Press Release

Prague, 17 August 2010 – All the petrol stations in the Czech Republic encounter theft of automotive fuels. According to statistics, as many as twenty thousand vehicles annually leave with a full tank but without paying. The BENZINA company, as the first of the operators of public petrol stations, has decided to combat these thieves and has introduced test operations of a unique security camera system. This permits direct on-line connection of sensitive high-resolution cameras located on the petrol stations to the register of stolen vehicles.

In practice, this means that information from this system is used directly for protection of the petrol station against fuel theft, i.e. it ensures that the drivers of stolen vehicles or with stolen licence plates cannot pump petrol. The great advantage of this system is its rapidity of response, with instantaneous comparison of the camera recordings with the data in the misconduct register and also with the data in the stolen vehicle database. The system simultaneously monitors and records any disagreement of the designation of the vehicle and other unspecified parameters.

“This impulse is instantaneous; before the petrol pump display clears, we receive the information that the vehicle was stolen,” says the author of the system and external employee of the LENIA company, Pavel Novák. “In this case, the petrol pump is immediately turned off. In addition, the system informs the police without delay, leading to more successful apprehension of thieves than in the past.”

“Test operation of the camera system at selected BENZINA petrol stations has proven very successful and we are now working on expansion to other sales outlets,” adds Martin Durčák, the Director General of BENZINA.

About Benzina
BENZINA, spol. s.r.o., with 366 public petrol stations, operates the largest national network in the Czech Republic and offers fuel and other goods and services to a wide range of customers. The BENZINA trade mark has been on the market for over 50 years. Today, the company is a 100% subsidiary of Unipetrol Holding. The market share of BENZINA in the domestic retail market in 2009 increased to 14%, compared to its minimum level of 9.9% in 2005. Revenues for sales equalled CZK 13.5 billion in 2009. More information can be found at www.benzinaplus.cz.