Traveling and Living

Ensuring you will enjoy your holiday starts with assuring the safety of your home while you are away. It seems we hear this warning time and time again, however statistics demonstrate that we often fail to take the steps necessary to protect our belongings left at home and also our possessions we take on our trip. When the safety of either our home or our travel luggage is violated, it mars our enjoyment.

People remain more vulnerable if they still operate on the premise of the days when they left the key under the mat or the house unlocked. Recently, I was visiting relatives in the US Midwest and was alarmed at their crime prevention attitudes. They routinely left their 3000 square foot home unlocked with patio doors open. Their opinion is that if someone wants to break in, they will. So why make it difficult; they will only damage locks and/or break windows. This is very foolish thinking. Criminals are basically lazy. If there are two houses side-by-side and one is locked and alarmed, even if they are high on drugs and looking for an adrenalin rush, they are more likely to choose the easy target!

Arm yourself with the latest information from the local police department, and try to think from inside a criminal’s mind-set – don’t make yourself a target. Start by removing all keys hidden outside your home. Let’s face it – there are only a few good hiding spots outside a house and if you think it is a good hiding spot, you are probably wrong. It is likely to be the same spot as most people use: under a mat, in a flower pot, in the mailbox, on the top of the door jamb, under a bush—how predictable is that? Install secure dead-bolts, and proper locks on windows. Place screws in the top window tracks on sliding windows, so windows cannot be easily lifted up-and-out from outside.

Get a monitored alarm system. It is affordable and can minimize damage if thieves do enter. Most people who have never experienced a burglary fail to fathom the damage and vandalism that occurs in the process. Install light timers and use them. Ensure that mail, junk mail and newspapers do not accumulate, leaving tell-tale signs of your absence. Arrange to have the lawn mowed and watered and make arrangements to secure the safety and care of your pets.

Next, build a “what-if” plan. Leave your travel itinerary with a trusted neighbor or friend. There are many reasons for staying in touch. Not only does it protect your home. It enables family/friends to reach you in case of a family emergency. It also secures your safety. Recently a retired couple was buried alive in a mud slide in BC and it was nearly a week before they were even announced missing. They were in the habit of not staying in touch, so the family simply didn’t think anything was wrong – until it was too late.

Given the circumstances of the slide it is unlikely that earlier notice would have saved their lives, however it would be a relief to a family to never have to question that. Set up a travel about to keep your family and friends involved with your trip. It will create a great diary and memory of your trip and gives a meaningful way to maintain contact.

Keep personal records, both with you and at home of your credit cards and travelers’ cheque numbers. Keep a back-up credit card and/or travelers cheques secure but separate. Keeping everything together could leave you stranded. Notify your credit company that you will be making more expenditure and that billings will come from your travel destination.

One week into my daughter’s trip around the world her bank phoned me and asked for her. When I said she was unavailable, they asked when they would be able to reach her. I stated she was on a lengthy trip and would not be accessible for some time. They asked me where she went and when I expected to have contact with her.

It was at that point that I became aware that the call had been triggered by the flurry of charges coming from Tokyo, Hong Kong, and China. If she had not been living with me, or had my response to the bank been different, they would have frozen her cards assuming she was being victimized by fraud.

Most travel by air has been affected by the World Trade Center attacks, and security criteria is constantly changing and becoming stricter.

Many of the things you could carry even a year ago are now prohibited. Simple things we could carry such as a bottle of water, now can only be carried on if it has been purchased beyond the check-in gates. Keep your luggage in sight at all times. You become liable if someone plants anything in your luggage. Remove all previous destination tags to prevent your luggage from going on its own vacation – alone. Place tags that list your name, address and telephone at the next destination point – making it easier for the airline to reunite you with your luggage if it becomes lost. It is wise for these tags to be somewhat private, so they cannot be easily read by the wrong people. Keep a list of the contents of your luggage and carry-on items so you will be able to tell the airline what you are missing if it goes astray and is never found.

Use a unique method of tagging your luggage for quick, easy identification when it comes off a carrousel. The more times your luggage goes around the circle without you grabbing it, the more likely it is to be lifted willfully or accidentally by someone else.

When there are 500 black suitcases going around and around, unless yours has some quick identifying feature it becomes unrecognizable. Beautiful expensive luggage is often targeted more than ‘tacky tourist’ suitcases with large pink daisy designs. The assumption on the part of the thief is “if that is how bad their taste is in luggage, what is inside is probably equally as unappealing”. Exercise your sense of humor – they will never know.

At your destination, do not leave cash or valuables in your hotel room. In fact, it is a good idea to leave all expensive jewelry home. Wearing expensive jewelry is like hanging out a sign – “I have expensive taste and my luggage may be worth going after”.

Lock your suitcases when leaving them in your room. It makes them more secure from unscrupulous housekeeping staff and also prevents the possibility of the suitcase being used to carry things out of the room.

Never open your door to an unexpected person or stranger. Look through the door viewer and use the security measures provided by the hotel for your protection while in your room. It is also possible to purchase an inexpensive motion sensitive alarm to hang on the inside of your room door. If an intruder enters, it will alert you. It is a terrible experience to wake up to a stranger in the room with you. We were once victims of a home invasion, and although we were unaware of the burglar’s arrival and departure – it took a very long time before we could sleep without feeling we were being watched. Protect your calling card numbers or pin numbers from people who may easily watch you, or snap your picture with a camera phone.