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Service Vehicle Passes

KhakiCrab

Old Salt
Just got back from a trip to the Defence Academy, where the b'stards on the gate wouldn't let me in until I'd done a U-turn, parked up, stood in their guardroom for ten minutes waiting to be seen to and got one of their visitor's car passes for my Service vehicle.

Now, in the course of my job I visit a lot of different units of all three Services and the DA aren't unique in not accepting a work ticket and ID on the gate, but they are in a tiny minority.

Why can't we have MoD-wide car passes issued for all Service vehicles, that would be acceptable to all MoD establishments?

Seems like common sense to me...

...oops! Answered my own question :evil:
 
Probably sticking my neck out here, but where would the ID's be kept? In the glovebox? What would the ID state, that it is an OK Vehicle?


I'd nick the ID with the Vehicle!
 
So what stops anyone nicking the work ticket with a Service vehicle?

In what way is a work ticket superior to a vehicle pass?

And if it were in my department, we'd keep the ID with the keys to the vehicle in our work cars key press.
 
KhakiCrab said:
So what stops anyone nicking the work ticket with a Service vehicle?
In what way is a work ticket superior to a vehicle pass?

And if it were in my department, we'd keep the ID with the keys to the vehicle in our work cars key press.

Did you not state that they would not let you in th camp with a work ticket? in which case nicking the work ticket with the vehicle is pretty pointless!

I am part of a team that also travels to many tri service sites, some accept the vehicle (lex hire vehicle) work ticket, many don't and we have to get a car pass. Such is life, we simply apply the principle of expecting to have to get a car pass at everry camp we visit, but if they accept the workticket then that is a bonus. It is up to each individual CO on how he wishes to secure acces to their camp and this should not be removed by the issue of a generic type of vehicle pass.

Just get over it. :D
 
I must say that I was a bit confused when I was issued a personal ID card and a vehicle ID card, for the reasons stated above. But then I'm RAF and we seem to do things differently just for the sake of it sometimes.
Before I had it, after the first time I'd been through, it used to take me two minutes in the guardroom. No drama.

I was told that the vehicle ID had to be left on show when on any MOD property. Little plastic wallety thing stuck on the windscreen. When not on MOD property, the card goes with you.

Later it was explained it was to stop a ring of Forces based high-end car thieves exporting Ferraris etc using RAF aircraft.
Had me going for about three seconds.
 
GrumpyGit said:
Just get over it. :D

Hey! Consistent with how I was taught by the military, I wasn't simply whingeing about something, I was offering a solution.

But clearly making things easier and simpler is unacceptably heretical to some :twisted:
 
It is a pain in the arrse to get a pass each time, but remember it is also the securitys way of knowing what outside agency is on thier camp.
With the new type like in B******d, if you have been there before your info is stored on the computer and they just print out a pass for you. no problems
 
conco said:
but remember it is also the securitys way of knowing what outside agency is on thier camp.

I've got no problem with that logic - but given that, ALL units should demand that everyone gets a vehicle pass each time, Service vehicle or not.

As it is, anyone with a low-spec, nearly-new Ford or Vauxhall, a Lex tax-disc holder for effect and an oblong of green canvas with a couple of pop-studs on it can get onto MOST military establishments. In fifteen years I've never once had a gate-guard ask to actually see the paperwork he assumes is in my work ticket pack.

Now for relatively little cost and increased security there are systems that could ID any Service vehicle visually and/or electronically and thus also enable MoD to dispense with the services of one of the guardroom staff to offset the cost. :twisted:
 
There used to ba a unit whose role included trying to get onto camps with a smile, or a friendly wave, or a gym membership card; or a combination of all three. At one stage the unit was looking at infiltrating the contract workforce as a means of testing their vetting procedures. Only a G2 / G4 spat kept that one in the box.

Then there are red-top journous who keep trying to get into palaces, ports and airports. I know of one site where a shrink wrapped pallet of copier paper disappeard from outside the QMs in a few hours. Probably several people and a van were involved.

Head Office have "reccommended " a common access system accross the defence estate. Has it been mandated and funded?

I rather think that many sites have bought stand alone systems, some may not have. The degrees to which system functionally is exploited varies from site to site. Most of you probably recognise that these systems have the abilty to store your card number as well as personal particulars.

If such a system were networked accross the defence estate, heads of establishment / COs could then consider, trusting clearances done by other sites, on the basis that ther was a secure database that all could trust.

Until "Head Office" is prepared to fork out for a defence-wide system ( just like the US CAC) I, for one, would continue to advise CO's / HOEs to mandate their own acccess control procedures.

Until the accountants are prepard to consider the lost-opportunity-cost of contractors, suppliers and visitors having to queue up at the gate to get in; suppliers and contractors will propbably continue to include their front gate waiting-time on the the MoD customer.
 
Veering slightly off-topic for a moment, as an ex-Army/now RAF officer, it's always amused me that in the airforce what I get on the gate is "Alright, mate? - sorry, Sir!" whereas according to my OR Army colleagues going into Army camps they get "Alright, Sir? - sorry, mate!" :D

It ranks alongside soldiers being trained to answer the phone by ending with "-Sir!" What are the odds of it actually being a male officer on the line? :twisted:

Edited for muppet spelling
 
Jobs... Worths...

Plain and simple. I hate them. Things used to run alot smoother in the good old days of keep it simple. Pull up at a gate. Flash MOD90 - possibly a quick search then crack on.
 
I've got a green land rover defender( not painted nato green) when I go to different units the amount of times I have been waved through by the bored gate gaurds is unbelievable!! I always stop and challenge them why they have let a sranger in a strange vehicle into camp.
the reply is always..

...."I thought" etc, Don't think...KNOW!!!

check and challenge anything and everything thast YOU let into your camp and HOME!! that is your job, would you do whilst on stag in a harbour? no so don't do it and stop dripping like a leaking tap...
 
I started this thread with a suggestion as to how to make vehicular entry to MoD sites both simpler AND more secure, yet the debate seems to have degenerated based on an erroneous assumption that I was questioning the need for security.

Go figure!
 
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