to mind that the police have treated me like a criminal

[gingeroots]

locked bike to railings ,on return found crossbar badly dented where someone had presumably been twisting bike against lock .
Insurance want crime reference nos - police refuse to give one -
"we're not here to give crime reference numbers "
"we can't verify that this is how bike was dented - the wind could have done it "
The position and type of dents ,imo ,make it obvious that someone has been wrenching the bike against the lock - but as well as telling me that they know nothing about bikes ,there was no interest in seeing the damaged bike .

So basically they think I'm lying .
Great.

That's awful. I thought that if you reported something as a crime they had to give you a reference number.

Why not phone back and ask for clarification?

Where do you live? can you report on-line?

SE London .
I've not heard of on line reporting .
I guess they're entitled to think that I was lying ,but the guy was so confrontational ,I can't believe he should be in the job .
sample - " We only deal in black and white ,in facts "
me ,attempting to explain ,"When I left the house in the norning the bike wasn't dented ...
him ,interrupting " According to you "

Totally with you Ginger - DD had her phone stolen @ a concert, but because we couldn't 'prove' it was stolen (ie we didn't actually see someone dressed in a Stripy shirt with a swag bag over their back lift it) the police were not interested!

The fact that it must have been 'taken' out of her tight jeans pocket meant nothing !!

And we realised almost straightaway that it was gone and phoned it - when eventually answered it must have been in a bag of phones 'cos you could hear them all ringing and definately no sound of the concert - so our assumption was they'd been lifted 'to order' and were on their way to a new life!

Serious learning curve for DD !!

No crime = no unsolved crime = better figures for the press release.

Sad, but true.

Really shocking - when some kids decided to keep banging into our door to the flats resulting in breaking the lock I ran the police for a crime reference to give HA as need to report things like this. Told police I'd spoken to kids who'd apologised etc. Gave me one, didn't come and check damage and rang 2 days later to check I was OK. Obviously very good police here - should be grateful.

That's a terrible atitude!

You could be mugged and roll up at the police station - "someone just stole my handbag!"
"according to you"

Or "I've been burgled, they've made a terrible mess and my laptop is gone"
"you could have done it yourself"

Police cannot refuse to receive your report of a crime, surely!

Anyone can report any crime at all - It's up to the police to investigate, surely? Not to stick their fingers in their ears and refuse to hear!

Could you not call back and try again and use the mugged example?

maybe you can try calling a different police station, to see if they are any more helpful? that is really bad though yanbu @ all

TBH I'm a bit traumatised and can't face exposing myself to more of the same .
During the course of our conversation he twice ( probably more ) misreported my words back to me eg "you said the bumps weren't obvious " and when I denied saying that his response was " so now you're changing your story ".
I'm going to talk to the insurance company and ask them to come and look at the bike .
I can't believe that anyone with a brain could see the damage and decide that the damage was caused some other way .
Surely my ability to claim can't be determined by whether the police believe me or not .

I really think you should re-report (I'd be making a formal complaint about this man too, tbh.)

Or just leave it and pay for the repair yourself.

Them's yer choices, really, don't you think?

I used to work for the police and was seconded to the control room for a while - sounds like you got a difficult call taker, tbh, and a bit of a jobsworth. Technically, a crime number is issued when a crime has been committed, and without evidence, then it can't be confirmed. However, it really wouldn't have been a problem to issue a crime number to you.
I would suggest calling back, and asking for an incident number, rather than a crime number. An incident has to be created on the database for every report, and so your incident number has to be relayed to you. In my experience, an incident number would be enough for your insurance claim.
Perhaps ask to speak to the control room manager and report the conversation. All calls are recorded, and then at least you can get the facts rather than an operator's interpretation of the law.
Yadnbu!

I'm considering reporting him because ,leaving aside his judgement as to whether or not to believe me ,I'm shocked by him saying I said things which I didn't .
He wouldn't give me his name but I took his number down .
According to the bike shop because the frame is alumminium and rigid ,the dents will have caused weak spots .They say it can't be repaired .
I'm really grateful for people's replies ,I always come away from situations like this feeling in the wrong .

sterry thanks - it wasn't a telephone call ,I went in person .
It was a community support officer on the desk ,he did eventually go and get a police woman .
At this point I brought the bike in to show her .She did say that she was apologising on behalf of the CSO ,but she also said when I showed her the bike " Well I don't really know what I'm looking at " and she closed the conversation by looking at the CSO and saying " Well I'm leaving it up to you " ( presumably the decision to gibve me a crime reference nos or not )

We had a similar problem when my son's ipod was stolen.

Classic shakedown. He was bumped into and the guy helped him up and was apologising, meanwhile someone else unplugged his ipod from the headphones and took it out of his tight pocket.

We reported it to the police and their attitude was that teenagers lose things all the time and lie about it! I was so angry.

whippor did they refuse to give you a crime reference number ?

I've just asked dh (a police officer) and he asked if the area is covered by cctv? That could make a difference.

He did say though that it's a really tough one as there's many other ways the damage could have been caused and no way of proving that it wasn't accidental/already there.

FWIW, I work in insurance and most insurers are well aware of the police's attitude to these situations and their desire to keep reported crime figures down.
They CAN'T inist on you providing a crime ref number. If they do and making a claim starts to get messy, then threaten them with the Ombudsman.

Gingeroots - Yes they did.

We left it till the next day and my husband phoned again, got a totally different person and they gave us a crime number no problem at all and mentioned that they'd had a lot of problems with pickpocketing gangs.

showofhands - can you ask him if the police can refuse to accept you telling them that a crime has been committed?

Surely claiming a crime has been committed is anyone's right, and it is up to the police to determine - after investigation - whether a crime has been committed, not to say that they aren't interested, go away.

I realise they aren't actually going to investigate in cases like this but surely the principle is the same - the right to report a crime, the duty of the police to investigate.

I've asked Hecate. He's at work though, so might not respond straightaway.

showofhands - the thing is that the damage is such ( the position and shape ) to exactly correlate with where the D lock would be used to lock the bike .
Of course that's no where near proof and probably not so obvious to someone who doesn't cycle .
But in anycase they weren't interested in seeing the bike ( eventually I went and got it ) and had obviously decided that I was lying .
I mean " the wind could have done it " !

mrsmindcontrol- thanks for that !
I'm definitely pinning my hopes on insurers .

Okay, dh is obviously speaking generally and not officially and not commenting on a particular case...

He says that usually the victim's belief of a crime having taken place is enough. If they felt that on balance of probability that a crime did NOT occur then they are not obliged to crime it. He also points out that people who nick bikes, nick bikes. They are usually well practised and don't rattle against a d-lock. He is a cyclist (serious cyclist) and a police officer and sees a lot of damage done to bikes left locked to railings instead of in secure cycle storage (people jostling for position locking bikes against railings, other cyclists, people knocking into them and yes, even a strong gust of wind). He says they see more accidental damage than criminal damage (proven by cctv footage). Usually they just nick the bike if that's the intention.

Was it an area with cctv?

He says if you're unhappy then go back, absolutely. And make a complaint. They are a service and you feel let down.

Maybe tis worth phoning then - they will have to raise and incident for you?

No CCTV ,no other bikes .
There are a series of dents , not scratches or anything minor ,I'm sorry but a strong gust of wind would not have caused them.
My own view is that whoever did it either thought the railings would break or were just twisting/wrenching it on purpose to cause damage because they were p*ed off that the lock didn't give.
I do understand that this would be hard to prove ,but surely it's the same in lots of other situations where people report things lost /stolen etc .

Anyway feel a bit embarrased that your husband at work is being troubled on my behalf . Thank him for me :)

Ginger I think you were just unlucky with who you initially spoke with - ring them up and try again