The key to this Churchill Banker under floor safe had been lost a long time ago but was still being used to store cash. All of a sudden the safe lid failed to open for the owner despite repeated hammer blows. Even knocking off the bolt control knob didn’t seem to help them so they called us. The initial photograph didn’t include the raised flooring surrounding it which meant the safe was far deeper down than was comfortable but we set to work on it. The first thing we noticed was that the lock had somehow been locked and secondly it was very loose meaning that extra security devices in the safe had likely been activated.

The first thing we did was to pick the lock open which would have been enough under normal circumstances to remove the lid but our suspicion of an activated relocker was confirmed. This was looking like a very long job and having to drill the lid in several places to release the spring loaded relockers. We got really lucky with it though and managed to get it open without any drilling or further damage than had already been caused before we arrived.

Here is a perfect example of a quality safe doing what it is supposed to do. Thieves had pounded on this Churchill safe lid with sledges, tried to dig it out and even attempted to cut through it with a disc cutter with no luck. All they had managed to do was make it more difficult for us to open when we were called to this job at a petrol station in Ormskirk.

The owners keys would no longer open the lock and the bashed lid without a handle was going to be a bit more difficult to open than a simple lost key job. Despite the extra work, we were able to get the lid off to find the contents still safely inside.

Given the extent of the damage we advised a replacement safe was required in this instance but it had more than paid for itself keeping the bad guys out.