Business Questions? Ask a Locksmith.

[Varjeal]

I'm starting a new thread dedicated to answer and discussing questions about the business of locksmithing/emergency lock-outs, etc. Tools, advertising, paperwork, all that good stuff is open for discussion. Since this is a lockpicking site, please save your specific questions about lockpicks for other, more appropriate forums on this site. Thanks.

[Luke]

I got a couple.
Before opening a door, what sort of I.D do you make the people show you before you pop the door open and what sort of paper work is involved.

and

Name the all the tools a locksmith needs to run his busness successfully.

oh yeah - are you saving up for a van?

[plot]

What would you need for a lockout only bussiness? (besides a van... ie: would you need a keymachine? blanks, etc... what's involved in this? i'm sure you can't just show up and pick the lock everytime... people probably want a key made if they are gonna dish out 50$ or whatever)

And how much capitol do you think one would need to start such a bussiness?

(I'm aware that a lockie probably can't make a living off of ONLY lockouts, but part time type of stuff...)

[Varjeal]

Luke: Most of the time, to be honest, I don't ask. If I suspect anything in any way though, I ask for a valid driver's license (which should have that address+a picture of them) That's probably the best source of I.D.

There's other, more subtle things that can be done as well. Assuming the keys are locked inside, I've asked where exactly they are, or other general questions about the interior of the house, pictures on the wall, etc.

2. All the tools???? hehehe...o.k...I'll try that in another post and perhaps sticky it for the forum, alright? Cool..

3. Yes, I am constantly watching out for a good van for sale.

[Varjeal]

Plot: For a lockout only business, a van really isn't necessary, but would be preferrable.

Depending on how complete of a lockout business you want to run and what services you want to provide, here are some things you MAY want to have.

A good quality key machine, an assortment of residential and automotive blanks, a good key catalog, key rings, magnets, novelty items like that are often good "impulse" sales items, a good set of lockout tools and manuals, invoice books, business cards, waiver forms, basic set of hand tools, perhaps some extra locksets, including some automotive ignitions perhaps, several "oops" kits (these kits have many such parts as linkage clips, lock clips, etc,) for those occasional goof ups, etc.

And of course, advertising.

As far as necessary capital, depending on how much you want to get into it, you could probably start with $2000 and then of course go as high as you want.

The amount you spend really depends on the area your servicing and the specific types of services you want to provide. If you're just doing a basic lockout/keycutting service, probably between that $2000-$3000 by the time you select your equipment and inventory.

A note on prices, btw...Lockout service is ALWAYS a set fee. Key-cutting/programming is extra in ALL cases.
When you get into the business side of lock-outs or locksmithing itself, you will quickly realize that the service call does not provide you with as much "profit" as some people think. You have costs such as fuel, maintenance, advertising expense, wear and tear, tools & equipment to pay for out of that fee. Don't sell yourself short.

[Luke]

Heheh, a good one about this lockout thing on TNL was mentioned "What is the first thing I will see when i open the door, exact details?"
Varjeal go on TNL and there is a really funny post about a smith who is a great guy but was on a lockout opened the door and a T.V camera was in his face saying. "you are on T.V, you did not ask enough information to let somone into the house, you did not break any laws!"

Also a question about invoices, how to you lay yours out?

[Varjeal]

re: invoices...

I have two different types, one for "on the spot" type service and the other is one for commercial clients that I would mail out. The "on-site" invoices have my company information in the top left corner including GST/Business number. The top right is the invoice number in red letters.

Underneath that is a space for the customer's information including name, address, phone number, etc.

Then, it's a simple quantity, description, cost chart, followed by a total, place for tax, and grand total.

At the bottom is a signature line for the customer and a brief legal thing that says the customer authorizes the parts/service listed above, and will pay upon receipt of the invoice.

If I need a waiver signed, that's a seperate slip.

Regarding that TNL thing, that's been done a few times by different networks. The thing that bothers me most is not so much that the locksmith supposedly didn't ask enough questions, but that now that particular locksmith, and probably many others, are going to be harrassed more often when a legitimate customer is asked to provide i.d. when they need to quickly gain access to their own property. Unfortunately the t.v. people never take that kind of thing into consideration. Just my 2 cents...

[mightymouse]

Some more questions from the perspective of a lockout business. Firstly I'd like to ask a little about money:

Varjeal, can you give us an accurate breakdown of how much cash you'd expect to get from each callout? I mean, I'd expect that it varies depending on the particulars of each job, what time of day you do it, and what stuff you sell to the customer in terms of new locks etc in addition to your basic callout fee.

Now, how much would your fixed lockout fee that you mentioned be? Do you charge more in the evenings, and if so how much?

How many callouts would you normally have in a day, and what would be the average in a week? (Please include a description of the day's/hours you normally work).

Out of the expenses you mentioned (fuel, tools, advertising etc), how much would you expect to spend each week on each? Can you give us average figures for total revenue & net profit?

I'd also be interested to know whether you are usually run off your feet or have to waste lots of time waiting around for calls to come in. How large an area do you accept jobs in? Could you give us rough figures for the percentages of certain types of jobs? - How many cars versus houses versus businesses jobs? How many people just lost their keys compared to those whose locks etc are faulty? What percentage of jobs do you walk away from because they are related to domestic family fights or drunks who want to take a drive? I know its often quicker (& thus profitable) to use brute force and sell the customer a new lock afterwards, but in roughly what percentage of jobs would you make use of your pick-fu? And how often do you get to mess with locks that are non-standard (high security or an unusual brand etc) compared to the stuff people normally have on their front door?

I apologise if the money questions are a bit personal. If you dont feel comfortable with them, then just shoot me or something. Basically I would like a picture of the day to day life of a someone running a lockout business and what they can expect to take home at the end of the day.

Oh, also, does anyone run a lockout business in the UK? It would likely be interesting to many of us if a willing UK lockie could create a new thread parallel to this one and answer all the questions here in terms of what it would be like in Britain.

Many thanks in advance :)

[Varjeal]

Good questions all, most of which are rather sensitive, but that's o.k., since I have a friend who also runs a locksmith business, I can give you HIS stats. Most of the time if you ask a locksmith or anyone else in business they will say, "never enough" or something equally sarcastic and unhelpful, but I'll do the best I can cause I know this friends business fairly well.

1. Call-out fee. The basic "service call" fee varies depending on the size of the city/town/area you live in. That said, the average call-out fee is approximately $30-$50 during "normal" business hours. (8-5). Most business' (with the exception of my own and a few others, which is why I don't use my own business for an example) charge extra for after hours and holidays, generally 1/2 again as much, so $45-$75. I do, however, charge extra for after midnight and until 6 a.m. at the previously mentioned rate.
This is a standard practice and acceptable within the industry.

2. Most call-outs during the summer/fall fall into the after hours category due to parties, late shopping, etc. In the winter, lock-out calls can come anytime due to vehicles locked with keys in, frozen locks, etc.

3. Generally speaking, lock-out calls are due mainly to customer fault, so the sale of additional keys, magnets, keyrings, etc. can occur.

4. In my particular town of 16,000. A lock-out a day is fairly average, with Saturdays being the busiest and Mondays the slowest.

5. You can figure out your own expenses with the mileage you would drive (both ways) to a typical call, and dividing the cost of advertising and tools over the course of a year. Your revenue and profits can vary greatly.

6. Because my own business is new, more of my time is spent promoting the company and services than actual "trade time".

7. My personal trade area is a 100km radius. Basically, each locksmith requires a population base of 40,000 people to support them. (I took this figure from a trade magazine awhile ago.) My county is 72,000.

8. As far as lockouts, cars will be about 70% of your business, with homes about 25% and business' 5% or less.

9. I would say 75% of people lose their keys or lock them inside as opposed to faulty hardware.

10. Regarding domestic disputes, etc...if I get 4 like that a year, it's an awful lot.

11. Brute force vs. pick-fu...pick fu 99%.

12. Non standard locks...not near enough...perhaps 5% and growing. More and more people are beginning to realize the benefits of better quality hardware/security systems, etc. and are confident enough to ask questions about it.

I gotta run now, but I hope this info helps a bit, and don't hesitate to ask questions if you got 'em.

[mightymouse]

All useful and interesting information; thanks varjeal :)

[2] and [4] present something I hadn't thought about. People's behaviour changes at certain times of year or in a typical working week.

As for having more callouts on saturdays, I'd guess this is because people become more likely to forget their keys etc when their routine changes. During the week people work and thus have a pretty well defined morning routine: get up, shower/dress/eat/pick up car & house keys/leave for work. On weekends people break their routines to get out and have fun etc and thus are more likely to forget their key's. I guess everyones gets pissed on weekends too, so being intoxicated might play a role as far as people losing their keys are concerned.

Also, the nature of lockout work is obviously quite different depending on location. You might have to deal with lots of frozen locks in Canada, but some lockie in the mediterranean probably wouldn't ever encounter that problem.

[12]: More people realising the value of better quality hardware is obviously a good thing - for them. But if everyone suddenly adopted high security locks, it would take longer to pick them, thus forcing you to spend more time on any particular job if you insisted on using your pick-fu all of the time. At least it makes things more interesting though.

It would also require more skill on the part of the picker. This is a question I hadn't thought of asking earlier: Generally speaking, how skilled at lock picking is the average locksmith? Every time I've had a locksmith come out to open my front door when I'd lost key's, he didn't even try to pick it. They normally just grab a hammer and smash the window glass on the door or drill the cylinder. The locks are five pin Yale ones, which are pretty standard on most british front doors, and thus I'd expect most british locksmith's to have learned how to pick them quite well.

I guess either these guy's were incompetant, or just out for more money.

[Varjeal]

I don't know how things are in most countries concerning skill at lockpicking, but in my area they're pretty good, but in the province fairly poor or average at best. In a lock-out situation, though, (residential and commercial anyways), most will still reach for a pickgun before the manual tools, and many will reach for the drill before the picks.

For some reason I've heard many complaints about British locksmiths unable/willing to do NDE and this suprises me considering some of the best lockpickers come from "the other side of the pond."

It could simply be a speed vs. labor cost decision, which is really quite unfortunate.

[plot]

i talked to a guy that did lockout parttime, and he said his bussiest nights of the year where after the first or second snow... people goto warm up there cars and lock themselves out. or during the first coldsnap i guess.


varjeal: i'm sure this probably varies greatly from locksmith to locksmith, but what about what % of the week is usually spent doing lockouts, verses simply fitting locks or something similar?

also, what % of your bussiness income is from lockouts, is it more profitable then just selling and fitting locks for bussinesses? and what percent of installing locks etc. is bussiness vs. residential?

also, are you basically on call 24/7 for lockouts? what do you do if you get a call while you are at someplace for a day installing locks...? do you drop everything you are doing and run out there, or do you have an associate or something you refer them to?

[Varjeal]

Lock-outs are a pretty decent percentage of my particular business, but most business' prefer not to do them in favor of trying to get commercial work.

I personally find lock-outs a good opportunity to get both residential and commercial business since it's a good opportunity to introduce yourself (and get paid for it) and your business services. Lock-outs are about as close to "pure" profit as you can get. No inventory, just tools, labor, and vehicle maintenance costs to be concerned about.

As far as installing locks, residential is far higher than commercial....commercial tends to be more serivce, or replacement work.

I'm on call 24/7, so if I'm installing some product and a call comes in, I will talk to the customer and briefly explain. 99% of the time they don't mind if I leave for a few minutes and come back. (I generally leave some tools there to insure them I'm doing so...) With the odd one that won't, I'll refer 'em to another guy I know who does that type of work on occasion.

[mightymouse]

How does being on call 24/7 affect your home life? I mean, dude, when do you sleep?! Do you just switch off your cell phone (I presume you only use a cell phone and dont give out your landline numbers to customers) when your doing family stuff, or do you feel obligated to leave it on and just refer business to friends? Does the workload place much stress on the partner/kids etc? How much spare time to you generally get?

Like my other questions, this seems to be getting personal. Please feel free to use your friends info like before (& hope he doesn't read this forum!).



Referring back to british locksmith's, its sad to see that you've heard all these bad things. I sure hope you got it wrong somewhere along the line, though from my past experience I suspect you didn't; the locksmith's I've had to call out always seemed to be in a rush. Their cell phones would ring every minute or two, and they'd generally look very stressed and busy.

I've just been browsing my yellow pages for local locksmith's, and found that many of the ad's contain "no callout fee!" slogans. This seems to conflict with your situation of using fixed callout fee's in Canada etc. Unless I'm mistaken (perhaps the ad's wern't specifically mentioning lockout situations, although they seemed too), then perhaps british locksmiths make their money by the time it takes to do a job etc. This seems a little strange because if it were the case you'd expect them to take their time rather than rushing, unless they make less money and have to fit in more clients.

Once again, may I request that a british locksmith write a parallel of this thread for the european forum? It would be enlightening to contrast the british experience from the canadian one. Cheers.

[Luke]

Hey Varjeal,
Is this friend the guy who's bus is called "The Abyss" ?