Every year, hundreds of people across Lancaster have their phones stolen. It’s one of the worst things that can happen – losing your handset, your personal information, and even your pictures. Thankfully, it looks as though the number of phone thefts is falling…
Get Phone Repairs has used data obtained from Lancashire Constabulary to find out exactly how many phones were stolen in Lancaster over the last five years. Delving into the figures, we’ve found that there’s been a huge drop since 2019.
How many phones were stolen in Lancaster in 2022?
Lancaster has seen a huge decrease in phone thefts across the city as recorded incidents plunged since 2019.
According to our data, there were a total of 106 phone thefts recorded in Lancaster last year, down 28.4% since 2018. Although phone thefts have since shown signs of rising, they’re still well below previous levels.
The latest 2022 data shows that:
- £38,000 worth of phones were stolen in Lancaster.
- On average, 0.3 phones were stolen in Lancaster every day.
- 1 in 493 people in Lancaster had a phone stolen in 2022.
After a large slump in 2020, the number of phone thefts rose sharply the following year but has once again begun to drop.
Don’t want to be one of our phone theft victims? Check out our guide to stop thieves from stealing your mobile phone to keep your hands on your handset.
106
phone thefts in 2022
28.4%
decrease since 2018
£38,000
worth of phones stolen in 2022
2.03 thefts
per thousand people
What about other UK cities?
| City | Thefts | Value | Rate | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | London | 91,103 | £32.3 Million | 10.35 |
| 2 | Manchester | 3,896 | £1.4 Million | 7.06 |
| 3 | Doncaster | 621 | £220,455 | 5.47 |
| 4 | Liverpool | 2,224 | £790,000 | 4.58 |
| 5 | Newcastle | 1,100 | £391,000 | 3.93 |
| 6 | Nottingham | 1,083 | £384,000 | 3.35 |
| 7 | Preston | 394 | £140,000 | 3.21 |
| 8 | Salford | 318 | £112,890 | 3.06 |
| 9 | Birmingham | 3,149 | £1.1 Million | 2.75 |
| 10 | Sheffield | 1,416 | £502,680 | 2.54 |
London was obviously the highest with its 91,103 reported thefts accounting for 67.4% of the entire UK total. However, with varying populations, it’s difficult to rank the cities accurately.
Instead, we ranked the major cities across England and Wales by how many phone thefts there were per thousand people.
Again, London came out on top with 10.35 thefts per thousand people, while Manchester clinched the #2 spot with 7.06. Doncaster came in third with 5.47 followed by Liverpool with 4.58 and Newcastle with 3.93 to round out the top five.
Get Phone Repairs founder Ryan Leston said: “We’re seeing a huge rise in mobile phone theft across the UK. Thousands of mobile phones are stolen in cities across the country, most commonly through pickpocketing and table surfing. Police forces all over the country are backing local initiatives to tackle this rising crime, but the best way to avoid being part of our stats is to take preventative measures. Avoid using your mobile in crowded areas and you’ll stand a much better chance of hanging onto it. Thieves are far more likely to target people they know have high-end devices. So, keep your smartphone out of sight.”
What about the rest of the UK?
As you might expect, phone theft is on the rise across the whole country. There were a total of 135,147 phone thefts in the United Kingdom in 2022.
The value of those stolen handsets came to over £47 million.
National figures reached a low point in 2020 with the total number of reported phone thefts reaching just 89,252. However, it’s been on the rise ever since, with numbers increasing by 35.9% last year alone.
Here’s how the individual countries fared:
- England racked up 133,464 phone thefts in 2020.
- Northern Ireland saw a more modest 1,003 phone thefts.
- Wales saw even less – just 680 phone thefts all year.
Note: Police Scotland refused to supply data to our study.
Again, we chose to look closer at the figures, using our PTI to more accurately compare the countries. Even then, England comes out on top with 2.81 thefts per thousand people. Northern Ireland had a PTI of 0.53 while Wales saw just 0.2 phone thefts per thousand people.
For more information, check out our full UK phone theft stats.
Methodology
FOI Requests
All our UK phone theft data was obtained via a series of Freedom of Information requests, submitted to every UK police constabulary. Our Lancaster data was obtained directly from Lancashire Constabulary.
Phone Theft Value
We calculated the cost of phone thefts in Lancaster by taking the total number of incidents in each year and assuming a minimum of 1 phone was stolen. We multiplied this by the average cost of a mobile phone, which was found to be £355.
Thefts per Thousand People
Populations differ from city to city, so we needed a way to normalise the data for ranking purposes. When ranking various UK cities, we take the total number of phone thefts in a given year, and divide that by the population. We then multiply the figure by 1000 to show how many thefts there were per thousand people.
UK-wide Data
Several UK constabularies refused to provide data. These were: Hampshire Constabulary, Police Scotland, Staffordshire Police, Sussex Police, Thames Valley Police, and Wiltshire Police. Average and per mille figures exclude areas where data was not provided, using an adjusted population to arrive at reliable figures.
Our full UK phone theft data can be found here.