Essex Police has collated information on postage thefts between 2019 and 2022 as part of a freedom of information request.

The data shows the number of crimes increased and then went back down over the time period.

In 2019 there were 217, in 2020 there were 302, in 2021 there were 1126 and then 2022 there were 243 incidents of postal theft reported.

It comes after it was revealed that parcel thefts are more common in Essex than in any other police area in the UK, according to a study carried out by an international courier service.

Essex residents have reported a total of 1,888 parcel thefts to Essex Police between 2019 and the first quarter of 2022, with a total of 102 mail thefts recorded per 100,000 people.

According to the data from Pack and Send, the number of thefts has increased significantly over the last three years – and more worryingly, Essex Police has had a higher proportion of stolen packages reported per head than any other police force, including the Metropolitan Police, Kent Police, and Cambridgeshire Constabulary.

The Covid-19 lockdown has been cited as one reason behind the increase in crimes of this nature, with more and more consumers turning to online shopping whilst retailers closed during the lockdowns in 2020 and 2021.

With 11,000 incidents of mail theft having been recorded in the past three years UK-wide, it means the number of parcel thefts recorded in Essex accounts for 17 per cent of the overall national figure.