Penny On The Move is warning fellow forecourt owners with above ground fuel tanks in the Cumbria area and beyond to be on high alert. This follows two recent incidents at its sites in the county in which thieves siphoned off diesel with a plastic pipe connecting to an artic truck in a nearby field.
The most recent of two of these thefts within the past month took place at around 1am on Saturday morning at its award-winning Crosby Moor Service Station in Carlisle. Thieves emptied the entire tank while parked 10s of metres away in a field next door. Fortunately, the truck got stuck in the mud and the thieves abandoned the vehicle after four hours.
Police have impounded the truck and chief executive Vicky Hennessy believes that officers have an idea who is behind the ruse which if it had not failed could have cost the business thousands of pounds. She is still to hear when the fuel will be returned.
But the Top 50 Indie was not so lucky when its Newlands Service Station in Ulverston was targeted earlier this month, again around 1am with thieves using the same technique of pipework feeding into a tank on the truck. This time the thieves were an hour and a half on site, before making off with around £13,000 of diesel.
“This is not a quick process, but the problem is that with the truck being on a farmer’s field 50m to 100m away, they are out of site from motorists and CCTV and nobody notices what is happening,” says Hennessy.
She adds: “Both of our affected sites are rural locations which were closed at the time, with these people drilling into the side of one of the above the ground tanks and going in through the top with the other.”
“We want to warn other operators. If it happened to us twice in four weeks it’s very likely they will be scoping other people out.”
Penny on the Move, which had a similar incident at a site in the north east of England three years ago, is now upgrading security measures across its 24 sites with above ground tanks.
It has been installing motion-activated sensor lighting around all above ground tanks to deter unauthorised access during low-visibility hours, and replaced existing tank bolts with tamper-resistant alternatives to reduce the likelihood of forced entry siphoning attempts.
It also now deploys perimeter CCTV and tank specific cameras, equipped with alarm-linked activation, and integrated with existing store alarm networks to ensure immediate response when activity is detected.
And it is enhancing 24/7 remote monitoring of fuel levels using Fairbanks wetstock management systems to enable prompt identification of irregular drawdowns or suspicious activity across all above ground equipped sites.
Hennessy urges other operators with above ground tanks at rural sites to consider similar action.
She says: “We’ve now been hit three times in three years and want to raise awareness of this issue which could cause real problems for smaller operators in particular. In hindsight we should have had security measures in place, as it’s far better to take preventative action than lose tank loads of fuel and all of the expense and hassle that this brings.”
Penny On The Move’s Crosby Moor Service Station won the Northern England up to 4mlpa category at the Forecourt Trader Awards in 2024.
