The Best and the Worst

[combatcoastie]

There are many stories on the forum about the worst posts and the bests posts that we've worked at over the years. Whether it's been done before or not, let's do it again...


Regail us with your tales of the best and the worst posts you've ever worked.


For me, the worst was a completely abandoned enormous warehouse. The place spanned about 2 city blocks. There were no amenities whatsoever- no power, no heat, no running water, and a LOT of scrap copper just laying around for the crooks. There were holes in the fences and the entire place was just completely overrun by rodents and homeless. I worked that account for about 6 months before the place was eventually sold and demolished.

The best was an apartment complex in downtown. It was an old highschool that they turned into apartments of various levels of luxury/non-luxury. The basement units were almost all section 8 while the west side of the building was all pent-houses and lofts running close to $2,000 a month (which is huge for the area.) Security was a 24 hour operation. Each officer would work a 48 hour shift, and then have 3 days off before working another 48 hour shift. We were heavily armed and we had our own apartment. So we would move in for two days, make ourselves present during daylight hours and then around 10pm, we'd head back to our apartment and take turns sleeping/patrolling. The apartment was one of the nicer apartments and they had furnished it for us- two bedrooms two bathrooms, all the appliances and a flat-screen with cable. We also had a nice little balcony. The area was gang-central so we definitelty worked our butts off, but it was a pretty awesome gig. As with most things, the property management company sold the building to another company who terminated our contract and brought in unarmed Securitas officers to just work 10pm to 6am. After numerous assaults on security and a huge increase in crime, the property management company eventually brought in off-duty police and wound up paying twice as much as they had paid for our services (and we were making 16-18 bucks an hour.)

Your turn!

[SecureTN]

Hmm. Worst was probably the 13 hour shifts sitting in my jeep on a construction site watching a gate for $8.00 an hour.

Prison supervisor or a $9.25 do whatever factory may have been best... not sure

[Jaeger]

I can say with fair certainty that what I've gone through so far is nothing compared to the "worst" many of you have told about in these forums on a regular basis. Some of the stories about construction sites, squats and sites missing basic infrastructure makes my skin crawl, but in addition it also tells me that I shouldn't complain about very much since at least I get to work indoors and a filthy bathroom or a shoddy "back room" of a market in an occassional retail shift or so is nothing compared to the stuff many other colleagues face on a regular basis.

But, I suppose I could tell you about a few of the "worst" postings I've had, but they are naturally nothing compared to the stuff many of you face all the time.

I once did this eight hour gig, which required me to stand next to the certain "object" which I was guarding while it was on public view. There was another officer at the same site, but he was required to sit in the monitoring room and not to assist me since he had his own duties. I was ordered or rather required to stand next to the object for eight hours, and even taking bathroom breaks was an impossibility. I was issued with a TETRA-linked radio and one of those really high speed-looking earphones with a cord going under my shirt and all.

Anyway, standing there for eight hours was an absolute hell to endure. You had very little space to move and when you became hungry, you just had to go behind this large pylon and eat muesli bars or something to get energy.

And I suppose I could call doing retail shifts "worst" too, since I know many colleagues from the various fancy receptions and the like who would never go to do retail security under any circumstances. Not me though, but when I first arrived to this market at the bad part of town and almost instantly encountered a group of four drunken drug-addicts wanting to buy beer and then not being sold any due to intoxication (or something) kinda flew me instantly into a different world.

As for the proverbial "best" job postings, I would have to say a certain reception that I've been a regular in ever since I started this job. The people there are not too bad, the breaks for us officers there are generous and you can drink free coffee of various sorts there as much as you like. The site is a good place to go and sit around for a few shifts once in a while.

Generally speaking though, I would have to say that I haven't even gone to the point of tasting anything remotely outstanding in terms of job perks or "worst sites" for that matter. All in all I've had it pretty civil compared to many others, but there are naturally always sites with even better or worse conditions in them than the ones I float around at.

[PolarDeer]

Worst? A rundown suburban shopping mall slated for part-demolition, part-renovation by a new owner. A 24h-manned site with both under-construction parts and those open for business manned by a single guard in a somewhat worse-off area with the city and having to cope with both the local youth and the substance users as well as the burglars trying to sneak in overnight trying to steal tools from the construction crew. Due to the under-construction parts being improperly fenced in and often not even having doors installed yet, it was a literal security nightmare.

At one point the CCTV system went down when an electrician accidentally destroyed its cabling and no one bothered to repair them because all the camera locations were going to be torn down anyhow. The nightshifts were 16 hours and after 23 or something with the last store closing there was practically nothing to do save for deterring the hobos and graffiti makers away from the location and possibly watching some drunk people coming from the downtown in the weekend. There were proper toilets and break rooms around, though. I did that for two months before our company's contract for the account ran out and another company took over.

Best, I dunno? I couldn't name a single best spot but given my apparent status of a ghetto market specialist I enjoy whenever I get to do shifts at the bigger department stores. You have good and extensive CCTV systems, you don't work alone, a bigger location naturally has more stuff to do in different categories than your average grocery store and usually the management expects you to concentrate solely on the security- related tasks and all. I'm keeping my hopes up on the company winning bidding for some of the mall accounts possibly changing security companies in 2013.

And I suppose I could call doing retail shifts "worst" too, since I know many colleagues from the various fancy receptions and the like who would never go to do retail security under any circumstances.

I've worked industrial sites that are somewhat comparable to reception stuff at least in the "fanciness" and know people who think that too, though then again I know a lot of retail/crowd control/patrol officers who'd never work industrial or reception sites. It's down to opinion I suppose.

[Squid]

Can't really say, as the best and worst tend to have best and worst parts mixed up.

"best" could be sitting in deserted building lobby with McD's across corner providing free wifi, and I even got 'extra' from McD employees after while because I gave them my cell # "just in case"....actually got a call on night just as "stand by" like if they didn't call back in like 2 minutes then (maybe) they were getting robbed or something. But it sure was boring otherwise, and my office was retarded about keys....we had to wait for couple hours for patrol to drop off keys and they would always loss them, so I might be in car for 4 hours.


Another "best" was parking lot of fancy private club....real, real nice setting in country, but boring even with walkman, and I was supposed to be walking ALL the time(but no one ever around), so I'd slowly cruise on bike 1/2 time, and stalk game the other 1/2.

Working at port was "interesting" because I saw what a joke "Homeland Security" was, but cool big ships coming in and out and being spun by tugs, etc. Mostly though it was sitting outside on crap desk with a clip board huffing diesel and asbestos with huge trucks 3' from my desk, with about 3 diff people who thought they were my boss.


"Fire watch" outside little industrial park. They actually had a little portable fire alarm so my ONLY job was sitting in my car waiting for it to ring, or if I wanted walk around.

But overall I'd say a low class condo/apts mostly handing out guest passes and writing tickets and foot patrol. Just a no win cause it was during housing crunch and everyone was broke and pissed and look for scapegoat and we were it. But about 20% were really nice folks you could talk to and pass the time with.


Always seems to be mixed bag.

[Jaeger]

I also once did a gig where I was sitting in a hallway for eight hours and acted like a glorified doorman taking the coats and outer garments of visitors coming to take part in a conference of some sort. I had a radio for communication with another officer in the same building, but my tasks there were merely to open the door, take the coat and greet the folks coming in. I was also supposed to make sure that no hobos or other fiddlers tried to come through the entrance that the esteemed guests used.

The good part about this gig was probably the food. The catering served several large buffet-style meals there, and naturally whenever the conference continued I went in and ate as much as I could. The staff there were also very kind and friendly people, so working that gig was really made easy that time.

[Pop pop]

There are many stories on the forum about the worst posts and the bests posts that we've worked at over the years. Whether it's been done before or not, let's do it again...


Regale us with your tales of the best and the worst posts you've ever worked.


For me, the worst was a completely abandoned enormous warehouse. The place spanned about 2 city blocks. There were no amenities whatsoever- no power, no heat, no running water, and a LOT of scrap copper just laying around for the crooks. There were holes in the fences and the entire place was just completely overrun by rodents and homeless. I worked that account for about 6 months before the place was eventually sold and demolished.

The best was an apartment complex in downtown. It was an old high school that they turned into apartments of various levels of luxury/non-luxury. The basement units were almost all section 8 while the west side of the building was all pent-houses and lofts running close to $2,000 a month (which is huge for the area.) Security was a 24 hour operation. Each officer would work a 48 hour shift, and then have 3 days off before working another 48 hour shift. We were heavily armed and we had our own apartment. So we would move in for two days, make ourselves present during daylight hours and then around 10pm, we'd head back to our apartment and take turns sleeping/patrolling. The apartment was one of the nicer apartments and they had furnished it for us- two bedrooms two bathrooms, all the appliances and a flat-screen with cable. We also had a nice little balcony. The area was gang-central so we definitely worked our butts off, but it was a pretty awesome gig. As with most things, the property management company sold the building to another company who terminated our contract and brought in unarmed Security officers to just work 10pm to 6am. After numerous assaults on security and a huge increase in crime, the property management company eventually brought in off-duty police and wound up paying twice as much as they had paid for our services (and we were making 16-18 bucks an hour.)

Your turn!

kinda sounds like Iraq, the only thing missing is a set of .50's on the roof top, an 82ND Airborne check point, and the Green Berets and Delta behind the huge Green Halliburton walls, so secretive, the Army public affairs Chief was never allowed inside. lol.