Dive Brief:

• Insurance claims showed contractors lost 7% less heavy equipment to theft last year than the year before, and thieves made with 19% less equipment than disappeared four years earlier.
• Law enforcement got reports of 10,925 pieces of equipment stolen in 2012, with Tex and North Carolina leading the list with 1,401 and 1,037 thefts, respectively.
• The most popular targets were mowers, loaders (skid or wheeled) and tractors (tracks or wheels) in that order.

Dive Insight:

The National Insurance Crime Bureau has several techniques that contractors can use to keep equipment on their job sites, including removing fuses in off hours, installing hidden fuel cut-off switches and parking equipment in a "wagon circle" that makes it hard to move any one piece and putting lighter gear like compressors inside the circle. About a fifth of equipment was recovered last year, making for heavy loses for insurers and eventually higher rates for owners.