During our 20 years working in and for the locksmith industry we have come across the question "Why is it so difficult to find a trustworthy locksmith?" many, many times usually after the customer has been overcharged, had their door, lock and door-frame butchered or has been left waiting 5 hours for a locksmith to arrive after the call centre said he would be there in 30 minutes.
On the other hand there are however 1000's of happy, satisfied customers who have used qualified, professional locksmiths and been extremely pleased with the service they got, unfortunately you hear from happy customers less than you hear from un-happy customers so we'll try to explain why this industry has such a bad reputation.
The locksmith industry in completely unregulated meaning that anyone can set themselves up as a locksmith and start touting for work regardless of their skill and training which causes a problem for customers who are simply not sure who is qualified and who isn't, who has been trained and who hasn't and who is trustworthy and who isn't.
Apart from locksmiths themselves there are a number of companies who take advantage of the non regulation too and run crash locksmith course for 5 days, 3 days and even 1 day in some cases, now no one will be surprised to hear that you cannot learn a trade, any trade, in 5 days yet through misleading online ads, paid listings and vague wording on their websites these companies, one in particular are directly responsible for around 90% of the amateur locksmith currently touting for work in the UK.
The other 10% are handy men and jack of all trade types touting for emergency call out work, you can tell the type and they turn up and immediately start drilling whereas a professional, trained locksmith will attempt what's known as non destructive entry first using lock picks and other tools of the trade.
So with the locksmith industry being flooded with amateurs who have only been on these crash courses and achieved worthless, made up certification it's the customer who suffers and ends up being overcharged and/or gets a bad job done.
What the best Locksmith Training Course Available
In 2019 Ofqual (The Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation) launched two official locksmith diplomas, the first of their kind, one for commercial and residential locksmiths and one for automotive locksmiths and all of the decent, professional locksmith training centres and colleges switched over to these official Government approved and regulated courses. These Ofqual courses take many months to complete so are the most in-dept training course available in the industry.
However, because the industry is still un-regulated it is not a legal requirement to sit the official Ofqual courses and a number of training centres continue to push their worthless 5, 3 or 1 days courses with one defiant company actually claiming to run the only official course and claim that only their paying members are qualified locksmiths when it is completely the other way around.
So how do customers find qualified professional Locksmiths?
Many people who end up requiring the services of a locksmith after being locked out of their home, office or vehicle for example will use Google on their mobile phone to find the nearest local locksmith. All that I can say that if you do use google make sure you check out the locksmiths google reviews which many customer forget to do.
A sure fire way of making sure that you are booking a professional, qualified locksmith is to use the Smart Locksmiths website instead. Smart Locksmiths, launch in 2018 is database of local independent locksmiths and only lists fully vetted, qualified and DBS checked locksmiths and does not list any rogues, amateurs and moonlighters.
Since its launch Smart Locksmiths has gained the respect of both customers and local locksmiths and has the largest, official database of independent, fully qualified locksmiths in the UK, we say official because there are a number of other websites trying to copy Smart locksmiths business model whilst claiming the have 10 times as many members/listings, the difference is that with Smart Locksmiths you contact the locksmith direct so their member numbers are clear and searchable but with other similar websites you can only search a town or area and then contact a switchboard or operator who says they will send out one of their 6000 engineers, this does sound extremely far fetched yet people do fall for it.
It's the call centres, sometimes referring to themselves as national locksmith companies, who are responsible for the long waits time people report because they don't have thousands of members and probably don't have anyone nearby even though they say they do, so they'll send someone from miles away and make you wait. These call centres are popular with the real rogues of the industry who sign up so that they can hide behind the call centres phone number, turn up in an unmarked vehicle and never reveal their true identity
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