A missed opportunity

Security companies typically submit a plethora of tender applications every month, gambling on the figures that they hope will win them every contract. In essence, each contractor is trying to provide the end user with the best possible service at the lowest feasible price. In the process of doing so, contractors are not only devaluing themselves and their officers, they are also devaluing the industry as a whole – by agreeing to supply a contract that is all-too-often unsustainable.

The well-worn practice of 'best price' tendering is contributing to a downward spiral in security standards. Guarding companies are compelled to cut costs by suppressing pay rates and reducing officer numbers – not to mention cutting back on the degree of training, supervision and management available to those guards. Margins are inevitably forced down.

Not only is price a short-sighted method of awarding a security contract, it often results in clients receiving a lower standard of service – not just on an individual contract basis, but (infectiously) throughout the industry as a whole.

At a time when private security companies are seemingly being invited to play a greater role in securing public buildings and patrolling the streets alongside the police, now is most definitely not the time to be lowering our collective standards.

Back to basics: the specification
The tendering process usually begins with a potential client describing the security provision that they need – or think they need. These ideas are then harnessed in the service specification. Often, this will be based on the end user's existing manned security contract, one that may not have been working too well for them.

Generally speaking, clients will set their own tendering guidelines to cover the levels of skill and experience they require, on top of the training, staff welfare benefits and degree of managerial support they'll expect to receive. They will ask potential security contractors to demonstrate how their policies, practices and philosophy will enable them to provide these variables – affording the contractor little or no opportunity to discuss the parameters of the contract, and (potentially) to offer innovative solutions.

In addition, it's often the case that contractors are given only the briefest of tours of all those sites to be protected. There is a miniscule 'window of opportunity' for effective consultation. Alas, too few in-house security and facilities managers view the procurement process as an opportunity to review their total security needs with the aid of an experienced contractor.

If the end user's budget is tight – and they usually are – there is an even more powerful argument for conducting a proper review of the company's total security needs – including the possibility of an integrated solution involving technology and manpower.

What we have here is nothing less than a missed opportunity. A tendering process which looks forwards rather than backwards – to what could be achieved rather than what has been available to date – would enable many clients to make strategic economies through the development of bespoke security solutions.

Best price tendering is contributing to a downward spiral in security standards. Guarding companies are all-too-often compelled to slash costs by suppressing pay rates and reducing officer numbers

Rushing the tendering process is also counter-productive. Ideally, a quality contractor needs a submission period of four weeks. Subsequent to a contract being awarded, the client should then allow for a six-week dedicated implementation phase. Any new contract start-up requires at least 25 key service areas to be addressed such that the contract begins in the desired fashion.

Left alone, those key areas could take twice as long to redress when problems begin to arise.

A true partnership is key to the smooth running of any security contract, yet the tender process is usually driven by procurement managers with a firm focus on minimum price. They tend to want to pay as little as possible to the people on the front desk, the 'night watchman', the CCTV operator, the car park guard, the post room supervisor and any other employees of their security contractor.

Why should such employees be paid any less than their own members of staff, alongside whom they work on a daily basis?

A good client will want to see money allocated for the training of their security staff, along with a well-rounded package of employee conditions which will keep skilled officers in the job. However, we've all heard stories about clients who set an hourly pay rate which is lower than any of their own employees would actually work for, and then impose penalty clauses on the contractor when certain standards are not achieved.

If contractors are paying guards less per hour than the market rate, and less than they can earn elsewhere, they will soon cotton-on to that fact – and leave. Clients dislike this churn as much as we do, so what's the answer?

The answer must be for the industry to set a regional scale of minimum pay rates acceptable to security staff. In this way, we will break free from the downwards spiral of low wages, poor performance and officer churn.

The cost of a guarding contract
Clients need to be reminded that approximately 80% of the costs of any manned security contract are comprised of officer wages, and that these are low – with no scope to reduce them.

Profit margins are also very low and, if the industry is asked to cut them still further in order to realise cost savings, we will be hard-pressed to maintain the basic level of service to which any end user is entitled.

Contractors must be brave enough to decline to tender with any organisations who drive down wages, who will not consult, who dictate all contract terms, who 'want to cut costs at all costs' – and who try to trap their contractors with unrealistic terms and conditions.