Like tinsel in the shops and Christmas carols on the radio, an increase in cash-in-transit heists signals the onset of the festive season.
The recent spike in such robberies — there were 13 across the country this week — reflects the growing volume of cash being transported in South Africa’s major cities as the Christmas shopping season looms, say experts.
They also believe cash-in-transit firms will remain vulnerable to highly organised and well-informed robbers unless they take measures to improve security levels across the industry.
Experts say that the spate of cash-in-transit robberies in the past week highlights a definite increase in such crimes this year. There were 12% more heists from January to October this year than in the same period last year, with a particularly dramatic rise since August, according to the South African Banking Risk Intelligence Centre (Sabric).
Police statistics show that the number of cash-in-transit robberies increased from 192 for the period 2002/03 to 220 in 2004/05. Last year 37% of the heists took place in Gauteng. In 2003, businesses lost R130million in heists.
”Monday was one of the worst days that the industry has experienced,” said Sabric managing director Pierre Steyn. There were reportedly 10 heists, resulting in the deaths of at least two security guards. Steyn believes the attacks were the work of a number of gangs.
The police also expect cash-in-transit robberies to rise as people spend more in preparation for the holidays. ”The number of robberies can be attributed to the upcoming festive season and the large amounts of money in circulation,” said police spokesperson Mary Martins-Engelbrecht.
Criminals are getting wise to the strategies of the police and pre-empting festive season initiatives. ”Robbers aren’t stupid. They also do risk management,” said Steyn. ”They would expect law enforcers to launch festive season initiatives soon.”
Experts acknowledge that cash-in-transit robbers have plenty of information about the firms that they target and firms must continually improve their security to deter attacks.
”They are predators,” said Steyn, ”They know exactly when and where the movement takes place. They don’t go for the strong, they go for those they can overwhelm.”
Experts say that increasing the number of guards in cash-in-transit vehicles would improve the defensive capacity of crews. Often there is only a driver and a crew member. The crew member is vulnerable to attack as he enters and leaves the building alone. A third guard would increase his safety.
Firms could also invest in armoured vehicles as opposed to hardened vehicles, similar to taxi minibuses. ”Some of the small firms operate from the back of a boot,” said Steyn. ”Their sense of social responsibility to their own people and the public is low. If clients displayed a proper social conscience, they would make provision for vehicles to use entrances where the public don’t go.”
The three largest cash-in-transit firms, Coin Security Group, Fidelity Services Group and SBV Security, are involved in an initiative to upgrade their vehicles, although the process is not complete.
But as fast as cash-in-transit firms introduce new security measures, robbers infiltrate the companies and devise new strategies to counter heightened security.
”Robbers seldom plan a robbery without inside information,” wrote Jean-Pierre Rossouw this year in a report entitled Walking Among Shadows based on interviews with convicted robbers. The report forms part of the research he conducted for Sabric. ”It became evident that the type of employees most robbers targeted were those they believed had an axe to grind, with nothing to lose and a lot to gain,” reported Rossouw.
Disgruntled cash-in-transit guards are invaluable to robbers who want to tap them for information when planning future attacks. This week the Mail & Guardian interviewed two cash-in-transit guards to get a sense of their morale and vulnerability to approaches from criminals. Solomon (not his real name) complained bitterly about his treatment at Coin Security Group.
”It’s dangerous,” he said. ”We’re there because we want the money, but at the end of the day, the people that we work for don’t care. They only want you to put money into the company.”
Solomon said he has been approached by people asking for information about his work. He said criminals often approached guards at their homes and used violence to intimidate them into cooperating.
Cash-in-transit guards earn up to twice the average salary of security guards, and security companies hope this will make them less susceptible to corruption.
But guards also come under pressure from their employers, who suspect them of collusion. After cash-in-transit vehicles are robbed, Coin routinely administers polygraph tests to already traumatised guards, who claim they are not shown the results and are assaulted by superiors if they fail the tests.
Coin denied the allegations, saying it had responded to complaints about poor labour conditions in the cash-in-transit division by launching an investigation and that the matter has been resolved through a workers’ forum.
Steyn said the industry needed to institute minimum technical and operational standards.
He also expressed concern that fierce competition between cash-in-transit firms might be leading to cost-cutting, which prevents them from improving security.