lost property


27
Jun 10

Tips for your children’s property to be returned, not lost

It is a known fact that children lose their toys, keys, jackets, and clothes. You name it and they’ve most likely lost it at one point or another in their life. The question is does their property stay lost? Have you ever thought of making their property returnable when lost??

Putting the ol’ last name on your kids clothing tag works sometimes but why not put your number instead? Why would you write on a coat tag when you can write a note and stick it in the pocket in case lost? A good idea one mom thought about was sewing her own tag on top of the normal tag in the back. This extended her area for displaying her own note and contact information for easy contact.

Two simple elements are needed. Something just as easy as writing “return” and then including a contact number or address it can be returned to. Just writing a name on a piece of property will tell the people in fact who owns it, but finding that person may be a whole different story.

One thing that my children lost that was very nerve racking to me was our home keys. We ended up re-keying everything including the back shed. It cost us easily over $300 and rather than telling them not to lose their keys again I decided to find a remedy that worked.

With very little effort I came across a lost key return service named “Back To Ya” which is just as simple as attaching their lifetime service keytag, registering it on their website @ www.BackToYa.com and taking a deep breath. My kids keys now have their very own method of return back to us anonymously so we don’t have to worry about them getting into the wrong hands.

There are many different ways to ensure your property returns back to you after lost.  Hopefully the tips found here can help you in making the decision what would work out best for you. Maybe this article will even get some juices flowing in the brain to come up with your own ideas so that your little guy’s things get back to where they belong. Thanks for listening.


20
May 10

A Resting Place for the Flotsam and Jetsam of Commuting

Oh the horrors of not labelling your stuff. How much must all this cost?

via A Resting Place for the Flotsam and Jetsam of Commuting.


6
Apr 10

My story & How losing your keys ruins an Anniversary

Oh what a sorry tale I have to tell.

Three years ago I was out to dinner after a tough day at work.  It was a celebration of our last un-married anniversary, we were getting hitched in about a month.

Got a nice relatively close park in an underground secure parking.  We got to restaurant in heaps of time.  With the entrées ordered things couldn’t have been going better.

Well things started to go a little south from there.

You know when you look back on things that go wrong you can usually pin point the exact point that things start to fall apart.

Well this is that moment!

The phone rang, I should have turned it off!!  It was a rather frantic call from where I worked at my day job, I handle the IT and software development for Kitset Kitchens.   Well the guys were in a bit of a tiz with a computer in the office.

Well I left the restaurant and paced up and down the pavement while talking the guys through how to fix the problem, all the while fiddling with my keys in my pocket.

After ten minutes, or so, everything was settled and I was able to return to the restaurant and enjoy the rest of the night.

Or so I thought.

After the lovely dinner we walked down the sidewalk towards when I had left my car.  As we got closer I put my hand in my pocket to get my keys, well they weren’t in the normal pocket, so I sheepishly checked the other pocket; nope not their either.  ”Honey could you check your handbag please? I might have put them in there.”  Nope!  Oh crap, where the hell are they?

Surprisingly she STILL married me…

So then begins the treasure hunt.  First back to the restaurant, looking along the way.  Nope, not there.  Then checked the road, which I had been pacing up and down.  Nope, not their either.  Then I asked all the stores I had passed in case someone found them and handed them in.  You guessed it, nope, not there either!  Well I spent a few hours looking, then realized what the hell do I do with my car? The secure parking locks up for the night in 45 mins!

Well to save you all the boring details.  I left the car and got my girlfriend, surprisingly she still married me, to drive me home.  Then I called around all the local police stations to see if anyone handed anything in, nothing!  Funnily though, they all said they had boxes and boxes of keys I could come and look at though.

Just as I was about to give up, in the middle of the night, I got a call from a guy who worked at my local golf club.  Apparently, the kind lady who found them saw the tag, which had a membership number on it, and called the golf club.  He gave me her phone number.

From there it was a simple case of arranging to meet her the next day and get my keys back, plus pay a ridiculous fee to get my car back from the car park.

Well I have to say the whole mess got me thinking.  The situation could have been improved had the lady been able to contact me instantly without doing any detective work and if her details had been kept more private.

Had these two simple problems been solved chances are she would have been right next to the restaurant when she found them; I would have only had to walk outside to get them off her.  The wonders of timely information.

Well I set out to create a simple fast and effective solution that solves all these problems.

Why not take 5 minutes out to check out my awesome Lost Property solution at www.lostuff.com.

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30
Mar 10

What is my property REALLY worth to me anyway?

This is a question that is not asked enough!  In fact it is the reason people neglect to take the necessary time to ensure they don’t lose their possessions.  This remains true for not only tangible possessions but also non-tangible ones. The failure to fully appreciate the loss of data on a computer is the reason that we don’t backup our computers as regularly as we are all told to.

What would it cost me, as a whole, to replace this item.

People spend $1,500 on a laptop, and $800 on a phone and then do nothing to protect that investment.  I think this is out of the misguided belief that “oh, but I’m insured”.  That maybe true; assuming that you paid the exorbitant fees for laptop insurance god forbid you are going to “travel” with it; but will that get you back the data stored on the devices?  Unfortunately, the answer is a big fat “NO”!

In most cases the lion’s share of the value of these devices is the information they contain, not to mention the disruption they cause when they suddenly disappear.

Then in the case of something benign like your car keys.  The key itself is of little value; perhaps $5-$100 depending if you just need one cut or if you need to request it from the manufacturer.  But what does your time cost? The resulting inconvenience of losing your keys while you are out shopping triggers a set of events that go something like this:

  • Realize that they are missing;
  • Spend ‘x’ time retracing your movements in the hope that they are still sitting on the pavement somewhere;
  • After trying that a few times you then realize that you have to get home and leave your car there. So it’s either Public Transport, Taxi, a kind friend or walking;
  • Then you have to get your “spare set”, go back to the car and pick it up so you don’t get a parking ticket;
  • Finally, you need to arrange to get another key.

That’s only if you were down the street shopping.  Imagine how much that could compound if you were away on holidays instead.

So if you were to look at each item you own and ask yourself not “what did this item cost to buy” but “what would it cost me, as a whole, to replace this item”; I think people would take the time to be a little more diligent and proactive about protecting their property.

We have attached a “True Replacement Cost Calculator” spreadsheet for you to have a play with, to find out what you are really risking by not labeling everything properly.  I’m sure that after plugging just a few items into this calculator you will be surprised just how much these objects are really worth to you.

After losing my keys I realized first hand just how much something can cost you even when the item itself is very cheep.

As a result I created the fastest and simplest Lost and Found solution, for those who want to be proactive.  It is available worldwide, 24×7.  There is zero waiting time!  You think it, you label it, there and then.  No waiting for the mail, no second action.  Take 5 minutes to setup your details so the item can find it’s way home and label to your heart’s content.

Check out the best Lost Property solution on the net today, www.lostuff.com.

[Coupon for free membership available to the first 10 members: BLOG-1]

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22
Mar 10

Why you should never put Personal Details on property!

So why not just put your name and phone number on your keys and other stuff?

With the rise of the awesomely powerful and interconnected Internet. One unfortunate byproduct has been that we have somewhat lost some of our privacy.

What you will find all around the internet are companies and websites that allow users to enter small pieces of information, like a phone number, and it will spit back other information that someone might like, for example an address. I’m sure you can see what this means if you put your phone number on your house keys.

So while a simple “way home” for your stuff is important, what is equally important is, an “informational fence” that will stop anyone who finds your property from linking and compiling any sort of personal profile of you. That “informational fence” is usually provided by a third party who also provides the bridge back to you.

So the bottom line is never put personal details on your stuff. Always put some form of coded information that does provide a distict “way home” for your things but not obvious enough for any 10 yo with an Internet connection to find. It is undoubtably best to use a 3rd party as the firewall between you and the finder; because although some 70% of items will be found by Good Samaritans, that still leave 30% which may either be lazy or not quite so good.

Check out our Lost Property recovery solution which solves this problem in seconds at www.lostuff.com

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19
Mar 10

Welcome to my blog

Hi,

Welcome to my new, and first, blog.

Just to give you a small insight to me, I HATE losing things; and I don’t like seeing other people losing their stuff either.

So this blog is going to basically devoted to tips and tricks to help prevent you from losing your possessions, as well as updates on things that I create to help in this quest; as well as, knowing me, probably some general ramblings on the topic.

Anyway that’s about it for now. Thanks for coming by and checking it out, feel free to bookmark me, add my RSS feed, share me with your friends and just generally spread the love. I planning to post regularly, and get some good content up ASAP.

Thanks again for taking the time to read this.

Cheers,

Paul

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