Business Crime Initiative

Supporting Crime Reduction Initiatives

Over 250 city, town and shopping centres have established business crime reduction partnerships as part of their local community safety initiatives. Many are focused on the retail sector. 

Effective management of these partnerships is essential. Indeed, many local Police forces insist that they be properly accredited. To that end the Association of Town Centre Management (ATCM) has established the Business Crime Initiative (BCI), a partnership with Empowering Communities to allow:

• Independent accreditation to take place.
• An advisory service to be established.
• Effective networking to take place.
• Formal qualifications to be available.

The increased mobility of criminals means that partnerships must continue to develop strategies that allow them tackle both local and cross border crime committed by travelling criminals. Effective partnerships can reduce the opportunity for offending. 

At the same time as there is growing evidence of increased business crime due to the recession, some retailers are curbing their support for local crime initiatives. We believe this is very short sighted and will use our existing networks and contacts to get this message over.

The ATCM is offering membership of this new organisation, set up to ensure the highest standards are maintained and enable initiatives to be as effective as possible.

Membership Benefits

1.  Business Crime Partnership Accreditation

A new Accreditation scheme has been developed for the ATCM by Empowering Communities, which is also a not-for-profit enterprise.    

The new Accreditation uses the BASIS model, developed by Gary Pettengell, founder of Empowering Communities. To be accredited schemes must show:

• Benefit for the local community and evidence of the perceived value to their members.
• Accessibility and that they are affordable.
• Structure covering all the necessary protocols such as data sharing and compliance with the Data Protection Act.
• Informative.
• Sustainable and system dependent, not relying on one individual.

An introduction to the Accreditation process will be via optional workshops to be held throughout the year.

2.  Advisory Services

Guidance and governance issues are important for local crime reduction initiatives. There are two principal areas: Partnership working and Technical.

We will provide advice on the best methods to establish a targeted, intelligence-led, partnership approach to business and retail crime reduction; working with key stakeholders, including the Police. Advice of a technical nature e.g. relating to issues such as CCTV protocols, Data Protection Act, information sharing, and Police liaison will be handled by Empowering Communities, who have several years experience of administering local, regional and national crime reduction schemes.

3. Standards

a) Networking: The sharing of best practise is effective and best achieved through networks. The ATCM will organise these events with input and attendance by Empowering Communities. Initially, we propose to hold these twice a year, one in the north and one in the south. They will be for practitioners from Partnerships, including the Partnership Manager and other key stakeholders such as the Police and Community Safety Officers if invited by the member and may be linked to the ATCM's existing Street Operations Group.

b) Qualifications: We are currently applying for accreditation for two training programmes through the National Open College Network. These will be aimed at partnership managers and security staff. The first of these will be ready later this year.

To become a member of BCI join online here or download the application form.

Current ATCM members have the added benefit of a 20% discount on BCI membership. Simply log into the ATCM members page of the website and then join online.

For more information on BCI, download the Membership Information Pack.

For more information on the Accreditation download About the BCI Accreditation Scheme.   

Contact:

Martin Blackwell, DMS, MIPM
Development Director
ATCM
+44 (0)207 222 0120
+44 (0)7799 644 556
info@bciuk.org