They are everywhere.

Whenever an alarm pings off, a private security company is quickly deployed and a new face arrives to keep you safe.

The private security sector is booming because of this because, well, South Africa’s crime stats don’t seem to be dropping.

There are over 1,87 million registered security officers in South Africa – 490 000 of whom are classified as active, details a report released by the Private Security Industry Regulatory Authority (Psira):

Meanwhile, the South African police force has around 153 000 sworn in police officers, while the South African army has only 89 000 active personnel – about half as many people as the private security force.

Now, with the announcement by the Department of Labour concerning the new minimum wages for the private security sector, Business Tech took a look at just what that means:

From 1 September 2017, this massive workforce will see their salaries increase by an average of 6.4%, based on the latest sectoral determination for 2017/18.

Private officers are paid according to the roles and responsibilities they have.

How it works – security guards are “graded between A and E based on the type of duty they perform”.

Take a look:

Then, their rate of pay differs depending where in South Africa they are:

Which equals a monthly revised pay is as follows:

Yeah, not that much. I would hate to know what they were getting before the increase.

Then, on the other less formal side of things are security guards. To make it official takes a little more than signing up with a local company.

First, you need to register:

Car guards are subject to a “bay fee” – the daily cost a car guard must pay to agencies or managers of shopping malls to secure a certain space to guard at the specified location.

A Psira circular on 2017/18 admin fees showed that individual car guards need to pay R184.00 a year to be recognised and registered by the authority. The group’s 2016 annual report listed 1,502 registered ‘car watch’ companies in the country.

And we all know there are a whole lot more than that.

When it comes to the total amount of coins in their pocket, this is what we know:

In a survey of 144 car guards in the Pretoria region in 2015, this was fairly reflective of what car guards earn, with 37% indicating they earned between R51 and R100 a day, and 34% earning between R101 and R150 a day.

In 2009, the Basic Conditions of Employment Act was amended to include car guards under the Sectoral Determination for private security.

According to the amended act, car guards fall within the category ’employees not elsewhere specified’, which means registered car guards earn between R2,933 and R3,534 a month, depending on the area they work in.

Informal car guards are not covered by the regulations, and thus earn anywhere between R50 and R100 a day, while still be subject to the bay fee.

Of course, as Business Tech points out, the industry “is largely unregulated”, and “has been accused of being exploitative to those who work as guards”.

A few years back, VICE took a look at South Africa’s private security sector and if you haven’t seen it, do yourself a favour:

[source:businesstech&businesstech]