The order of things, before touching the door
Put nothing back and clean nothing. Photograph the leaf, the frame and the tool marks on the faceplate before anyone walks through. The complaint is filed in Villefranche itself, and those images carry real weight in the file. Tell your insurer, following your policy for the form the declaration has to take.
If the door no longer closes, it can be made secure temporarily without removing what matters: the home is shut, what was touched is recorded, and the permanent replacement follows. In a block of flats, at Troussier or in the tenement buildings near the station, tell the managing agent as well if the hall or the common door was forced. A screwed panel or a temporary closure erases none of the marks already recorded.
A detailed quote is presented before the work and a detailed invoice at the end. Those two documents are what your insurer will ask for, along with the receipt for the complaint. Keep the removed parts too: a drilled cylinder or a torn-out keep says more than any description.
What has suffered without showing it
A door in the old centre rarely gives way at the lock: it is the frame that goes. A hundred-year-old oak jamb levered open leaves a keep held in place by little more than habit, even if the door still shuts. The timber is repaired or replaced, otherwise the new lock fitted to it will do nothing. A split jamb shows up if you close the door slowly in the low morning light.
A cylinder that has been struck or forced round keeps an invisible amount of wear: it still works, then jams a few weeks later. It gets replaced, including when the attempt failed. The same reasoning applies to a forced handle or a rose torn off a landing door in Béligny. That is not something you can settle by eye from the landing.
Finally, every way in is looked at, not only the one with marks on it. On the Beaujolais properties around Villefranche entry is often made through the vat house, an outbuilding or the garage, whose fastenings have never been touched since they were fitted. In the centre, a courtyard door left on a plain latch matters more than a third bolt on the front door.
How does this service work?
Techniques, typical situations, standards and things to watch out for: it is all on our securing your home after a break-in page. This page focuses on what the service involves in Villefranche-sur-Saône.