On Thu, 22 Dec 2005 16:02:35 +0000, Mike Roscoe wrote
(in message ):


"Mike" wrote:
Get yourself a peep hole in the door.
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OK! So what happens when you look through the
peep hole, see a postman, open the door only to find he isn't ?
It's been done before and with disastrous results.

M.R.

An intercom is useful but it isn't something that suddenly makes you safe.
For example if you answer the intercom and a voice says "Delivery" or "I got
a delivery for you mate", if it has to be signed for as many do, you do
actually need to let them into the building or you won't get your delivery.
As was seen on the UK news recently where a man was murdered in the hallway
of his Chelsea home seconds after admitting a "Postman" who wasn't one,
letting someone into the buidling, if you have no additional security, can be
a bit risky.

I think the answer is to have a metal barred gate over your own (internal or
external) front door and to do business, ie accept and sign for deliveries,
through the bars! They can shoot you through the bars buit they can't get
inside your home. Another variation is to have a front door that has a hatch
or smaller door that opens up within the main door sufficient to sign for
things and allow medium sized parcels to be pased through. Just because you
(probably) can't buy this sort of thing at B & Q doesn't mean it isn't a good
idea.

It sounds alarmist but in some areas these sort of things are necessary. I
visited a health centre in south London a few years ago where there were
posters all over the place in the waiting room saying not to go to the post
office alone but always in groups, and a nearby corner shop had taped-up
smashed plate glass in the window and instead of being able to enter the shop
and wander around, entering through the door brought customers into a metal
cage from which they could access only a short bit of counter. A man,
frightened-looking, would approach and ask what you wanted, and then go
walking among the shelves, find it and bring it to the counter where you paid
for it from the cage and then left the cage/shop via the door, having entered
no more than about a metre into the shop overall. What bothers me is- whover
that man was wanting to keep out- I want to keep them out too! My doctor was
attacked outside his surgery a couple of years ago- someone was waiting to
take his case off him by force, which he duly did. My doc had a few bruises
but nothing too bad. Not long after that the chemists shop two doors away
suddently adopted the policy of keeping the door locked and making customers
ring the doorbell to gain admittance, thus presumably stopping the wrong
people from getting in (again?). The hand-written signs explaining this
precaution did have a certain er, rawness about them. Most of this violence
is in the cities, but not all.

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