shanladams82

We went to San Francisco yesterday to apply for our visas. We rented a car and parked next to the building. The street is very busy, cars always driving up and down it, people constantly walking up and down it.

We went in to the consulate, it only took 1-1.5 hrs from getting a number ticket and walking out. At one point my husband went outside to get something out of the car. My son had a kids messenger bag in the back seat. When we came out of the consulates office our back rear window was smashed and our son's bag was gone.

There are 2 cameras on the consulates office pointing right at our car and 2 on the entrance of the apartment building right next to us. The consulate said they only give up video if the police request it and we couldn't track down anyone from the apartment complex. The police wouldn't even come out to take a statement from us, we had to file over the phone. We ended up having to drive the car with glass in the back seat with our kids all the way to the airport because the rental car company's tow truck took 2 hrs and didn't show up and it would take them 4 hours to send a new rental car. The consensus of residents in the area that we spoke to is that the police don't care (there have been multiple robberies with cops right across the street that didn't do anything) and that it happens all the time. Oh and if we had happened to wander outside while it was going on they say we probably would have gotten shot.

We got the rental car instead of a taxi because it was cheaper to rent a car for a day. That is no longer the case since we have to pay a $1000 deductible on our HO insurance policy to pay for our sons video game system and all the games of ours he had with him in that bag. Live and learn I guess.

We would live happy lives never having to go back to San Francisco again, but he has to go back to pick up our passports with the visa in them.

I know this isn't about China directly, but I figured if anyone came here looking about info about getting visas (like I did) that it might be helpful information. And yes I know we should have made him take his bag inside, but we were all in a hurry and we had him get out the passenger door instead of the driver door so he wouldn't get hit by the many speeding honking cars on that road and we didn't notice that he left it. We have been all over the world and never been violated like this. We used to live in the nastiest part of Orlando, Florida and we never experienced anything like this. We live in Utah now and have gotten complacent with how little crime there is here compared to elsewhere.

Oh and if something like this happens to anyone, anywhere. Make sure your car insurance covers rentals (ours does but there is a $500 deductible) and make sure you book it on a card that has customer benefits (our Chase Visa covers that deductible for us since we paid for the rental using that card and declined loss damage waiver).

thursdaysd

I'm sorry, but people who leave things that are obviously worth stealing in full view in a parked car in a big city should not be surprised if the stuff vanishes...

And it is hardly anything to do with the Chinese consulate!

Kathie

I'm sorry this happened to you.

I agree with Thursdays, it's an absolute rule to never leave anything visible in a parked car, as it is an invitation to theft.

MmePerdu

This seems a fairly predictable outcome based on the facts provided. I always wonder exactly what motivates these type of posts. I'd just be embarrassed.

janisj

ditto ditto

This has nothing (at all) to do with the Consulate. It has <u>everything</u> to do with crime in San Francisco and you being imprudent re leaving valuables in the car.

The thread's title is silly IMO. Better would be something like "<B>Lesson Learned - never leave valuables visible</B>"

CanadaChinaTraveller

You'll be safer in China.

shanladams82

Wow. I regretted posting this right after I did so, but because I thought I would get fussed at because it should be in the forum about the U.S. not China.

First of all, it kind of does have to do with the consulates office. The neighborhood in general was pretty nice. The street was never empty, it always had people walking or a full line of cars stuck at the stop light. What connects it to the consulates office though is that the police told us that we were probably stalked to there. They saw us pull up, knew we didn't belong (most people in the area were Asian and we were the only non-Asians in the consulate office itself) They said that they probably made sure that we were there for the long haul and that there was a long line and that we weren't just picking up our passports from the pick up window that had no line. To me that seems like planned ring of crime specifically pertaining to the scenario of people going to the consulates office, since there were no other businesses around really that people would be going to. Not a crime of opportunity. Why did they pick our car, the only white people in the area, and not the full street of cars parked along the side of the road in front of and behind us that we saw plenty of bags and other items in? If everyone should know that you will get robbed in San Francisco then why did we hear so many stories of people that got their cars broken into in different areas of the city. Like the Asian guy who saw us on the phone with police and told us how he got his car broken into at Golden Gate park and he didn't have anything in his back seat, it was all in his trunk, his passport, his laptop and a bunch of cash. Or the person who was standing right next to his car talking to police officers and someone busted the opposite side of his car and took something without either of them noticing.

That being said, jeesh. It's not like we are some untraveled feeble idiots or anything. I don't carry a purse when we go to foreign countries. We always have multiple photo copies of our passport just in case. We split our money and credit cards up between all 4 of us so that even if someone does manage to steal my under the shirt money holder they don't get everything. We keep our luggage with us if the hotel won't let us check in yet and don't even trust their "luggage storage" (in Amsterdam the hotel offered and we saw it, it was just a closet in a back area of the hotel, not locked, and we could have taken or gone through anyone else's bag that was in there if we had wanted). We don't even carry more than one carry on size suit case with us on intl trips because the more stuff you have the more chances you have of something getting lost or stolen. Normally we each have a back pack and then one carry on bag. (At least we weren't the idiots that the rental car lady told us about that brought all of her expensive jewelry and left it in her car and all of it got stolen)

We grew up in Orlando. If any of you were mentioning going to Orlando I could tell you which neighborhoods you have to watch out for getting mugged, which ones you'd have to watch out for getting shot or raped (which are different then the high mugging ones), and that's is in areas that aren't the obvious (because everyone should know parking lots at theme parks aren't safe). I could warn you not to trust the I-drive ticket sellers for theme park tickets because half the time they might give you 1 or 2 that works and the rest our fakes. I could tell you that it is safer to park your car on the street with more people and traffic around then in a parking garage, which is why we parked on a busy street instead of a parking garage at the consulates office.

If I saw someone mention driving from Vegas to LA I would warn them about the theft ring where the thieves steal the third row seats out of certain brands of SUV's. Not something that travelers would know or even expect even in a "large, dangerous city" like LA, but a good tip.

I could also tell you that the criminals in places I have been before would rather get easy low risk stuff than to take the chance on a busy street with surveillance literally pointing at the car they are breaking into. And a kids messenger bag with cartoons on the front is low risk. The chances that he actually had something of value in there was very low. This is actually the first time in hundreds of trips that he has actually had anything valuable in a bag. If it had been his sister's bag all they would have gotten would have been a grungy stuffed animal and her copy of the gettysburg address that she had to memorize. If it had been my bag he would have gotten my rate processes notebook that had my notes from a class I'm taking for my master's thesis. This is actually the first time he has ever carried a bag like that on a trip that wasn't a back pack with clothes in it. Normally we keep his 3ds in my purse or my husband's pocket. He had just bought that bag at comic con last month and he was excited that he had something he could carry his ds in instead of us having to do it. He's an 8yr old kid not used to carrying around a bag at all, and we aren't used to him carrying a bag around either. It completely escaped us that he should have had a bag on him too when we got out of the car. Of course it's our fault for not being more diligent. Him having a bag was against our routine. Normally, if we have bags we can't take in with us we put them in the trunk, but even that isn't a guarantee of safety, because the thief could have popped the trunk after breaking the window.

Also, the criminal is going to be sorely disappointed. The serial number on the system has been reported stolen and it had parental control locks on it so our son couldn't accidentally purchase something. That means they will not be able to sell it to a pawn shop or a used game store because those places require the system to be wiped and it can't be wiped. They can't call nintendo and have it wiped either. The thief could sell it for cash to someone unsuspecting on Craigslist or something and then the buyer will have a brick that won't do anything.

Yes, I may have ranted some, but this isn't supposed to be a "woe-is-me" sob story. What I had hoped would be taken away from this post for inexperienced travelers or even moderately experienced ones was:

1. Book your rental car on a credit card that has consumer benefits that offer to pay for damage from theft or accident. You have to check the box on the rental agreement declining loss/damage waiver. (I had kind of known about special things like this in the past, but it was something I had completely forgotten about until my car insurance agent mentioned it, because we have car insurance that covers rental cars as if they are our own car.)

2. Make sure you know back up transportation options in case something happens to your rental car. It would have taken over 4hrs for Budget to get a replacement car to us. 4 hours of sitting on the side of the street where our car was broken into. There was no train or trolley stop near there and Uber can only take 1-2 people, not 4. They wanted us to wait over 2hrs for a tow truck which also wouldn't have been able to transport us because he could only hold 3 people. In the end we ended up driving the car with glass in the seat to Budget at the airport, but it would be worse for someone who actually got into an accident or the whole car stolen and they wouldn't have had the option to drive it.

3. Watch for who is watching you. My husband will avoid our street completely if someone follows him from the highway into our neighborhood or is driving suspiciously, but it never crossed our minds to watch who was keeping an eye on what we were doing inside of the consulates office.

4. Homeowners insurance covers stuff that you get stolen out of a vehicle not car insurance. So if something does get stolen check with them.

But you know what, you guys go ahead and feel all mighty and superior because you called an 8 yr old kid daft. Feel good about your perfect selves who have never had anything bad happen to them anywhere, no matter how diligent you normally are. Especially considering the likelihood that we were targeted for being tourists, and from stories of people in the area, even if he hadn't left his bag in the car it would have been broken into anyways to check for the stuff they assumed would have been in our trunk if we were normal tourists and not just people in the city for 5 hours to get our visas. I mean none of you have ever had an accident while traveling and gotten hurt, or gotten scammed or gotten something stolen right.

thursdaysd

Yes, back in the day my car was broken into and my radar detector stolen. But it was in a dark parking lot downtown and my husband's truck was parked so that my car was screened from the street. I certainly didn't go round advising people not to eat at that restaurant.

Yes, I was once pickpocketed in Rome. It was on the notorious bus 64, late in the evening after I had been drinking. I was careless, I recognize I was careless, And I see no need to warn people about bus 64 because there are loads of warnings already.

So, you know a lot about Orlando. Good for you. But you were a tourist in SF.

MmePerdu

This may be the first time I've seen a unanimous reaction here among those replying to a post.

After the racist-tinged comments near the top I skipped to the end. No one blamed the 8 year old. I think "feeble" does indeed describe the rest.

A suggestion, next time you feel like losing it, write it, enjoy the venting, then delete it. Your mistake has been clicking on "submit", twice.

curiousgeo

Agree, a lot of wasted time and effort posting this subject.

janisj

>>First of all, it kind of does have to do with the consulates office.<<

No it doesn't.

>>The neighborhood in general was pretty nice. The street was never empty, it always had people walking or a full line of cars stuck at the stop light. What connects it to the consulates office though is that the police told us that we were probably stalked to there. <<

>>To me that seems like planned ring of crime specifically pertaining to the scenario of people going to the consulates office, since there were no other businesses around really that people would be going to. Not a crime of opportunity. Why did they pick our car, the only white people in the area<<

Man oh man! You sure don't know very much about San Francisco!!??!! The exact same thing could have happened in any neighborhood anywhere in the city (and does multiple times every day). And be very careful -- those sneaky Asians are all over the city. What a putz . . .

shanladams82

I wasn't going to reply to this anymore but now that 2 people have insinuated I am a racist I have to.

All of this nastiness in response to my post and no one even acknowledged the actual important information in my post about tips regarding the unreliability of a rental car company and insurance. Did you guys even read that part of my post or just read one part and fly off on a bunch of assumptions about things I didn't say?

I didn't say anything about thinking that Asians are the ones that committed the crime. Really, this is what was taken from my post? I honestly don't know what race was most likely to have done it because there are criminals of all races in all cities. If I was going to be silly and speculate with no idea of proof at all I would probably say it definitely wasn't an Asian person. Profiling is ignorant. When you spend all of your time looking for people that you think did something, the people who really did it slip right under your nose.

The only thing I said was that the police said that we were probably watched and the criminals knew we were tourists from out of the area because we were the only white people in the consulates office getting visas. We assumed it was normal scum behavior partaking in easy opportunity. The police department and the Asian guy that spoke to us near our car were the ones that insinuated that the criminals were of the type that actually stake out and watch who is coming in and out of the consulates office. I felt they were probably telling the truth when I saw that plenty of other cars right near ours on the street were not broken into despite having plenty of valuable items sitting around in their cars. They didn't say they were Asian, and we certainly didn't insinuate that we believed they were Asian.

Do you people really think that we would go out of the way to visit countries that have people that we would profile into having done this? Our kids speak Chinese, they spend half of their school day with Chinese or Taiwanese nationals (depending on the grade they are teaching) that are their teachers that speak in only Chinese to them. They have the utmost respect for the culture and they were playing with and speaking Chinese with the kids that spoke it while we were waiting in the consulates office. DH took Japanese and loves Japanese culture. We went to Thailand and loved how friendly and nice everyone was there. Making assumptions like that about me is no better than the jerks that do profile people and make assumptions based on race.

Why wouldn't I believe what the police officer tells us, especially when the police station is supposedly just a couple of blocks away and would know best what is going on in their own city? The woman who wrote up our report at the rental agency said her car was broken into twice where she lives, and she has heard horror stories of tourists leaving jewelry in their cars because they went to lunch before their hotel and it got stolen, she says cars come in all the time like ours. She also said that tourists in cars that are obviously rental cars are targeted and that we were probably watched and we hadn't even told her anything about what the police officer said.

thursdaysd

This screed is quite irrelevant. The relevant info is that you left something potentially worth stealing in view in a rental car. It got stolen. Duh.

MmePerdu

No, I didn't read the whole thing...again. And no, you don't have to. But if you must, make it concise and worth our time. These are neither.

Any post that mentions race, while having nothing whatever to do with the issue at hand, is suspect.

jacketwatch

I agree with Kathie.

CaliforniaLady

I don't want to get in the middle of this debate, but I would like to say that the cardinal rule is not to leave any items visible in a car. I have heard police officers say that many times.

My younger son's girlfriend, who is a very smart and capable CPA, left her KMPG-issued computer bag on the front seat of her car in Brentwood, which is a posh neighborhood in West Los Angeles. The next morning, she found her window was smashed, and the computer was missing. She is from Idaho, so she was not of the mindset about the high crime rate that we have in parts of California, but she still lives here and is enjoying her life.

The point is, live and learn, and enjoy your precious life.

jacketwatch

Californialady that's well put. What I gleaned from the post was common sense about not leaving desirable items visible in an unattended car and insurance coverage. That's it. What happened after that is a mess.

CanadaChinaTraveller

Besides using common sense, this is SanFrancisco:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/25/us...=top-news&_r=0