Northwest Protective Services

[Swifty]

Hello to all,

I am in the process of applying to Northwest Protective service based out of Seattle, WA and want to know if the "new" company is better than the old one. NWPS was known to be the place that would hire anyone off the street before but with my limited contact with them lately it would seem they may have cleaned up a bit. Any current or past employees here that can set the record straight? Thanks in advance.
Swifty

[Charlie Fox]

Nope...same place. Just your basic guard company.:(

[Swifty]

Nope...same place. Just your basic guard company.:(

What do you know about them? There is no such thing as a "basic guard company". Every company is very specific as far as their quirks, training, level of professionalism and how they treat their staff. I have worked for both sides of the spectrum and been with some very good and very bad guard companies. In my experience the only people who can say how the internal workings of a particular company are are the people who do/did work there or who deal with them on a day to day basis. Does anyone have any insight as far as that goes or is "nope":confused: the most intelligent thing going on here? :cool:

[mjw064]

Hello to all,

I am in the process of applying to Northwest Protective service based out of Seattle, WA and want to know if the "new" company is better than the old one. NWPS was known to be the place that would hire anyone off the street before but with my limited contact with them lately it would seem they may have cleaned up a bit. Any current or past employees here that can set the record straight? Thanks in advance.
Swifty


Nope, just your standard security guard company.

[Charlie Fox]

What do you know about them? There is no such thing as a "basic guard company". Every company is very specific as far as their quirks, training, level of professionalism and how they treat their staff. I have worked for both sides of the spectrum and been with some very good and very bad guard companies. In my experience the only people who can say how the internal workings of a particular company are are the people who do/did work there or who deal with them on a day to day basis. Does anyone have any insight as far as that goes or is "nope":confused: the most intelligent thing going on here? :cool:

OK let's see...NWPS is probably the oldest local security company in WA, but they didn't get that way by being the best. Their hiring practices are of the "warm body" style, training is the bare minimum to meet the requirements, supervision is shaky at best, management is NOT concerned with us "line animals" because they can always find more. Pay can be OK, 11-13/hour but no benefits (other than what WA state offers as Basic Health). Chance of promotion? Pretty fair as they have a temendous turnover rate. If you stick it out you may get a chance to become an account supervisor within a year (yep, they churn through them too).

All-in-all just your basic contrct security company. Specific enough for you?:rolleyes:

[Swifty]

Substantially more informative. Thank you very much. Basically long story short, I have a postion currently doing more customer service than security. I enjoy the position and love the majority of the people, including the boss, there but with the economy and the commute the pay is killing me. I would like to get back into more high speed low drag security again preferably patrol but am having a hard time finding a good company to get into. I have patrol experience, armed experience, LP/investigations experience and supervisory and site management experience so I feel I would be an asset to any organization. Does anyone know of any good companies in the Seattle/tacoma area that do armed site or patrol work? Any info would be greatly appreciated.

[Lawson]

Unfortunately, there isn't a whole lot of "high-speed low drag" security in Western Washington.

[Sgt.Campbell]

Swifty, your best bet is going to be to find a reputable company that offers LP. Contract security companies are for s***. Don't be suckered in by these folks. No contract firm cares much for the people at the bottom as long as the head honchos keep reaping the money from their contracts.

That's my advice.

Further, you might want to check out Rite-Aid ($13/hr to start as LP here in Cali; don't know 'bout WA), as they have a decent benefit package, and other retail outlets. They tend to treat their employees better and offer far and away the best chance of upward mobility, as loss prevention is it's own industry within the industry.

[Lawson]

i think swifty is just looking for some side-work.

[SpecialAgentKC]

Swifty: I'm not sure what you consider "high speed/low drag" insofar as security goes, but, you may want to consider in-house at a school district. I work an armed off-duty gig w/ a local district. It's not bad.

Here's an example of a present opening, most busy districts pay $20.00/hr.+:

Position: Campus Security Office - Job # 10-08-PT

External Job Posting


Salary: $20.00 - $26.00**

Location: TBD

Posting Date: May 29, 2008

Closing Date: Until Filled

Summary

9 Months per year / 8 Hours per day (M-F) / 7:30 am - 4:00 pm

POSITION SUMMARY:
This position provides security and safety services for students, staff, schools and other District properties. The Security Officer can either be assigned to a campus or to patrol. Security Officers are generally assigned to either a middle school campus or to patrol District owned properties with an emphasis on elementary schools. The security officer's primary focus is to respond to security....

Good luck! --K.

[SecTrainer]

Swifty, your best bet is going to be to find a reputable company that offers LP. Contract security companies are for s***. Don't be suckered in by these folks. No contract firm cares much for the people at the bottom as long as the head honchos keep reaping the money from their contracts.

That's my advice.

Seems like strange advice, though, considering that you work for a contract service? In your forum intro you seemed to suggest that the company you work for is "different" (better) than most, so why can't there be others that are also better?

[SpecialAgentKC]

Another Seattle area offering for good pay:

Security Shift Supervisor $28.85/hr + benefits Security Shift Supervisor needed for Seattle area. Pre ferred candidates: 5 years security management/law enforcement experience including control room opera tion. Inter-Con Security Systems 451 SW 10th St, #220 Renton, WA 98057 fax: 425-227-8914 email: dfitzgerald@icsecurity.com

Inter-Con seemingly has some governmental contracts.... --K.

[Investigation]

That would be at the Federal Way School District:

http://www.fwps.org/dept/hr/posts/classified/


Swifty: I'm not sure what you consider "high speed/low drag" insofar as security goes, but, you may want to consider in-house at a school district. I work an armed off-duty gig w/ a local district. It's not bad.

Here's an example of a present opening, most busy districts pay $20.00/hr.+:

Position: Campus Security Office - Job # 10-08-PT

External Job Posting


Salary: $20.00 - $26.00**

Location: TBD

Posting Date: May 29, 2008

Closing Date: Until Filled

Summary

9 Months per year / 8 Hours per day (M-F) / 7:30 am - 4:00 pm

POSITION SUMMARY:
This position provides security and safety services for students, staff, schools and other District properties. The Security Officer can either be assigned to a campus or to patrol. Security Officers are generally assigned to either a middle school campus or to patrol District owned properties with an emphasis on elementary schools. The security officer's primary focus is to respond to security....

Good luck! --K.

[Lawson]

One of my old patrol routes was in Federal Way, I saw a crown vic roll out of Decatur High School one night, it looked real slick. The only thing that turns me off of that job is that its 8months a year. :(

[CorpSec]

One of my old patrol routes was in Federal Way, I saw a crown vic roll out of Decatur High School one night, it looked real slick. The only thing that turns me off of that job is that its 8months a year. :(

You were working for $10 an hour weren't you? At your old job you would have had to work a year to make what this job pays in six months at $20 an hour. Considering that it is a nine month position, you would make considerably more money than you had been making AND have 3 months off a year.

[Swifty]

You were working for $10 an hour weren't you? At your old job you would have had to work a year to make what this job pays in six months at $20 an hour. Considering that it is a nine month position, you would make considerably more money than you had been making AND have 3 months off a year.

In addition if it is like Kent school district they pay you all 12 months but you get paid the equivalant of 9 months at $20+ an hour. So basically you are paid $15 an hour plus 3 months vacation time every year. Plus this gives you 3 months out of the year to go do some side patrol gig and double your paycheck for a few months. The per year salary is over $31K which isn't spectacular but counting in the benefits and the fact that it is less than 4 miles from my house, sign me up.

[SpecialAgentKC]

Typically, you have a choice of whether you want the payments spread out at a school district gig. Plus, you can opt to work summer session, special events and O/T. Or, you can work as a sub (part-timer), as I do, as a supplemental deal.... --K.

[Lawson]

You were working for $10 an hour weren't you? At your old job you would have had to work a year to make what this job pays in six months at $20 an hour. Considering that it is a nine month position, you would make considerably more money than you had been making AND have 3 months off a year.

Yeah, but I also wasn't paying the bills. Im just concerned about 4 months off, its a little eh... I guess it's just new to me and a little troublesome.

Does anyone know if these guys are armed or not?

[SpecialAgentKC]

Lawson: FWPS is not armed, if that's where the query was directed. They may carry some limited defensive equipment, I'm not sure. --K.