How to Choose a Manned Guarding Company in London
Choosing a Security Guarding Company You Can Rely On
A Buyer's Guide for London Businesses
Appointing a security contractor is one of the few buying decisions where the cheapest option can put your people, premises and reputation directly at risk. The officers you appoint will control who enters your building, be first on the scene when something goes wrong and represent your business to staff, visitors and the public on every shift.
London has hundreds of companies offering security guard services, and on paper many of them look the same. Most will promise SIA licensed officers, 24/7 cover and competitive rates. The real differences only show when you look at how a provider is accredited, how it vets and supervises its staff, how it reports on performance, how it builds its hourly rate and what happens when an officer fails to turn up at 2am.
This guide sets out the process we recommend for appointing a provider of manned guarding services in London. It covers a seven-step selection process, the free public checks you can run yourself, the questions to put to every bidder, a weighted scorecard for comparing quotes, and the changes coming in 2027 that buyers should plan for now. It is written by an SIA ACS-approved contractor, so it also explains what a well-run security company should be willing to show you.
A Seven-Step Process for Appointing a Security Provider
Most poor security appointments come from a rushed process rather than a bad decision. A business asks two or three companies for "a price for a guard", picks the lowest number and finds out what it has actually bought after the contract starts. Following a simple, structured process takes very little extra time and makes the right choice much easier to see.
- Write a one-page security brief. Set out the site address, opening and guarding hours, the duties you need (access control, patrols, reception, CCTV, lock and unlock), the main risks, any incidents in the last year, your preferred start date and the notice period on any current contract. Every bidder should receive exactly the same brief.
- Build a longlist from the SIA register of Approved Contractors. Start from the companies independently approved for security guarding rather than whoever ranks first in a search or sends the best brochure, then narrow the list to providers already working in your sector in London.
- Invite three or four providers to quote. Send the brief together with the questions set out further down this page, and give a firm deadline. Asking more than four companies rarely improves the result and makes fair comparison harder.
- Insist on a site survey before any price is given. Walk the site with each bidder. How carefully they look, and what they ask, tells you a great deal about how they will manage your contract.
- Score every proposal on the same weighted scorecard. Price should be one factor among several, not the only one. A sample scorecard is included below.
- Verify your preferred bidder before you sign. Check the ACS and licence registers, the company's Companies House record, its insurance certificates and at least two client references.
- Agree the contract, KPIs and mobilisation plan. Confirm assignment instructions, reporting, review meetings and, if you are changing supplier, how officers will transfer. Hold formal reviews at 30 and 90 days, then quarterly.
Start With Compliance: Accreditation, Licensing, Vetting and Insurance
Compliance is the minimum standard, not a selling point. Any provider that cannot evidence the four checks below should be removed from your shortlist before you discuss price.
SIA Approved Contractor Scheme (ACS) Status
The Security Industry Authority regulates the private security industry under the Private Security Industry Act 2001. Its Approved Contractor Scheme is a voluntary accreditation awarded only to companies that pass an independent annual assessment of their vetting, training, supervision, customer service and financial management. A logo on a website is not evidence. Ask for the company's ACS reference and check it on the register yourself.
SIA Licence Verification for Every Officer
Every officer working in a licensable role must hold a valid SIA front-line licence for that activity, such as security guarding, door supervision or CCTV, and display it while on duty. Ask for the names and licence numbers of the officers proposed for your site before they start, not after.
BS 7858 Staff Screening
BS 7858 is the British Standard for screening people employed in a security environment. It covers identity, right to work, a continuous five-year employment and address history, and criminal record disclosure. Ask how the company screens staff, who carries out the checks and whether officers are ever deployed before screening is complete.
Insurance Cover
Request current certificates for employers' liability insurance (a legal requirement for any employer), public liability insurance and professional indemnity insurance. Check the limits of indemnity against your own lease, landlord or client requirements, and make sure the policy covers the activities the officers will actually carry out on your site.
Three Free Checks You Can Run in Ten Minutes
You do not need to rely on what a provider tells you. Three public registers will confirm, or contradict, most of the claims made in a sales proposal, and none of them costs anything to use.
1. The SIA Register of Approved Contractors
Search for the company by name and check three details. First, the approved legal entity should match the company that will sign your contract. A trading name sometimes belongs to a different, unapproved company. Second, the approval should cover the service you are buying, because ACS approval is granted per sector and a firm approved only for door supervision is not automatically approved for security guarding. Third, the approval should be current.
2. The SIA Register of Licence Holders
Check each proposed officer's licence number and make sure the licence sector matches the duties. A door supervisor licence also allows security guarding work, but a security guard licence does not cover door work at licensed premises such as bars, clubs or late-night venues. If your site needs both, ask for officers who hold the right licence. Our door supervision services page explains where that line falls.
3. Companies House
A company's free Companies House record often tells a different story from its website. Compare the incorporation date with the years of experience claimed, check that accounts and confirmation statements are filed on time, and look at the size of the balance sheet against the size of the contracts the company says it holds. Frequent director changes, overdue filings or directors linked to several dissolved security companies are all reasons to ask harder questions.
Experience, Staffing and Supervision: Who Turns Up and Who Checks on Them
A licence proves an officer is legally allowed to work. It does not prove the company behind them can deliver a consistent service, week after week, across every shift.
Relevant Industry Experience
A corporate office, a construction site, a retail store and a residential block all carry very different risks. Ask for examples of similar sites the company currently covers, what duties its officers perform there and how long it has held those contracts. Experience in your sector means the officers already understand the typical threats, the regulations and the level of customer service expected.
Reliable, Consistent Staffing
The best results come from a small, stable team of dedicated officers who learn your site, your staff and your regular visitors. Ask how the company recruits and retains officers, how it builds a dedicated team for each contract and how new officers are inducted on site. Constant changes of face are a sign of high turnover and poor retention.
Active Supervision
Officers on long or overnight shifts need oversight. Ask how often supervisors or mobile managers visit the site, whether those visits are recorded, how officers are checked during the night and who you can speak to if standards slip. A named account manager with real authority to resolve problems is worth far more than a generic helpline.
Emergency and Absence Cover
Sickness, transport disruption and family emergencies are inevitable. What matters is how quickly a trained replacement arrives. Ask whether the company runs a 24-hour control room or duty manager, how it covers short-notice absences and how long your site would be left unguarded. A site that is regularly left empty between shifts is not a protected site.
Security Technology, Reporting and Accountability
You should never have to take a provider's word that patrols happened or that an officer was on site. Modern security companies use technology to give clients clear, verifiable evidence of the work being carried out.
Digital Patrol Monitoring
Electronic patrol systems record when an officer reaches each checkpoint on a patrol route, using tags, QR codes or GPS. Ask whether the company uses a patrol monitoring system, whether missed checkpoints raise an alert to a supervisor and whether you can see the patrol records for your site.
Attendance and Welfare Checks
Officers should book on and off duty through a recorded system, with regular welfare checks during the shift, particularly for lone workers and night shifts. This protects the officer and gives you confidence that the hours you are paying for are the hours being worked.
Incident Reporting
Ask to see a sample incident report and daily occurrence log. Reports should be timely, factual and detailed enough to support an insurance claim or police investigation. Find out how quickly serious incidents are escalated to you and whether you receive regular summaries that show trends across your site.
Site Surveys, Risk Assessments and Assignment Instructions
A Proper Plan Before Anyone Is Deployed
A professional security guarding company will want to see your premises before it recommends a solution. A site survey looks at entrances and exits, perimeter, lighting, CCTV coverage, access control, high-value areas and the times your site is most vulnerable. A written risk assessment then identifies the threats that matter, such as theft, trespass, antisocial behaviour, violence towards staff or fire risks, and sets out how officers will help manage them. For complex or multi-site estates, an independent security consultancy review can set the specification before you go to tender.
The output should be site-specific assignment instructions: the document that tells every officer exactly what to do on your site. Good assignment instructions cover duties and patrol routes, access and visitor procedures, key and alarm management, emergency contacts, escalation steps and how to deal with incidents. They should be agreed with you, kept on site and reviewed whenever your operation changes.
Be cautious of any company that quotes officer numbers and hours without visiting, or that hands you a generic set of instructions with your company name added. The way a provider approaches this stage is often the clearest indication of how it will manage your contract.
Ten Questions to Ask Every Bidder, and What a Good Answer Sounds Like
Almost every security company will say "yes" to a yes-or-no question. Open questions that ask a provider to explain how it works are far more revealing. Put the same questions to every bidder and compare the detail in the answers, not just the confidence.
| Question to ask | What a strong answer includes |
|---|---|
| What is your ACS reference, and which services does it cover? | A reference you can check on the SIA register immediately, approved for security guarding under the same legal entity that will sign your contract. |
| Who would work on our site, and can we see their licence numbers? | Named officers or a clear profile of the team, with licence numbers supplied before mobilisation and an offer to meet the lead officer. |
| How do you screen new officers, and how long does it take? | Screening to BS 7858 carried out before deployment, with a clear explanation of who checks references and what happens if a gap cannot be verified. |
| What happens if an officer calls in sick an hour before a night shift? | A 24-hour duty manager or control room, a pool of officers already inducted on your site, and a realistic replacement time stated in minutes or hours. |
| How often will a supervisor visit, and how will we know? | A stated visit frequency, recorded visits including unannounced night checks, and visit reports shared with you. |
| What will we receive each month? | A sample report showing hours worked, patrol completion, incidents, trends and recommendations, not just an invoice. |
| What does your hourly rate include, and what is charged extra? | A breakdown covering pay, holiday, National Insurance, pension, supervision and overheads, plus written rates for bank holidays and short-notice cover. |
| What do you pay officers, and how do you keep them? | An honest pay rate at or above the legal minimum, ideally the London Living Wage, with a clear approach to training, progression and retention. |
| How will you mobilise, and what if our current officers transfer to you? | A dated mobilisation plan covering induction, assignment instructions, uniforms, equipment and how TUPE consultation will be handled. |
| Can we speak to two clients with sites like ours? | Named contacts at current clients in your sector, offered without hesitation. |
What Has to Be Paid for Out of a Security Guard's Hourly Rate
Why the Cheapest Quotation Is Rarely the Best Choice
Every legitimate manned guarding company in the UK faces the same fixed employment costs before it pays for supervision, management or profit. Understanding those costs is the quickest way to tell a lean, well-run quote from one that cannot be delivered legally.
| Cost built into the rate | What it means in 2026 |
|---|---|
| Officer's basic pay | At least the National Living Wage of £12.71 an hour for workers aged 21 and over from 1 April 2026. Many London clients specify the higher London Living Wage, which the Living Wage Foundation reviews each autumn. |
| Holiday pay | 5.6 weeks of statutory paid leave, equal to around 12.07% on top of every hour worked. |
| Employer's National Insurance | 15% on earnings above the £5,000 annual secondary threshold, the rate in place since April 2025. |
| Workplace pension | A minimum employer contribution of 3% of qualifying earnings under auto-enrolment. |
| Sick pay and absence cover | Statutory Sick Pay is now payable from the first day of absence, and every absence still has to be covered by another paid officer. |
| Licensing, screening and training | SIA licence fees and renewals, BS 7858 screening, site inductions and refresher training. |
| Supervision and 24-hour support | Supervisor visits, a duty manager or control room, and patrol and reporting systems. |
| Insurance, uniforms and overheads | Employers' liability, public liability and professional indemnity cover, uniforms and equipment, ACS assessment costs, account management and a modest margin. |
Once those costs are paid, the margin left in a security contract is small. When a quote is far lower than the others, the difference has to come from somewhere, and it is usually the parts of the service you cannot easily see: underpaid officers who leave within weeks, unscreened or unlicensed staff filling gaps, no supervision outside office hours and no replacement when someone fails to turn up. It can also expose your business directly. Under the Private Security Industry Act 2001, both a contractor that supplies unlicensed staff and a client that knowingly uses them can commit an offence.
The real cost of poor security shows up as stolen stock, damaged property, injured staff, failed audits, insurance disputes and reputational damage, all of which soon outweigh a small saving on an hourly rate. Choosing a compliant, reliable and professional provider of security guarding services gives you trained officers who stay, managers who answer the phone and the evidence you need to show that your duty of care has been met.
References, Reputation, Contract Terms and Value
Once a provider has passed your compliance checks, the commercial side of the decision comes down to track record, clear terms and genuine value for money.
Client References
Ask for two or three references from current clients with sites similar to yours, and actually call them. Ask how long they have used the company, how it handles absences and complaints, how responsive the account manager is and whether they would renew. A confident provider will put you in touch without hesitation.
Reputation and Track Record
Look at independent reviews, how long the business has been trading and its filed accounts at Companies House. A security company that is financially unstable is more likely to cut corners on pay and training, or to fail part-way through your contract and leave you without cover.
Clear Contract Terms
The contract should state the hours, officer numbers, hourly rates, bank holiday and short-notice premiums, service levels, reporting, review meetings, notice period and liability terms. Avoid long minimum terms with no performance clauses, and make sure you understand exactly what is and is not included in the price.
Measurable Service Levels
Agree a handful of KPIs you can actually measure, such as shifts covered on time, patrol checkpoints completed, report delivery dates and response times for replacement officers. Link them to regular review meetings so that problems are raised and fixed early rather than at renewal.
A Simple Weighted Scorecard for Comparing Security Quotes
Scoring every proposal against the same criteria stops the lowest hourly rate from deciding the contract by default. Score each criterion from 0 (not evidenced) to 5 (excellent, fully evidenced), multiply by the weighting and add up the totals. Adjust the weightings to suit your site. A high-risk or high-footfall site might move more weight onto supervision and response.
| Criterion | Weighting | What to score |
|---|---|---|
| Compliance and accreditation | Pass / fail | ACS approval for security guarding, licensed officers, BS 7858 screening and insurance. Any failure removes the bidder before scoring. |
| Understanding of your site and risks | 20% | Quality of the site survey, risk assessment and draft assignment instructions. |
| Staffing, retention and absence cover | 20% | Pay rates, dedicated team, induction, replacement times and 24-hour support. |
| Supervision and reporting | 20% | Supervisor visit frequency, patrol monitoring, sample reports and KPIs offered. |
| Account management and mobilisation | 10% | Named account manager, review meetings and a credible mobilisation or TUPE plan. |
| References and financial stability | 10% | Comparable client references and a healthy Companies House record. |
| Price and transparency | 20% | Total annual cost on a like-for-like basis, rate breakdown and clarity on extra charges. |
If two proposals end up close, the deciding factor should be the one you would least like to go wrong, which for most sites is the reliability of cover overnight and at weekends.
Warning Signs to Look Out For When Selecting a Security Contractor
Most problems with security contractors can be spotted before a contract is signed. Treat any of the following as a reason to ask harder questions, or to remove the company from your shortlist altogether.
- The company cannot give you an ACS reference, or it does not appear on the SIA register of Approved Contractors.
- The company name on the proposal is different from the approved company on the SIA register.
- It is reluctant to share officer licence numbers, screening procedures or insurance certificates.
- The hourly rate is far below other quotes, with no clear explanation of how pay, holiday, pensions and supervision are funded.
- It offers to pay officers cash in hand or treats them as self-employed when they work fixed shifts under the company's direction.
- It provides a quote without a site visit and without asking detailed questions about your risks.
- There is no 24-hour control room or duty manager, and no clear plan for covering absences.
- It cannot show you examples of patrol records, daily logs or incident reports.
- Its Companies House record shows overdue accounts, frequent director changes or a much shorter trading history than it claims.
- It will not provide client references, or the references it offers are vague or unrelated to your sector.
- The contract has long tie-in periods, unclear charges or no service levels you can hold it to.
Changing Security Provider: Mobilisation and TUPE
Many London businesses reading a guide like this already have a security contractor and are thinking about replacing it. Changing provider is straightforward when it is planned, but there are rules that catch out buyers who leave it to the last week.
Your Current Officers May Transfer
When a guarding contract moves from one contractor to another, the officers who mainly work on your site will often transfer to the new provider under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006, known as TUPE, keeping their existing pay and terms. The outgoing contractor must give the incoming one employee liability information at least 28 days before the transfer. This is often a good thing, because officers who already know your site keep working there. Ask each bidder how it will consult transferring staff, re-induct them under its own procedures and deal with any training or screening gaps it finds.
Ask for a Dated Mobilisation Plan
A good provider will give you a written plan with dates for the site survey, assignment instructions, officer inductions, uniforms and equipment, patrol system set-up and the first review meeting. Check your current contract's notice period before you go out to tender. A 30-day notice period gives a new provider very little time to mobilise properly.
Regulatory Changes London Buyers Should Plan for Before 2027
A security contract signed today will probably run into 2027 and beyond, so it is worth choosing a provider that is ready for the changes already on the way.
Martyn's Law
The Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025 received Royal Assent in April 2025, with an implementation period of at least two years before its duties can be enforced. Premises and events where 200 to 799 people may be present will need suitable public protection procedures, covering evacuation, invacuation, lockdown and communication. Sites expecting 800 or more will face enhanced duties that may include physical and operational security measures. The SIA will regulate the new regime. If your premises are in scope, ask bidders how their officers will be trained to support your procedures. This matters especially for venues and event security.
The SIA Security Buyer's Charter
The SIA's buyers' group is developing a Security Buyer's Charter, a set of good-practice principles for buying private security responsibly, expected to launch in spring 2027. Organisations that sign up will be expected to buy on quality and public safety outcomes, not price alone. The process in this guide follows the same thinking.
Review Older Specifications
If your security specification was written more than two years ago, it may refer to outdated training requirements, qualification names or wage rates. Update it before you go out to tender so that every bidder is pricing against the current rules.
How Prestige Secure Services Measures Up
Prestige Secure Services Ltd is a London-based SIA Approved Contractor, and we welcome clients who apply every check in this guide to us, including the scorecard. Our professional security guards protect offices, construction sites, retail premises, residential developments and corporate estates across London and the wider UK.
Independently Assessed Every Year
Our ACS status is verifiable on the SIA register, and our 2026 annual assessment achieved a higher score than the previous year with no improvement needs identified.
Licensed, Vetted and Supervised
Every officer holds a valid SIA licence and is screened to BS 7858 before deployment, with operations delivered in line with BS 7499 and supported by 24/7 management cover.
Site-Specific Plans and Transparent Pricing
We survey your site, agree assignment instructions with you and provide a clear, itemised quotation that shows what the hourly rate covers, with a dedicated account manager as your single point of contact. Contact our team to arrange a site survey.
