honesthans wrote:I was using the word 'everday' more as shorthand to mean important or essential skills that someone working in the field would have to know (as opposed to highly specialized skills) rather than in the literal sense as methods that a locksmith would use every or almost every working day. If I could rephrase my first question, what are the skills which FB doesn't teach which someone who wanted to work in the business would have to or really should know?
I had to think about this a little, it's not something I had considered in the past. Two days a week when my boss is off I cover the phones, so I'm going to try to answer your question based on the calls I answer and calls I run. Some of these may have been taught in the FB course but they are things you need to be proficient at.
Most common calls:
1. The most common call we get is the auto lockout, we get a few house and commercial unlocks but the majority are cars.
2. In the locksmithing end the majority of the calls are to make auto keys. Most of them are non-chip keys, but we do get calls for vats and transponder keys. In the future this trend will reverse.
3. The second most received locksmith calls are to do rekeys, commercial and residential.
Less common calls:
1. Trucks, big trucks like the 18 wheelers. The freightliner is the most common, but I have run calls on Volvo and Peterbuilt. You might want to learn how to unlock these.
2. Uhaul trucks, we open quite a few of these. There's the Fords and there are the GMC's.
3. Broken locks, most of the time these are commercial locks. The customer calls and says their key just spins in circles and the door wont unlock. You need to know how to open this door as it might be the only way in. Don't ask how as it can't be discussed in the public forums.
4. Removing the Club from the steering wheel because the key is lost.
This is the majority of the calls we get and I think this will answer what you are asking. If someone wants to add to this feel free as I'm sure I'm forgetting something.
I want to add that we mention that we do safe work in our phone book ad and seldom get calls for this. There will be many other odd request including repairing work done by other locksmiths.
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