How have face masks impacted the security industry?

With face masks becoming a mandatory requirement for our everyday lives, whether it be visiting the shops, getting on public transportation or even popping into your local takeaway, we’ve decided to take a look at how face masks have impacted the security industry as a whole. 

ID Please

Ask any security professional or retail worker what their bane of their life is and its ID’ing customers. Even long before masks were introduced, those who are required to ID customers hate it. The classic responses of ‘eeeeh can I tell my husband that’, ‘What are you ID’ing me for, im 35’ ‘this is so offensive’ and so on is really annoying and the unreasonable conflict for asking someone to see their identification is always unnecessary. We are just doing our jobs! 

But now, with masks being a requirement due to Covid 19, security professionals need to ID people now more than ever. With policies such as ‘Challenge 25’, there’s no way door supervisors or security guards can get an accurate interpretation of someone just from their eyes and forehead? Also with numerous videos going viral of teenagers dressing up as the elderly with a face mask on, security professionals need to be more on the ball now than never. 

See what some kids in America did: 

See how easy that was? There’s no limits to what people will try and get away with in order to purchase alcohol or enter nightclubs etc so if you work in the security industry, be aware! 

Long Shifts

With long shifts, often even night shifts too, wearing a mask for long periods of time can be incredibly uncomfortable and agitating. It’s an absolute credit to our front line workers in the NHS who wear full PPE for hours on end and for that we will always be grateful. And for now, it looks like nearly all security professionals and other professionals working in the likes of supermarkets are going to have to continue wearing facemasks for the foreseeable future. Therefore for now, we need to keep doing our duty and continue to follow the guidelines and wear masks. 

If you struggle with the tightness of your mask or you feel like after a while it’s really uncomfortable to wear a mask around your ears, watch this short video which will change everything! 

Get Licensed Heros

Here are some stories from some Get Licensed Heroes who have been working on the front line to help keep our communities safe: 

Paul Eite

Paul has been working in the private security industry for many years now and was running the doors of a nightclub before clubs were forced to close. Since then he now runs a team in Tesco managing crowd control 8am until 8pm daily. 

Since working for a Tesco store in Portsmouth, Paul stated that he’s seen a lot of people struggling with the Covid rules and has even been threatened with weapons on multiple occasions. Saying shoppers acted like they were “high on cocaine” and his team had a leg of lamb and a mountain bike thrown at them, while he was slashed with scissors.”

No one, no matter where they work, should have to face this kind of behaviour and we want to say a massive thank you to Paul and his team for continuing to protect our community! 

Robert Hobson

It is true professionals like Robert Hobson who makes the security Industry proud! 

Robert Hobson recently completed the Door Supervisor course with Get Licensed and looking to work in either retail security or within security on a holiday park!  He shared with us his heroic experience: 

“I once lent across a hole in a second floor room which went all the way down to the basement to unhook a young lad from a nail who had fallen from the lift. It was definitely a change of underwear experience!”

Robert is still in contact with the lad he saved and he is now a very successful businessman! I still see the lad in question he is a friend of my brother and he now runs a successful local motor business

Well done Robert! You truly went above and beyond your role!

Let’s continue to Do The Right Thing and all work together to keep everyone safe! Hopefully in the near future masks will be a thing of the past and we can go about our everyday lives as normal!