Dorset Police receives, on average, 1300 non-emergency calls every day. Between July 2014 and March 2015, this totalled 306,298 calls, 65 percent of which were answered within 30 seconds.

With the high volume of daily calls the non-emergency 101 line receives, there will inevitably be occasions where callers are subject to a delay with their enquiry.

To help tackle these delays, after the initial contact where the call is prioritised by the call handler, callers are given the option to leave a message, request a call back or send the Force an email at enquiries@dorset.pnn.police.uk. Each of these options generates a quick response as calls and emails are closely monitored by officers in the Force Command Centre (FCC) which means that the public do not have to wait on the line.

With such a high demand it is important that the public only call the 101 non-emergency line for a matter that requires a non-urgent police response. These will include, but are not limited to:

• Your car or motorcycle has been stolen
• Your property has been damaged
• You want to give information about crime in your area

Examples of matters that will require a response from other authorities such as the local council and not the police are:

• Dog fouling
• Abandoned or badly parked vehicles
• Dumping or fly tipping

As with every public service line, the 101 line is subject to misdirected, unnecessary or even nuisance calls. During this month alone, the following are real examples of calls the police have received:

• A caller found a basket of kittens and a mother cat and wanted to know what to do
• A caller reported they had dropped their phone out of the car window
• Callers have asked for:
  • A taxi
  • Opening times of the bank
  • The phone number for Bournemouth Crown Court
  • Cones for moving house
  • School administration

Superintendent Caroline Naughton, Head of Contact Management, said: “There are three key messages to the public.

“Firstly, policing is complex and therefore some calls will take longer to deal with, such as the reporting of crimes as we need to ensure all details are correct, provide support to the victim and ensure safeguarding is in place. Calls of this nature may take over 30 minutes to deal with and therefore the availability of call handers to answer calls is reduced.

“Secondly, if the matter isn’t urgent then please leave a message or email us on enquiries@dorset.pnn.police.uk. We have dedicated staff managing emails and responding to voicemails and we will reply to you promptly.

“Finally, it is very important that the public use the 101 service appropriately. We continue to receive inappropriate calls which put more demand on our system and potentially reduce availability of call handlers.”

Remember, if your call is an emergency, i.e. a threat to life, or if a crime is in progress, always call 999. For all non- emergency calls that require a police response, call 101 and if your call isn’t urgent, you can leave a message or use our email address enquiries@dorset.pnn.police.uk and we will respond to you as soon as we are able to.

We are advising to be aware of a Silver Ssangyong 4×4 which has been venturing down farm tracks in the rural areas. The occupants of this vehicle have been seen acting suspiciously.

If you live in the rural areas of Dorset and see this vehicle venturing down farm tracks or it doesn’t appear to belong in that area please contact us on 101.

Dorset Police as part of its CyberSafe campaign is encouraging parents – or relatives, teachers and other adults responsible for safeguarding children, to ensure they stay safe online.

When computers first came in to our homes their use was easier to monitor as they were static and often kept in an open area of the home.

Now, of course, in the age of smartphones and tablets – effectively mini-computers that can be used anywhere – adults can find it a real challenge to not only educate children in doing the right thing, but monitor and control their online behaviour.

None of us – of whatever age – is immune from encountering problems online. Our children are certainly more vulnerable and naturally more trusting than adults. Some of these potential issues are as follows:

• Inappropriate contact: From people, who may wish to abuse, exploit or bully them.
• Inappropriate conduct: because of their own and others’ online behaviour, such as the personal information they make public, for example on social networking sites. Unfortunately, children can also become cyberbullies, especially when encouraged by others.
• Inappropriate content: being able to access or being sexually explicit, racist, violent, extremist or other harmful material, either through choice or in error.

Here is a simple checklist from the Dorset Safe Schools and Communities Team to help you keep your children safe online. 

1. Talk, talk, talk. The most important thing for parents and carers is to have lots of conversations with their children and young people about what they are using, how these website/apps work, why they enjoy them, who else is using them etc. In this way they may be able to identify any risky content, inappropriate contact or conduct at an early stage.
2. Allow access to the internet from devices within the family space. We do not recommend children and young people having computers or games consoles etc in their rooms.
3. Check virus protection. Ensure that mobile devices and laptops have the relevant software to protect from viruses and other malware. There are several free brands that update regularly and provide good protection or there is other commercially available software.
4. Subscribe to their Internet Service Provider’s family filtering service. All major providers now have this service free of charge – the account holder simply goes to their account online and ticks the relevant boxes. This will prevent different types of content from being available via the router in a particular location. Note this does not have any effect on devices that are not accessing the internet via the router eg 3G/4G phone signal.
5. Use Safe Searching. Most search engines such as Google and YouTube have a safe search facility under the settings menu. Parents and carers of young children particularly may wish to use this to stop them coming across inappropriate material.
6. Tighten privacy settings on websites and apps. Parents and carers should try to ensure that any social media accounts or apps are set to the highest privacy settings to prevent unknown or inappropriate people from viewing or contacting children and young people – this can be found under Settings in most websites/apps. Often the default setting for these types of account is public meaning that everyone can see content including pictures and videos.
7. Consider using Parental Controls on devices. Parents and carers may wish to use Parental controls on laptops, mobile devices or games consoles. These controls can limit the times the device can be used, whether apps/games can be downloaded and whether the internet can be accessed. iPads, Windows and new Android (4.3 or higher operating system) have built in parental controls: for older Android devices, apps may need to be downloaded to provide parental controls.

More advice can be found on the Dorset Police CyberSafe website. cybersafe.dorset.police.uk   – Please log on for further advice and details.

The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) has received intelligence regarding two new Lottery Fraud letters/email attachments (Scam 1 & Scam 2) using the 2016 Rio Olympics as a theme.

The scams try to trick people into believing they have won the following:

Scam 1: An online lottery prize of £650,000 and a trip to Brazil to watch the Olympics as the recipient’s email address was chosen out of a possible ten million at random.

Scam 2: An online lottery prize of £820,000 and a trip to Brazil to watch the Rio Carnival and the Olympics as the recipient’s winning numbers 8 17 34 38 42 and 51 were selected.

In order to collect the winnings the recipient is requested to contact:

Scam 1:
Mr Dima Robert
MillMan Street, WC1N 3JB. London A5200.
Tel: +447035973561
Email: RioOlympics2016@represnetative.com

Scam 2:
‘UK Pay out Officer’
Email:paymaster-office@bol.co.br
+44 7937428753

Protect yourself from lottery fraud

• Never respond to any such communication. If you have not entered a lottery then you cannot have won it.
• Official lotteries in other countries operate in much the same way as the UK’s National Lotto.
• No official lotteries that we know of contact people to tell them of their win.
• We do not know of any official lottery operators who ask for fees to collect winnings.  Any request for a fee payment is a good indication that someone is trying to defraud you.
• Never disclose your bank details or pay fees in advance.
• If they have provided an email address to respond to, be very suspicious of addresses such as @hotmail.com or @yahoo.com or numbers beginning with 07 because these are free to get hold of.
• Genuine lotteries thrive on publicity. If they ask you to keep your win a secret, it is likely to be a fraud.
• Many fraudulent lotteries have bad spelling and grammar – see this as a warning that fraudsters are at work.

If you believe that you have been a victim of fraud you can report it online http://www.actionfraud.police.uk/report_fraud or by telephone 0300 123 2040.