Article | Reassurance – The Procurement of Gary

Written by: Thanc Lammen, System Archaeologist

The Procurement of Gary

I’ve run van security here for nine years, and for eleven days this autumn its highest-rated part was a pillowcase.

Gary is a Guy, the 1968 kind. Callum’s twins made him for the collection tin: navy overalls stuffed with newspaper, hi-vis, flat cap, gardening gloves, a pillowcase head with a felt-tip face.

Dawn. I run the transport office.

A homemade Guy in old navy overalls, an orange hi-vis vest and a flat cap, with a pillowcase head and a crude felt-tip face, slumped in the front seat of a white panel van with green gloved hands on the steering wheel, seen through the windscreen in a wet depot yard at dusk.

Gary Joins the Fleet

Sunday 25th: Clocks back, dark by five. Direct Line’s top tip, in Aviva’s tool theft release, is to take your tools out of the van overnight. So the SDS drill lives behind my kettle now. With nowhere else to put him, Gary stayed in the front seat of Van 3.
Monday 26th: Nobody touched Van 3. Nobody touched any van, but Van 3 had Gary. I wrote “Gary on duty” on the whiteboard as a joke. It hasn’t come off.
Tuesday 27th: A security assessor, clipboard under one arm, gave Gary a Somebody’s-In Rating of four traffic cones out of five, one off for having no hands. He recommended two per lorry and charged for the visit.

Gary Goes Fleet-Wide

Wednesday 28th: 7:04am. A vendor offers Gary Mk II, with waving arms and a rotating cap. Price By Arrangement. The arrangement is a man inspecting my passenger seats, and his diary only books next Tuesday. On Tuesday, it was next Tuesday.
Thursday 29th: Phil from procurement loves Gary: no monthly bill, no login, already in the van. Fleet-wide by Friday. The committee asked whether he’d need a parking permit.
Monday 2nd: The coffee machine died. “Gary was present.” A reversing light got clipped; the insurer’s form had one box for security present. I wrote Gary, then held 49 minutes to ask if he counts. Cut off at minute 50.

Bonfire Night

Thursday 5th: Motoring advice, via Yahoo News: gov.uk counted 292 road accidents on 5 November 2024, and a MoneySuperMarket expert says if you don’t need to travel, stay put. I read that to a yard whose job is the route. All eleven Garys left in a borrowed trailer once the twins had checked the pile for hedgehogs. Gary went to the bonfire, as Guys do. Soup, hot potatoes, school night. Our whole security strategy was on the bonfire.
Friday 6th, 2:07am: Callum’s phone goes. Van 3 has left his street, and Callum hasn’t. The tracker was under the dash the whole time – no face, never in the seat. He rang, a person answered, and he was told exactly where it was. He gave the police the location and knew where his van was.

Two vans, opened in a minute. The footage is here.

The End-of-Life Note

Gary cost nothing, never broke down and never did anything. He’s now ash: the only security product with an honest end-of-life policy. Proper trackers are on order. The twins are planning next year’s.

At Pay as you Track, we do things differently.

Under the dash: A hardwired tracker runs off the vehicle, hidden and difficult to tamper with. Vans and lorries alike.
The kit in the back: A battery tracker needs no wiring and suits tools and trailers.
If they find the first one: Recover works even if the tracker is removed.
Somebody on the end of it: Ring Pay as you Track and a person answers, not a 49-minute wait. UK team, software developed in-house.
Nothing to fill in: Read the packages straight off the page. No form, no visit, no next Tuesday.
Shown before it’s sold: Look, Find, Know shows you what it does first.

So when the street empties for the bonfire, what’s watching your van: a face, or a phone number?

Talk to Pay as You Track today on 0161 914 5500 or email [email protected] to see how we can help your business.

Or alternatively, chat with us on WhatsApp