Archi­ves

finan­cial aspects

Working as a 34a secu­ri­ty guard: What to do when the boss can­cels services?

Working as a 34a security guard: What to do when the boss cancels services?

In the pri­va­te secu­ri­ty sec­tor, shift work, night work and work on holi­days are com­mon working con­di­ti­ons. Secu­ri­ty guards often per­form chal­len­ging work to ensu­re the safe­ty of faci­li­ties, events and peo­p­le. Unfort­u­na­te­ly the Wages in this sec­tor often in the low-wage sec­tor for exam­p­le, in the sepa­ra­te secu­ri­ty ser­vice. If hours are unex­pec­ted­ly lost, e.g. becau­se the employ­er loses an important con­tract, and the month­ly tar­get working time is not rea­ched becau­se of this (or for other reasons), it can beco­me finan­ci­al­ly dicey as a 34a secu­ri­ty guard. This artic­le looks at the reasons that lead to the can­cel­la­ti­on of working days and shows the pos­si­bi­li­ties that one then has as a secu­ri­ty employee.

What are pos­si­ble reasons why my employ­er sche­du­les me on fewer assign­ment days?

First of all, the secu­ri­ty company’s point of view should also be brief­ly exami­ned at this point. The fact that you are on the duty ros­t­er less often has in most cases (hop­eful­ly) not­hing to do with you per­so­nal­ly, but has ope­ra­tio­nal reasons. If the­se are explai­ned trans­par­ent­ly by the employ­er and you can under­stand them, this offers a bet­ter start­ing point for a solu­ti­on to the pro­blem that can be sup­port­ed by both sides. It is pos­si­ble, howe­ver, that this will lead to a chan­ge of employ­ment or to you start­ing to look for a new job. Or may­be the “lean peri­od” is only short and you can com­pen­sa­te for the hours by working extra hours in the fol­lo­wing month or the employ­er accom­mo­da­tes you in some other way.

Here are ten pos­si­ble reasons why your employ­er might want to redu­ce your working hours:

  1. Lower cus­to­mer demand: The­re could be less demand for secu­ri­ty ser­vices, lea­ding to a reduc­tion in the num­ber of man-hours needed.
  2. Eco­no­mic slow­down: It is pos­si­ble that the eco­no­mic situa­ti­on has dete­rio­ra­ted, lea­ding to resour­ce cons­traints and cost savings.
  3. Chan­ges in the busi­ness stra­tegy: Your employ­er may have chan­ged its busi­ness stra­tegy, lea­ding to an adjus­t­ment of human resources.
  4. Staff rota­ti­on: Pos­si­bly rota­te staff to give all staff the oppor­tu­ni­ty to work and to dis­tri­bu­te working hours more equitably.
  5. New tech­no­lo­gies or auto­ma­ti­on: The Intro­duc­tion of new tech­no­lo­gies or auto­ma­ted sys­tems could lead to fewer employees being needed.
  6. Sea­so­nal fluc­tua­tions: Working hours could be sub­ject to sea­so­nal fluc­tua­tions, for exam­p­le if less secu­ri­ty staff is nee­ded in cer­tain months.
  7. Chan­ges in con­tracts with cli­ents: It is pos­si­ble that con­tracts with cli­ents have chan­ged and this leads to a reduc­tion in the volu­me of work.
  8. Legal rest­ric­tions: The­re could be (new) legal rest­ric­tions, such as maxi­mum limits for working hours or rest peri­ods bet­ween shifts. Or the exis­ting requi­re­ments (e.g. from the Working Hours Act) are now bet­ter fol­lo­wed up.
  9. Com­pa­ny holi­days or sea­so­nal com­pa­ny breaksYour employ­er may have deci­ded to redu­ce working hours during cer­tain peri­ods, such as com­pa­ny holi­days or sea­so­nal breaks (from cus­to­mers). Also, for exam­p­le, the Covid pan­de­mic had cau­sed tem­po­ra­ry dis­lo­ca­ti­on within the industry. 
  10. Inter­nal com­pa­ny res­truc­tu­ring: Your employ­er may car­ry out inter­nal res­truc­tu­ring lea­ding to a reas­sess­ment of working hours and resour­ce allocation.

What opti­ons do I have if my employ­er assigns me to less work?

Of cour­se, it is not worth arguing about one or two hours. Howe­ver, a loss of 20, 30, 40 per cent or even more hours is a big deal, becau­se you also have to make a living. If your boss remo­ves you from the duty ros­t­er, assigns you to signi­fi­cant­ly fewer shifts than usu­al and you don’t work your hours — then you have the fol­lo­wing options:

  1. Check employ­ment con­tract!
    That is the most important point. As a rule, what is decisi­ve is what has been agreed in your employ­ment con­tract. For exam­p­le, if it says “full-time”, the employ­er is obli­ged to employ you accor­din­gly. What is meant by full-time is usual­ly regu­la­ted in the respec­ti­ve coll­ec­ti­ve agree­ment. Often a spe­ci­fic num­ber of hours is also agreed. If, for exam­p­le, 170 hours per month are con­trac­tual­ly sti­pu­la­ted in your employ­ment con­tract, this num­ber of hours must be adhe­red to (apart from minor fluc­tua­tions, e.g. due to sick cover).
  2. Con­sult the duty ros­t­er!
    Duty sche­du­ling in secu­ri­ty ser­vices, e.g. in fac­to­ry secu­ri­ty, is often done on the basis of a fixed shift rhythm. In this way, it is pos­si­ble to plan rough­ly in advan­ce — of cour­se with a cer­tain degree of uncer­tain­ty (e.g. due to eter­nal out­stan­ding holi­day plan­ning). Howe­ver, the actu­al duty ros­t­er for the fol­lo­wing month is decisi­ve: If it sta­tes 20 shifts, for exam­p­le, then you are entit­led to work this num­ber of shifts. Once a duty ros­t­er has been published, it may only be chan­ged again after con­sul­ta­ti­on with the employees.
  3. Seek dia­lo­gue and actively offer work per­for­mance!
    Many things can be cla­ri­fied through com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on. Seek to talk to your super­vi­sor and reach a con­sen­sus. Important: Com­mu­ni­ca­te that you do not agree with the chan­ges and expli­cit­ly offer your work per­for­mance! Your employ­er is obli­ged to give you the work accor­ding to the exis­ting employ­ment con­tract, you pro­vi­de your work per­for­mance accor­ding to the contract. 
  4. Your employ­er does not react? Send a writ­ten remin­der!
    Inform your employ­er in wri­ting about the aspects men­tio­ned abo­ve. The writ­ten form is important so that you have pro­of. Set a dead­line for your boss, but con­ti­nue to be poli­te and coope­ra­ti­ve. After all, you usual­ly want to con­ti­nue working for your employer.
  5. If not­hing helps: com­plain!
    If all else fails, the employ­er does not react and talks (pos­si­bly also with the works coun­cil) have not led to suc­cess, the only opti­on is to take legal action befo­re the labour court.

Lawy­er Jörg Zitz­mann has beau­tiful­ly pre­sen­ted the facts of the case in the You­Tube chan­nel of the Aca­de­my for Secu­ri­ty:

How much money does one earn as an employee in the secu­ri­ty ser­vice with a cer­ti­fi­ca­te of competence?

How much money does one earn as an employee in the security service with a certificate of competence?

Tal­king around it is use­l­ess. One thing is clear: The tra­di­tio­nal secu­ri­ty indus­try is a low-wage sec­tor!
Nevert­hel­ess: the secu­ri­ty indus­try offers varie­ty, respon­si­ble, exci­ting and also quiet jobs. And if you’­re smart, you can make ends meet. But — what do you earn as a secu­ri­ty guard with a cer­ti­fi­ca­te of competence?

What mat­ters when it comes to ear­nings in the secu­ri­ty industry…

If you deci­de to work in the pri­va­te secu­ri­ty sec­tor or are loo­king for a new employ­er, the finan­cial aspects cer­tain­ly play a major role. The­re are seve­ral fac­tors that con­tri­bu­te to a good hour­ly wage. The most important aspects for a more attrac­ti­ve sala­ry are lis­ted below.

Level of edu­ca­ti­on and training

Obvious­ly, the bet­ter trai­ned you are, the hig­her your ear­ning poten­ti­al. As an unskil­led secu­ri­ty guard only with trai­ning accor­ding to § 34a GewO, you will very often not be paid much more than the mini­mum wage. With the expert know­ledge exami­na­ti­on, you can achie­ve a good bit more basic hour­ly wage with mana­geable effort.. You can go even fur­ther with fur­ther trai­ning to beco­me a cer­ti­fied pro­tec­tion and secu­ri­ty worker or with trai­ning to beco­me a spe­cia­list for pro­tec­tion and secu­ri­ty. Inci­den­tal­ly, the mini­mum wage nati­on­wi­de has been 12.43 euros per hour sin­ce 1 Janu­ary 2023. The increase to 13 euros per hour from 1 April 2023 has alre­a­dy been decided.

Addi­tio­nal qualifications

Addi­tio­nal qua­li­fi­ca­ti­ons, for exam­p­le in first aid or fire pro­tec­tion (e.g. as a fire pro­tec­tion assistant), are very hel­pful and increase the mar­ket value of secu­ri­ty staff. The­se do not always have a direct effect on the hour­ly wage, but they are always a plus point in job appli­ca­ti­ons. Addi­tio­nal qua­li­fi­ca­ti­ons include the following:

Inter­cul­tu­ral skills and know­ledge of for­eign lan­guages, espe­ci­al­ly at least basic Eng­lish, should also not be underestimated.

Acti­vi­ty

The secu­ri­ty indus­try has many facets and the­r­e­fo­re the acti­vi­ties that secu­ri­ty workers per­form are also very diver­se. Accor­din­gly, the­re are some­ti­mes serious wage dif­fe­ren­ces. Secu­ri­ty acti­vi­ties such as sepa­ra­te guards and simp­le guar­ding acti­vi­ties are often rather poor­ly paid. Jobs that requi­re spe­cial skills often pay well. For exam­p­le in the Avia­ti­on secu­ri­ty, in the ran­ge Cash and valu­ables trans­port, during the acti­vi­ty in nuclear faci­li­ties, in which Under­ground and sub­ur­ban rail­way guar­ding or as an NSL spe­cia­list in Emer­gen­cy call and ser­vice con­trol cen­tres the ear­nings are often signi­fi­cant­ly hig­her than the indus­try avera­ge. The exact amount of the wage for the job can be found in the Coll­ec­ti­ve agree­ments take from them. If they have been declared gene­ral­ly bin­ding, which is usual­ly the case, they app­ly to all employees. (It is best to add the fede­ral sta­te to the Goog­le search to nar­row down the results).

Working hours

Anyo­ne who is alre­a­dy acti­ve in the indus­try and works in shifts knows it: Often, bio­rhyth­ms and pri­va­te life suf­fer from the chan­ging working hours. Howe­ver, working night shifts, Sun­days and public holi­days often offers decisi­ve finan­cial advan­ta­ges. Depen­ding on the fede­ral state/collective agree­ment, the fol­lo­wing bene­fits can be ear­ned Night, Sun­day and public holi­day surchar­ges that are well worth see­ing. What’s more, the­se tax-free! On public holi­days in many places 100% Surchar­ge pos­si­blei.e. in addi­ti­on to the actu­al dai­ly wage, you recei­ve the same amount again — but tax-free! View­ed over the month, depen­ding of cour­se on the amount of night, Sun­day and public holi­day hours, the fol­lo­wing can be achie­ved Seve­ral hundred euros on top earn. Espe­ci­al­ly around the turn of the year or at Eas­ter, this can be a lucra­ti­ve affair.

Overtime/overtime

Over­ti­me is, of cour­se, a par­ti­al aspect of working hours. Nevert­hel­ess, I would like to devo­te a sepa­ra­te point to this aspect here. Why? Becau­se expe­ri­ence shows that a lot of over­ti­me is work­ed in the secu­ri­ty sec­tor, often much more than is legal­ly per­mis­si­ble and with too few breaks bet­ween assign­ments. Think careful­ly about whe­ther you want to go along with this and should actual­ly work 200, 220, 240 or even more hours per month. My tip at this point would be to invest in fur­ther edu­ca­ti­on and not to trade so much time for money: Memen­to Mori — your life­time is also limi­t­ed. Set prio­ri­ties and make a good decis­i­on for you, also for your future.

Sta­te

As in other indus­tries, the­re is a West-East divi­de in the pri­va­te secu­ri­ty sec­tor. In the past, the­se wage dif­fe­ren­ces were real­ly gla­ring. Secu­ri­ty workers in Ber­lin ear­ned in some are­as not even half of tho­se who work­ed in Bava­ria.  As a rule, the best-paid fede­ral sta­tes include Bava­ria, Baden-Würt­tem­berg and North Rhi­ne-West­pha­lia. Among the lowest paid are still the new fede­ral sta­tes, for exam­p­le Bran­den­burg or Meck­len­burg-Wes­tern Pome­ra­nia. Just a few years ago, one could bare­ly keep one’s head abo­ve water with a job as a secu­ri­ty guard in the East Ger­man sta­tes. Howe­ver, the mini­mum wage and the gra­du­al con­ver­gence of coll­ec­ti­ve agree­ments are incre­asing­ly put­ting the dif­fe­ren­ces into per­spec­ti­ve. In addi­ti­on, one should not for­get that whe­re peo­p­le earn more, they usual­ly earn less. Cost of living (espe­ci­al­ly rents) are hig­her. So think careful­ly — if you are toy­ing with the idea — whe­ther a move is real­ly worth it for you.

Indus­try

Many peo­p­le think of secu­ri­ty ser­vice jobs in the clas­sic way, as the secu­ri­ty com­pa­ny that as a ser­vice pro­vi­der exter­nal cus­to­mers. Whe­re­as in the past, vete­ran employees in fac­to­ries came to the plant secu­ri­ty ser­vice towards the end of their working lives to spend the last years of their care­ers doing less stre­nuous work, the situa­ti­on has chan­ged con­sider­a­b­ly nowa­days. Pro­fes­sio­nal, exter­nal secu­ri­ty ser­vice pro­vi­ders look after a lar­ge num­ber of com­pa­nies from busi­ness and indus­try or the public sec­tor as cli­ents. But they still exist, despi­te the deca­des-long trend towards out­sour­cing. The Inter­nal plant secu­ri­ty. Espe­ci­al­ly in indus­try, pro­per­ty and plant pro­tec­tion acti­vi­ties are when you are direct­ly employ­ed by the manu­fac­tu­ring com­pa­ny, very well paid. Der Grund hier­für ist, dass Sie nach dem Bran­chen­ta­rif bezahlt wer­den, dem die Mas­se der Beleg­schaft ange­hört. Wer­fen Sie einen Blick in die Rate tables for the metal and elec­tri­cal indus­try! The­se month­ly sala­ries are in a dif­fe­rent league.

Allo­wan­ces

Allo­wan­ces regu­la­ted by coll­ec­ti­ve agree­ment are usual­ly paid for guard/shift lea­ders, for dog hand­lers or in cer­tain faci­li­ties such as mili­ta­ry pro­per­ties. Like­wi­se, the­re are often allo­wan­ces for on-call duties, e.g. for (addi­tio­nal) work in the plant fire bri­ga­de. The­se ran­ge from a few cents per hour up to over 10% more pay. In Bava­ria, the­re is also slight­ly more money if you work in the grea­ter Munich area.
Secu­ri­ty com­pa­nies or their cli­ents also some­ti­mes pay Vol­un­t­a­ry (revo­ca­ble) allo­wan­ces. Manch­mal gibt es auch Ein­mal-Prä­mi­en für beson­ders erfolg­rei­che Ein­sät­ze oder für her­aus­ra­gen­de Arbeits­leis­tun­gen. Lei­der sind die­se Art Zula­gen aber eher die Aus­nah­me. Immer häu­fi­ger vor­zu­fin­den ist aber eine Wech­sel­prä­mie, also so eine Art „Begrü­ßungs­geld“. Das allein soll­te aber aber nicht unbe­dingt der allei­ni­ge Grund für einen Arbeit­ge­ber­wech­sel sein.

Con­cre­te numbers

You would like to know con­cre­te figures?
If you have read the artic­le up to this point, you will rea­li­se that this is dif­fi­cult, as it can depend on a num­ber of fac­tors such as the fede­ral sta­te, the job, the working hours and their (addi­tio­nal) qua­li­fi­ca­ti­ons. Nevert­hel­ess, a con­cre­te example:

This results in approx. 2520 euros of taxa­ble inco­me (gross) and just under 420 euros of tax-free supplements.With inco­me tax class 1 and no child­ren, a sin­gle per­son thus recei­ves approx. 2170 Euro net trans­fer­red. Howe­ver, this cal­cu­la­ti­on is for illus­tra­ti­ve pur­po­ses only. Your actu­al sala­ry paid out may depend on num­e­rous factors!

Hint: This artic­le was last updated in Febru­ary 2023. As the­re are regu­lar adjus­t­ments to both the mini­mum wage and coll­ec­ti­ve agree­ment regu­la­ti­ons, the frame­work con­di­ti­ons may have chan­ged in the mean­ti­me! (All infor­ma­ti­on wit­hout guarantee.)

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