[Kripster]

Finance lady at dealer says they no longer etch VIN on windows. True or False?

[ggalanis]

Originally Posted by Kripster

Finance lady at dealer says they no longer etch VIN on windows. True or False?

THEY don't offer it anymore, but there are surely companies that still do that, but this has gone down in popularity over the years.

What's popular here at the moment (YMMV) is a passive vehicle tracking and recovery system. I got the TAG system which lowered my insurance rates over the first 3 years by the amount of the installation (so essentially free as long as I kept the car for min 3 years)

The most important part of these systems is that they etch their logo onto the windows to show potential thieves that you have it. Given the choice, a smart thief will pick the next car that doesn't have it, but of course your car can still be stolen.

[ggalanis]

Originally Posted by ggalanis

THEY don't offer it anymore, but there are surely companies that still do that, but this has gone down in popularity over the years.

What's popular here at the moment (YMMV) is a passive vehicle tracking and recovery system. I got the TAG system which lowered my insurance rates over the first 3 years by the amount of the installation (so essentially free as long as I kept the car for min 3 years)

The most important part of these systems is that they etch their logo onto the windows to show potential thieves that you have it. Given the choice, a smart thief will pick the next car that doesn't have it, but of course your car can still be stolen.

Out of curiosity, what's going on in other areas with this kind of anti-theft stuff?

[Pictor]

lojack and vin etching used to be a thing that has largely been a markup money maker for dealers. I haven't been offered either services on a BMW in a long time (or ever). In the US you have the ability to track your BMW remotely and most of the higher end BMWs had the ability of remote immobilization for the last ~25 years through BMW Assist.

[ggalanis]

Originally Posted by Pictor

lojack and vin etching used to be a thing that has largely been a markup money maker for dealers. I haven't been offered either services on a BMW in a long time (or ever). In the US you have the ability to track your BMW remotely and most of the higher end BMWs had the ability of remote immobilization for the last ~25 years through BMW Assist.

Here we normally got reduced insurance rates for various anti-theft devices that made them worthwhile, including VIN etching many years ago (I think the last car I did it on was a 2007). The actual effectiveness of the anti-theft picked wasn't as important; they were basically always free or even less expensive than the insurance savings. The main point was just making your car less attractive to thieves than the next one.

The trackers they placed with my current anti-theft install are supposed to not be as easy to defeat at the standard bmw tracking (which essentially relies on a sim card [or possibly esim nowadays] and cellular antenna to transmit; these are all in the same location for a given car and easy enough to defeat for a motivated car thief. What I got is using small rfid transponders and are supposed to be difficult to find as well as there not being a given number of them in each car; the number and location supposedly varies. This is meant for the steal your car and ship it to the other side of the planet type thefts; so they supposedly have people scanning for the rfid transponders at ports of exit and the such. I am not personally sold on the actual effectiveness of the system, but my insurance rates were lowered for the first 3 years by a tiny bit more than the cost (it was like 350$ anyway so not a big deal either way). So I'll take an effectively free theft deterrent etching on my window any day.