“Twice in less than a year. That’s a lot,” Bernard breathes. This Brussels resident contacted us via the orange Alert us button to tell us regarding a double misadventure that would have gone well. To fully understand why Bernard enjoys bad luck, we have to go back to last September. That day, Bernard leaves his home in Evere in the Brussels region. Direction his vehicle: a BMW series 4, large coupe. Bernard works in a digital printing house and this vehicle is his company car.
Not an isolated case
Very quickly, he notices that a small side window is broken. The glove box was searched and a pair of glasses worth 300 euros was stolen. Sad, but nothing to panic regarding. But as he walks around his BMW, he falls from the clouds: the steering wheel and the two front headlights have disappeared. Taken aback by the nature and audacity of the theft, he quickly joins a tow truck. He has to act fast and find an alternative, because in 4 days he has to go on vacation.
With the repairman, he goes to the BMW dealership in Leeuw-Saint-Pierre. “Arriving at the dealership, I was told that it was already the sixth car of the day for the same flights! It was a Monday so it must have happened over the weekend.” Ironically, the thieves did not realize that Bernard had hidden a few hundred euros in the car for the holidays. A replacement car will do for his vacation. When he returns, he picks up his BMW 4 series.
rebelotte
But events will take a completely different turn at the beginning of July. “I understood right away.” loose Bernard who leaves his house to join his vehicle. It’s the face of a passer-by looking crestfallen and sorry looking at his BMW which he grasps that the theft has happened once more. “The hood was slightly open and the two headlights and the steering wheel were gone. I never thought it would happen to me once more.” As a result of chance, the same convenience store arrives: “It’s crazye”, he blurts out, also noting that Bernard has been the victim of the same theft in ten months.
This time, the thieves did not break a small window to gain access to the interior of the vehicle. “They would manage to encrypt the code of the key“, according to our alerter. “I think I’ve been spotted. It’s my obsession, if they come back. You have to dare”underlines Bernard who lives in a residential area.
In Belgium, several waves of this type of theft have been observed in recent years. In 2018, in Villers-le-Bouillet and Wanze, in particular. In 2021, it was in Saint-Georges and Amay that BMW steering wheels were stolen. These would probably be orders made from abroad. A raid is then committed in a few days before a period of calm.
We are doing everything we can to avoid this problem.
Does the BMW brand know? How to explain these thefts? Jeroen Lissens is the spokesperson for the German brand. He details: “Unfortunately, we have seen, as you have, that certain car parts, and certainly not only those of our brand, are the subject of crimes.“But it is impossible for BMW to quantify this type of theft on Belgian soil.
However, the brand recognizes: “We are well aware of the vulnerability of certain parts to theft, especially electronic parts. As the BMW Group, we do everything possible to avoid this problem.Jeroen Lissens develops: “For some time now, all electronic components (including the most expensive headlights and sensors such as cameras on the outside of cars) have had a special code that is practically impossible to decipher. This code is linked to the chassis number of the car, which makes the reuse of a stolen electronic part in another car totally impossible”we explain.
For Bernard, the cup is full. The BMW 4 Series, it’s over: “I’m disgusted. We’re working hard to get something right. I don’t need this type of car anymore.”
