The SentrySIS development team have this month released its ‘Member Risk report’ within the ever expanding suite of intelligence focused tools available to system administrators who manage crime partnerships. The eagerly anticipated report helps crime partnership administrators understand which of their members are most at risk from would-be retail offenders across any given day of the week.

 

The Member Risk report uses a custom built algorithm that examines all the known crime data associated with either a member, a selection of members or a group within SentrySIS ecosystem and scores them based on the levels of risk they are likely to face.

 

The key benefit of the report is that it allows administrators to warn high risk stores of the threats they face on any given day of the week so that crime reduction measures (such as an increase in a physical security presence) can be applied to help reduce or minimise these known risks.

 

Commenting on the new report, SentrySIS Director Lee Fella said: “The ability for a crime partnership to provide its members with data showing how ‘at risk’ they are is really something. The admins have a number of options through this report. Whether they want to analyse specifics or gain a detailed overview of risk in a certain area, this report covers all bases.”

 

Lee continued and said “I’m also really pleased on how the report can be easily exported as a professional PDF document. Like a lot of what SentrySIS already does, this makes it useful for when a crime partnership administrator wants to share the report’s findings with their internal wardens, BID rangers or police contacts. This way they can attend hotspot areas to help deter and divert crime away from their member stores on days we know crime is likely to occur.”

 

What is Member Risk profiling?

 

Most member organisations within a crime partnership are already likely to have some form of internal risk profiling in relation to retail crime. The advantage of the SentrySIS Member Risk Report is that it also utilises geographic data that may not be available to individual retailers and thus provides a more comprehesive and realistic view. How the Member Risk report within SentrySIS can further support any internal processes a member might have, is by examining specific risk levels against other member organisations within the same crime partnership.

 

For example, a member store might accept its current levels of shop theft and be under the impression that this is just the norm. The Member Risk report however may identify that the levels of accepted shop theft are actually way above the average in the system and can therefore be classed as a high risk store compared to its fellow members within the crime partnership.

 

 

Why is Member Risk profiling important?

 

Once a store knows this information, they can then examine the nature and level of the threats they face and apply effective controls to help manage and minimise those risks. Stores can then start to measure levels of business disruption (such as stock loss or staff on leave due to increases in stress because of violence towards shop workers) and apply operational costs associated with each type of risk.

 

How does the Member Risk report work?

 

Crime partnership administrators can apply a number of variables within their dataset to configure what data they want to see within a Member Risk report. Once an administrator has chosen to run the report on either a member (Tesco), a selection of members (Tesco, Asda and Sainsburys) or a group within SentrySIS (the day-time group) they can apply additional settings.

 

 

Applying a Radius

 

A radius boundary can be selected in kilometres, which creates a radius around each of the selected stores and includes data from within that radius. This helps to provide a more balanced risk profile. 

 

Applying a Member Limit

 

When using the radius variable, if it’s a highly populated area administrators can limit how many additional members to include in the search results. E.g. “Include a maximum of 20 additional members within my 5 kilometre radius around each location”.

 

Results based on combined vs historic only data

 

'Combined' results looks at both the historical incident record for each location as well as area data within the defined radius. The report also allows administrators to look at 'Historic' data only for each store if this is preferred.

 

 

Applying a Duration (days)

 

Administrators have a choice on how many previous days data to include within the search parameters. This becomes a useful variable as it identifies members’ risks over either a long or short period of time. E.g. “Include a maximum of 20 additional members within my 5 kilometre radius around each location over the last 60 days”. A member might only be facing high levels of risk based on seasons or a certain period across the year, such as Christmas.

 

Outputs – Lists and Map Views

 

Data within the final Member Risk report can be viewed in both a list or a map view. This allows administrators to analysis the report’s findings by member store and day of the week in an easy to digest graphical format. The administrators can visually see which member stores that are most at highest risk and the information can then be shared with the police, or the store themselves so they can put in place the necessary controls.

 

 

Summary

 

The Member Risk report is a powerful, quick and easy to use report that adds significant value to crime partnership administrators and their member stores. It does this through detailing ‘at risk’ members at their most vulnerable day of the week. Knowing this information can help member stores activate crime reduction tactics and strategies to help reduce shop theft and other anti-social behaviour. This means that their stores, their customers and their staff are in working and shopping in much safer environments. In addition to this, by introducing the right tactics and strategies can also help reduce stock loss.

 

The Member Risk report is one of many reports within the SentrySIS platform and is available to administrators now. To have a free demonstration of the Member Risk report and any other crime intelligence reports within SentrySIS, please contact us here.