AMI Warning – Be Vigilant and Beware of Trailer Scams

Over recent months, there has been a number of cases involving trailer scams – both plant trailers and horse trailers.
Generally the trailer is advertised for sale, either online or within a magazine, at a very cheap price to alert interest. When potential purchasers make contact, the alleged ‘seller’ creates a bogus story, often to pull on the heartstrings. For example, a woman may claim that her husband has recently passed away and she wants to sell his trailer on. Or the ‘seller’ may say they are in the army and need to sell the trailer on at a discounted price as they are moving abroad imminently; they claim that they can drop the trailer off if they receive a deposit or sometimes even the full amount. There have even been instances where ‘sellers’ have supplied an image of their passport in an attempt to appear credible. Lo and behold, the passport details are actually bogus.
Once the relevant sum has been paid, the ‘seller’ effectively vanishes into thin air. The trailer is never delivered and the money is nowhere to be seen. The ‘buyer’ can be hundreds or even thousands of pounds out of pocket. The trailer advertised is not necessarily stolen as the ‘seller’ most likely never had it in the first place.
We would urge all to remain vigilant when buying trailers or other equipment advertised online or in a publication. Always avoid paying the full price upfront and only pay the full amount once it is safely delivered or even better, when you go to see it in person.
At AMI Group, we offer a range of tracking devices which give superb protection in the event of plant theft. Even if plant machinery is stolen, the AMI tracking devices allow plant hirers to quickly pinpoint the location of the equipment to the nearest metre and enable its recovery – saving the plant hirer thousands of pounds and avoiding the hassle and inconvenience of replacing stolen kit. A small investment can pay dividends, as the money spent on increasing security measures can be quickly recovered through insurance discounts, reduced claims and less downtime.
Virtually on a daily basis we are helping AMI Group customers across the UK to locate and recover stolen equipment as a result of the use of state-of-the-art tracking devices which utilise GPS (Global Positioning System), GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) and RF (Radio Frequency) technology. Once an AMI tracking device is fitted to a piece of machinery, customers can logon to the AMI Nexis web-based portal to establish its exact destination.