AMARILLO, TEXAS -- We're getting closer to Christmas and many of you are shopping online which means your purchases will be delivered soon. In year's past, thieves have been known to follow those delivery trucks and take your merchandise after it was dropped on the doorstep.

One way you can protect your purchases from thieves is by having them delivered somewhere you know they'll be safe when you aren't home.

"If you know normally UPS or FedEx deliveries come between 10 and noon in the morning, and you know you're at work during that time, you might consider getting hold of a neighbor using a different shipping address, use your work address," said Amarillo Police Department Corporal Jerry Neufeld.

You can also take an early lunch or call a neighbor or friend and have them pick it up.

It might give you some peace of mind to know if a car happens to be following a UPS truck, their drivers are trained to handle the situation.

"Our drivers are trained to look for suspicious activity, like vehicles following them around and they keep seeing the same vehicle repeatedly. There's typically more than one person and they're trained to spot that kind of thing and then call our management team here and if they feel they're in any danger, to notify the police."

Luckily in our area, Corporal Neufeld says they haven't this situation arise much over the last few years.

"If they notice or feel like somebody is following them around they've been very good about calling us. We'll get some officers over there, we'll get that vehicle stopped, identify who they are, we may or may not be able to make an arrest at that point but at least we would be able to identify who they are."

The easiest way to avoid all of this is, just look out for each other this holiday season.

Black went on to say that UPS now offers a service called my choice.

The customer has the option to have the package directed to a neighbor's house or have specific placement options.