council fitted legge value bs lock

[pinky]

i was gobsmacked tonight, i went to a lost keys situation , young lady in council house, had keys lost or stolen and was locked out of a legge value bs lock.

i proceded to take a plastercine impression and decode and open the lock, 5 mins later door open and customer in, fortuneately nobody had used her keys to gain entry, as when i removed the BS face plate and removed the lock i was horrified to see that the hard plate had been removed from the lock on both sides, now the insurance company had she been a victim of theft could have refused to pay as without the hard plate this is not a bs lock.

when i removed the handles i was even more bemused by the council, as no wood was left between spindle and keyway, as the lock was r/h mounted, the slot is cut out and at the back of the bolt you can see the 5 lever gates through the cut out, making this an easy opening.

why buy bs locks to hammer off the hard plate ? beggars belief, the reason incidently that they had done this is a mystery, other than to make it easy if they ever need to repo the place, i checked her neighbors either side and low and behold their locks too were minus h/p , it seems a common thing that my local council do, but why ?

[toomush2drink]

I bet the fitter didnt have a drill bit quite big enough so rather than chisel the excess out he just removed the hard plate. Some of the council properties round here dont even have bs locks just these horrible "keypsafe" 5 lever locks. They have a curtain and blue hammerite case (securefast style but a bigger keyway) and no hardplate.

[Al]

Pinky, several of our estimeed council fitters do this in Nottingham, often you will see the plate on the floor nearby.
The reason is purely to make it easier to open when they go back to change the locks next year, they normally leave the internal side.
I've collected plenty Legge hardplates and sometimes SG them back on if the wood is missing.

[pinky]

this time they had excelled themselves by removing both sides on both locks.

a little unethical

[quicklocks]

[Unlock-IT]

Nice one Quicklocks, I agree with you 100%. No tradesman with any pride in his work would butcher doors and locks in this way. I think the problem is many councils sub cotract their work out, so are the people carrying out the work tradesmen? In this day a age there are many people mascarading as tradesmen and haven't got a qualification to their name or have had no formal training. With the shortage of qualified tradesmen in the country some people have to put up with what they can get, and this is where sub standard work is carried out.

[pinky]

unfortuneatly our esteemed council have and use their own fitters and sub contract very little out.

lets hope that when licences come in , they do so to prevent this.

i wonder if in the event of a robbery , and a lawsuite against the council for this practice in the event of non payment from insurers, would such a case have legs, after all , surely to remove the h/p and then fit a bs face plate with kite mark would be fraudulant possibly.

[1st solution locksmiths]

Pinky

only the other week my mate (chippy on the council) was doing this on profits. when i asked why he said that he is always being called to the same address to gain access. but when i stated that if a theft happend it would come back on him his face hit the ground as if to said ohh bugger how many have i done before. This is the same blokie who brought a lock round to me because the could not get the lever pack in on a 3k 74 I said no wonder the lever pack was from an endurance.

[master in training]

if it happened to me, rest assured i would take the council for everything they've got, luckily i dont live in a council house! i do live in a rented house though and will probably be asking to get the locks sorted out soon because they seem to have had it. but the back door lock is super-secure! it doesnt even move when you use the key from the ouside :lol:

[Rockford]

MIT - If you want the locks upgrading - call a locksmith. PM me, and I'll give you my number

[pinky]

subtle dean as always

[Rockford]

Hey - always on the lookout for business opportunities....

[master in training]

sorry, its a rented house, the landlord will sort it out, no doubt he'd get some bloody cowboy builder to do it like he did when the house was re-roofed and had the bathroom decorated, its terrible, if we get new locks i'll fit them myself and do a better job!

[1st solution locksmiths]

MIT

No don't fit them yourself call me i'll be glad to do them at a discount honnest!! o look we are in the same county not to far then

[pinky]

oh hint hint hint , please let me be your new best friend.