Six zones
Branch zones
Each has a different exposure, a different coverage answer and a different failure mode.
-
Z1
High
Lobby & Teller Line
The public face of the branch, and the zone where presence does almost all of the work.
-
Z2
Critical
Vault Corridor & Cash Room
Dual control, timed access and the handful of minutes when cash is genuinely exposed.
-
Z3
Elevated
ATM & Vestibule
Open when the branch is closed, and the source of most customer-facing incidents.
-
Z4
Elevated
Drive-Through & Depository
Vehicles, after-hours deposits and a blind side that most branch surveys under-weight.
-
Z5
Critical
Opening & Closing
Two windows a day with thin staffing and predictable timing. Most branch incidents sit here.
-
Z6
High
Closures, Moves & Refits
Consolidations, relocations and overnight refits, when a branch stops behaving like a branch.
Questions
Common questions
Will your officer intervene during a robbery?
No, and you should not want them to. Our standing instruction is comply, do not pursue, observe carefully and produce an accurate account afterwards. Intervention at a teller line puts your staff and customers between two armed people. Every institution we work with holds the same position.
Then why have an armed officer at all?
Deterrence and the hours around the edges. A uniformed armed presence changes which branches get selected in the first place, and it materially changes the risk during opening, closing and cash movements — which is where the actual exposure sits.
Do you work with anyone outside financial institutions?
No. Banks, credit unions and their cash operations only. It is a narrow trade with its own regulatory obligations and its own failure modes, and we are more useful to you for not splitting attention.
Can you act as our designated security officer?
We support the role rather than hold it. The Bank Protection Act designation sits with an officer of the institution — that is the point of it. We supply the survey work, the documentation and the annual report input that the designation requires.
What does a branch security survey cover?
Every zone walked at the hours it actually operates, including an opening and a closing. Sightlines, camera placement and coverage gaps, alarm and duress device placement and reachability, cash movement paths, lighting, and the vestibule after dark.
How do you handle a multi-branch network?
A common standard across the network with a per-branch annex, and a single point of contact above branch level. Branch managers should not each be negotiating their own arrangement.
Are your officers armed at every branch?
Not necessarily. Cash-heavy branches, those with incident history and those in isolated locations usually warrant it. A low-volume branch inside a supermarket frequently does not, and we will say so.
What about staff training?
We brief your staff on how to work with the officer — duress device use, what the officer will and will not do, and how the handover works at opening and closing. An officer nobody has been introduced to is half an officer.