port harcourt due to poor road network, snatching at gun point is not usually the norm but picking it from where u parked it in nite clubs, joints, supermarkets etc.

The tracker today is equally no threat for this set of sophisticated robbers because most trackers are wired to the BB (brain box) of the vehicle.
By default, all the wires coming out from the BB are usually similar with a cellophane strap round it, firmly secured. Because our tracker installers lack ingenuity, they run a new wire different from the ones used in the BB by default thereby making it easy to identify.
This is the bane of car trackers in Nigeria, the thieves call themselves professionals because each is able to identify the position of the BB of the car in his specialty.

Once the car is snatched, they drive a reasonable distance and pull over, the specialist id's the brain box, hand held battery powered drills and screw drivers are their favorite tools, in less than 2 mins, the tracker is useless and the car is gone.

Insurance on the other hand is the most legal fraud in Nigeria, if you are in doubt, visit any high court in ur jurisdiction and ask for their case files, the second highest on the list is insurance claims after land dispute. The big questions any insurance agent need to answer is this;

1 why do we need to go to court to settle our insurance claims even when our premiums are paid regularly?
2 why do we need insurance brokers to mediate between the client and the insurance company if the insurance guys re not unscrupulous? Or do we need brokers to withdraw money from the bank?
3 when you are signing an insurance agreement in Nigeria, do you see the caveat where they say "Natural disasters" are not covered by comprehensive insurance premiums? Did you see the interpretation of Natural disasters? Well, i don't think so till you have an insurance case, if your insured car is parked close to a building that eventually catches fire and it affects your vehicle, most insurance companies classify it as natural disaster, no claim.

4, no insurance company in Nigeria insures ''mob-action'' and in their agreement, there was no interpretation for that in other words, they can call it anything, eg 4 kids playing football on the street is a mob to the insurance guys cos if they burst your wind shield, you are on ur own with ur comprehensive insurance.

5 If boko haram attacks close to ur residence and the shock wave of the explosion affects your car and it is established that the attackers are more than one, insurance calls it "mob action", therefore no claim.

6 thieves without guns are "Mobs" in the Nigerian insurance books so no claim.

When you use a good broker, the insurance will pay not because of you but to maintain the good will and customer base of the broker, even at that, the criteria is still terrible, for a venture that charges between 8 to 10% of your car's worth annually.

From my experience so far, insurance against theft, devaluation of assets to pay lower claims has never been as reassuring as the most sought reprieve.

I will advise every car owner, even with ur tracker, use steel pedal locks and anti theft alarms, there is a hand held battery powered metal cutter that can cut the locks no doubt but it takes time and very noisy, will easily attract attention and difficult to procure in Nigeria.

The other option is engrave, yea people believe that they can pull out the reg. Number of their vehicle, show case it again and sell after using it for a while, well, the bad news is that the new reg process will give you a kick so engraving is an option now.

Engrave not just the replaceable parts but equally on the chassis boldly, that will deter thieves alot who want to pass it on as "direct Belgium" to the dealers.