Lost property

Lost property that has been handed in is kept for 4 events after hand-in. If unclaimed after this period items will get moved in to “freecycle”, which will take place on the Sunday of each event. Monster get first dibs, followed by GOD, followed by a free-for-all. Lost property items are labelled, ribbon colour-coded and stored according to the event at which they were handed in.

All valuable lost property (jewellery, watches, wallets, phones, iPads &c.) should be logged by a department head and kept in a secure location. All identifiable and valuable property should be returned to a player ASAP, by contacting the player themself, the nominated contact for their banner/coven/sect, or -- if necessary -- their nation’s Egregore, usually by radio.

⚠️Caution

Players are not allowed to rummage through lost property themselves – they must be able to accurately describe the missing item and a member of GOD crew must be present to assist with finding it.

Organisation

Storage

• Items are stored in crates.
• Crates that contain unidentified lost property should be sorted by item type, and marked with a piece of ribbon in the relevant colour code for the event at which the item was found, ideally at both ends.
• Crates marked with a rainbow of ribbon contain IDed lost property.
• Lidded security crates are best used for soft kit.
• 9L RUB with appropriate inserts are best used for small items.
• Bread crates are best used for everything else (that will fit in them).
• Arrows get stored in bins/buckets.
• Long weapons and other objects get stored in bins.

Stationery

• A5 arrows catalogue.
• A5 booklets for lost property slips, organised on a per-event basis. Currently these are discbound notebooks, with the binding discs and the laminated covers in (roughly) the same colour as the ribbon for each event. At time of writing each book is divided into six sections: OOC valuables, arms & armoury, jewellery, soft kit, bags & boxes, and miscellaneous.
• Lost property slips. A5, low-weight paper. The easiest way to manage these (that we've worked out so far) is to have a stack pre-printed and pre-punched, sitting in the very front (i.e. before the first divider) of the current event's booklet.
• Found property envelopes (C5) to put valuables into and record what steps have been taken to identify and contact owners.
• UV marker.
• Sharpie.
• Biro.
• UV torch.
• Price tags, for recording locations where objects were found and labelling IDed items that don't fit in envelopes.
• Hole punch. As of 2024, using Alex's Atoma disc binding punch.

Detailed processes

There are two main workflows plus some auxiliary bits.

Incoming

1. work out whether it is possible to ID the owner
   • does it have a PID or name indicating an owner written anywhere on it? (use the UV torch! if it’s a phone, there might be useful info in the emergency contacts)
   • does it have a ribbon attached to it? (write down the ribbon ID on a price tag or similar and attach the tag to the item immediately)
   • does it have any other names written in it? (e.g. promissory notes, notebooks that are clearly linked to a specific in-game group, …)
2. hand back anything the person turning the property in is both entitled to and wants (e.g. ribbons and IC cash found in IC areas)
3. double-check the list of open lost property requests: is this a match for any of them?
   • if yes, hand over to “outgoing”
4. tie an appropriate colour of ribbon to the item (if it is being handed in at an event different to the event it was lost at, use the colour corresponding to the event it was lost at)
5. if the item is IDable or valuable, fill out a Found property envelope and place the item within it
6. sort the item into an appropriate container
   • if it’s IDable, put it in a dedicated box for IDable items
   • otherwise, it is useful to have boxes for: OOC valuables; jewellery/watches/small items (can be combined with valuables); protective gear/armour; short weapons; long weapons; soft kit and clothing; water bottles/drinking vessels/liquids; miscellaneous

Outgoing

This section is made up of several similar, but different, jobs.

• if a player has a “lost property to collect” stamp on their pack:
  1. rummage through the box of IDed lost property until you find the item, which should be tagged with the player’s PID. if something is on this list, it’s because Alex has actually held it in their own physical hands – if you can’t find it, get the player to wait while you grab either Alex or Erin (apologies in advance for this – we are still trying to work out how to best organise the Found Property box!)
  2. once you’ve handed over the item, tick them off the printed list, mark any report slips with “returned”, and move the completed slip to the Done box
• if a player has an "arrows to collect" stamp on their pack:
  1. check the list for # of arrows
  2. check the arrows catalogue so you know what design you're looking for
  3. check the appropriate arrows bin

Between events

TODO:

• Logging details of lost property
• Reconciliation of handed-in found property with lost property records
• Detailed process for freecycle
• Colour coding table
• Arrow handling

Behind the scenes

We know that from the outside lost property often looks like a chaotic jumble – so we want to tell you a bit more about how the system works!

When you tell us you've lost something, the first thing we do is look through items we've had handed in. These are organised by the event they were lost at and the type of item – if you lost a goblet two events ago, we'll grab the box of drinking vessels that were handed in two events ago and go through it with you. We'll also double-check the boxes from more recent events, because items sometimes get found in the woods/other people's kit bags/the Academy storage container quite a while after they went missing!

If we don't have your item, we'll ask you to fill out a lost property form with us, even if you don't think it's worth it – it's incredibly frustrating to have something handed in and realise we know exactly who it belongs to, but didn't get them to leave their details! We keep these reports for a full year.

When items are handed in, we check whether we can ID their owner. This means that we look for a PID, name, or contact details, or even initials – in normal light and using a UV torch. We also check whether they seem like any of the lost property reports we have on record. If we find a match, we'll get in touch (via a text message from a PD phone, or e-mail) as soon as we can. This does sometimes take a while and we don't always realise when something that's been handed in matches a description, so even if we haven't contacted you, please do feel free to swing by to check any time when full lost property service is open!

In addition to matching up missing property reports with lost items during events, we are sometimes able to spend a few days before an event sorting through lost property. This lets us thoroughly double-check everything we have in storage against all lost property reports from the last four events – this means that we try to check every single piece of lost property from each event at least four separate times. If we find something we think belongs to you, we'll do our best to let you know by e-mail, and we'll stamp a reminder that there's something for you to collect (or inspect) on your character pack. Again, if we don't get in touch it doesn't mean we definitely don't have your stuff – it just means we haven't recognised it!

When we return an item, if it's not already got your details on we'll encourage you to label it with identifying information, e.g. your PID or your name. If it comes in again, we'll be able to get it back to you faster.