A Canterbury builder has been left shocked after burglars took off with $18,000 worth of kitchen cabinetry from a building site.
Builder Daniel Cunningham said he couldn't believe the news when he found out the entire kitchen was stolen from the West Melton site.
The cabinetry had been delivered on Friday April 21 to be installed on the Monday.
And when the kitchen installers arrived at the site, the pantry, cabinets and draws totalling $18,000 had been stolen.
Mr Cunningham said he thought it was a joke at first.
"They just rung up and said we are here to install the kitchen and it isn't here and pretty fast I knew he was being serious."
The only thing that wasn't stolen was the bench top because it hadn't arrived yet.
Mr Cunningham was the last person to leave the site on Friday.
He said it couldn't have been an inside job as he had freshly changed the code on the lock box on Friday- and no one else knew it.
"There's no way it was an inside job...we think they picked the lock and moved it out.
"I have never been hit in the past...but like I say a huge custom made kitchen, I don't really see where they're going to move on to or get rid of it."
A few weeks off finishing the job the build has been pushed back by two weeks.
"It's definitely a pain in the arse, it hold's the whole job up."
And he doesn't know what the burglars would be doing with the cabinetry as it was unlikely to fit anywhere else.
Police are investigating the incident.
A police media spokeswoman said it was hard to quantify if there has been a spike in trade site burglaries recently.
"But we do know that tradies vehicles or worksites can be popular with opportunistic offenders who see them as a good target for highly valued items such as tools."
Police advised tradesman to use good locks on your sheds and trailers, remove all valuables from work vehicle's and not to leave tools in vehicles particularly at night even if it is parked in a driveway.
"If being kept in a vehicle, use a quality lock box secured to the vehicle to store them and get a quality alarm with a glass break sensor and store in a secure garage if possible."
"Our advice to tradies is to have your tools engraved with a drivers licence number, Police have a better chance of linking that item back to you in the event they are stolen. In addition, record your serial numbers on SNAP or in another secure way such as taking a photo of the serial number and storing it securely," she said.
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