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Today I received form LAF02 from the Security Industry Authority (SIA) requesting that I renew my licence. There is no requirement for further training, they don’t ask for evidence of any continuation training. They don’t even ask if have been working in the industry keeping my skills current. In fact all they ask for is a repeat of the information they already have; such as my name, address and date of birth, oh and they ask for £245 which I suspect is really the point of the exercise.
Whilst they claim to want to
Raise standards of professionalism and skills within the private security industry and to promote and spread best practice.
Its clear they are not really interested in this, or they would have at least asked to see my current First Aid Qualification. The one they insisted I take prior to licensing, the one that lasts only 3 years! So as every Close Protection Licence expires so does those officers first Aid tickets. How hard would it be to insist on evidence of a current ticket with the renewal?
First Aid is the one skill that does need practise and continuation training. First Aid skills are so important in this industry. It’s bad enough that they settled on the First Aid at Work qualification as a minimum standard, but to then go on and issue licences and not check that the officers are at that standard beggars belief. Clearly the SIA look at renewals as a money making opportunity rather than a tool to “raise standards of professionalism and skills”
An official response when asked: Why is First Aid training not compulsory on renewal of the close protection licence?
“There is an expectation that close protection operatives would want to keep their First Aid
qualifications up to date. “
So they are not enforcing it, because they expect we will want to do it. Well the good officers will, but its not the good conscientious officers that need the regulation, its the rest and they will probably not bother. Where do all those £245 payments go? Its a shame you can’t buy common-sense.
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I just had my renewal through, I wondered the same thing. Sometimes I do think the SIA are one of the most incompetent departments that the government have. Then i think that this is the only one I do deal with, with no experience of the others I hope they are all not as rubbish as this one!!!
Call me a rebel, but I’m working underground and the SIA can shove their red tape up their well-oiled…
I also had mine sent I was told they did not require anything at all just tick the boxes and send, unsure about this I phoned them and they confirmed this is true so sent with the £245 and 2 weeks latter arrived back they require all my info again,looks like the renewal is going to take as long as the 1st one in my case 14 months? thank God I don’t work in the UK.
If you stop and think about it, all security personnel paying the £245 are doing a great service to the country. Without it the people running this service would be on our streets causing mayhem. Just checked the progress of my renewal (APPROVED ) BUT MAY TAKE UP TO 33 DAYS FOR DISPATCH OF LICENCE ????. Nothing new there then. Well my current licence expires 31st April so I guess I’ll be illegal for a while or unemployed. How many security guards have meet an SIA official ??????