5 ways to save money on your security guarding services
Security guards are essential on construction sites, but they can also be a pretty big drain on your budget, and you might be wondering if there isn’t a more cost effective approach to your site security.
One option that you may have considered is simply hiring cheaper security guards in the hope that their presence alone will put off intruders and their lack of experience and training won’t be challenged by a real-life emergency situation.
As you are reading this you have probably realised that this isn’t a great idea. The last thing that you need to be doing is to entrust the very future of your business to those who lack the skills or motivation to effectively protect your materials, machinery, and other key assets.
So, what’s the solution? Do you simply have to bite the bullet and pay for a full-time security guard service? Well, not necessarily, there are actually several ways to reduce the cost of your security guarding services without compromising on the safety of your staff and keeping your assets well protected.
Here are 5 of the best ways to reduce the cost of security guards
Hire dog handlers
If you manage a very large site, either in terms of the number of staff present, or large in terms of area, you would need to hire a significant number of security guards to cover the entire space.
However, security dogs have far superior senses of smell and hearing to human guards, not to mention that they can cover a much larger area in a much shorter period of time.
If you are looking to identify intruders, whilst also putting off any potential criminals who take more that a single glance at your site, security dogs are the way to go, and can significantly reduce your overall security expenditure.
Sure, the cost of a security dog handler may be slightly more than a standard security guard, but they are estimated to cover the same area of at least 3 human guards, meaning that your overall spending will be much lower.
Keyholding Services
Keyholding services are perhaps the easiest way to dramatically cut your overall security bill. Rather than having security guards physically on site 24/7, arrange for a local security firm to monitor your on-site alarm system and CCTV from afar, and only deploy guards to the site in person in the event of an incident.
This is the perfect balance between a technology only security system that will detect intruders but do little to deal with them and security guarding which can be extremely expensive. This way you get the real-time response to incidents that prevents serious harm being done to your assets, without the cost of full-time manned guarding.
Get a CCTV tower
CCTV towers not only record images from your site that can later be used by the police or for insurance, they are active deterrents to intruders and can issue a pre-recorded audio warning to anyone who strays inside key areas.
You can check on your site from anywhere in the world via mobile phone with a CCTV tower in place that sends images via 5G and these systems can usually be integrated with a keyholding and alarm response service. Even better, they need no mains electricity to run, making them perfect for remote construction sites.
Invest in fencing
Spending more money on security might not seem like the most sensible financial advice but sometimes you need to speculate to accumulate. By investing in high quality fencing to protect your perimeter, the risk of unauthorised individuals getting inside your premises reduces significantly. This could then reduce the need for security guards to be stationed at every single point along the perimeter and save you money in the long term.
Invest in quality
One great security guard is far superior to several sub-standard ones. Finding the right security firm that supplies highly trained SIA licenced experienced security guards is key to getting the best possible value for money. If possible, look for a firm that specialises in protecting construction sites in particular as their staff will be aware of all the threats to security that you may face.