Unarmed Security Guard

Shift start: the pass-down, your post orders & the radio check

• Anything to pass on before I take over? — Your opening line to the guard you're relieving. The 'pass-down' is everything that happened on their shift that you need to know — a broken gate, a person who was asked to leave, a contractor still on site. Ask it every single time, even when the other guard looks like they're already walking out the door.
• What's going on tonight? — A shorter, more casual version of the same question, and one guards use constantly. It invites the outgoing guard to tell you anything unusual before they leave. Two minutes here can save you an hour of confusion later.
• No pass-downs — nothing happened on the shift. — The standard answer when your shift was quiet, and a line you'll both say and hear. It also goes in your written report. Say it only when it's true: if something happened and you say this, the written record now disagrees with reality — and the record is what people believe later.
• Where are the post orders? I want to read through them. — 🔴 Your post orders are the written rules for your specific site — what you patrol, when, who gets in, what you do about X, and who you call. They define your scope at that site. Every site's are different. Reading them is described by experienced guards as the single most important thing a new guard does.
• The post orders say I call dispatch first — is that still right? — Checking your understanding of a written rule against what actually happens on this post. Asking is not weakness; it's how you avoid guessing at 3 a.m. When the post orders and someone's verbal advice disagree, the post orders are the rule — and you can say so politely.
• Radio check — do you copy? — How you confirm your radio works at the start of your shift, before you need it. 'Do you copy?' means 'can you hear me?'. Never assume the radio works; a dead radio only announces itself when you're already in trouble.
• Copy that. — Radio English for 'I heard and understood you.' Short is correct on a radio — you're sharing the channel with everyone else on site. 'Copy' confirms receipt; it doesn't promise anything else.

Access control: badges, the visitor log & politely refusing entry

• Good morning — can I see your badge, please? — Your standard access-control line. Greet first, then ask. The greeting makes it routine rather than an accusation, and 'please' costs nothing. You'll say this hundreds of times a shift; making it sound normal is the skill.
• Are you on the visitor list for today? — How you check whether someone is expected. If they're on the list, you sign them in; if they're not, you don't improvise — you call the person they're here to see, or call dispatch. The list, not your judgment, decides.
• Please sign in here, and I'll get you a visitor badge. — The formal step for every non-employee: name, time in, who they're here to see, and their escort. Filling the visitor log in accurately for every visitor is a real, documented part of the job — guards have been formally written up for skipping it.
• Who are you here to see? — The question that turns 'a stranger in the lobby' into something you can verify. It's polite, it's expected, and the answer gives you someone to call. If the name doesn't check out, that's your answer.
• Do you have a delivery order or a work order I can look at? — For a delivery driver or a contractor arriving. You're not being difficult — you're confirming they're expected. A real contractor has paperwork and won't mind; someone with no paperwork is exactly who the log exists for.
• I'm sorry — I can't let you in without checking. Let me call and confirm. — 🔴 Your line for refusing entry politely. Notice what it does: it declines without arguing, and immediately offers a next step that isn't you making the decision. You never have to win the argument — you just have to make the call.
• I have to check everyone the same way — it's not personal. — For the person who's annoyed at being asked. Applying the rule evenly is the entire point; guards get in trouble both for skipping the check and for applying it inconsistently. Saying this out loud, calmly, defuses most of it.

Patrol, radio brevity & writing the DAR

• All clear at the north gate. — The standard patrol check-in: where you are and that nothing's wrong. Short and specific. 'All clear' plus a location tells dispatch both that the area is fine and that you're fine — the second part matters more than new guards realize.
• Say again? — 🔴 Correct radio English for 'repeat that' — on a radio you say 'say again', not 'repeat'. Use it the instant you don't catch something. Guessing at a radio message is how a guard ends up at the wrong gate.
• Negative contact, calling out. — The brevity phrase for 'I tried this person on the radio and got no answer, so I'm escalating.' It creates a recorded attempt before you go to a supervisor — which is exactly why it exists. Guards use it after two tries with no response.
• I observed a broken window on the south side of Building C at 0215 hours. — 🔴 The core sentence pattern of the Daily Activity Report: 'I observed…' + what + where + when. Notice what's absent — no guess about who did it, no theory about why. Just what your eyes saw and the time on the clock.
• At 2340 hours I conducted a patrol of the parking structure. No incidents observed. — 🔴 A normal DAR line for an uneventful patrol. Yes, you write these down even when nothing happens: the DAR is the record that you were there, patrolling, at that hour. 'Nothing happened' unwritten looks identical to 'nobody patrolled'.
• Does anyone know what to put in a daily activity report? — A real question new guards ask, because nobody trains it up front. The honest answer: times, locations, patrols, weather alerts, anything out of the ordinary — down to small things like a scrape or a dent. If you're unsure whether it belongs, write it.
• I'm going to note that in my DAR. — A normal, professional thing to say out loud. It's not a threat — it's how the job works. Every shift ends with a Daily Activity Report, and it is the record that protects you when someone remembers the shift differently than you do.

🔴 Someone who shouldn't be there: the observe-and-report script

• Good evening — my name is Officer Chen with building security. — How you open. Identify yourself and who you're with, from a comfortable distance, before you ask for anything. It tells the person who you are and why you're talking to them, which removes half the tension before it starts.
• Are you aware that this is private property? — The setup line in the real trespass script guards are trained on. Ask it as a genuine question, not an accusation — plenty of people honestly don't know. Sometimes this sentence alone ends the whole thing.
• I'm going to have to ask you to leave. — 🔴 The core sentence of this chapter. Say it once, clearly, from a safe distance, and then stop talking. Notice the shape of it: it's a request, not a command, and you're not going to make anything happen. If they go, you're done. If they don't, you call — you don't escalate.
• I know you're in a rough spot, but unfortunately I do have to ask you to leave. — A real line guards use with someone who's homeless or sleeping on the property. It's the same request with the dignity left in. The guard who said this called police for the follow-through rather than touching him — in his own words, 'I don't go hands-on for liability reasons.'
• Sir, I'm not going to make you do anything — I'm just going to call the police. — 🔴 The most honest sentence in this pack, and a real one from a guard's own account. You are not a peace officer. You cannot make anyone do anything. What you can do is call — and saying so plainly, without threat in your voice, is very often the thing that ends it. In the real account, the person left on their own.
• Thank you — I appreciate it. — What you say the moment someone starts complying, and then you stop talking. A veteran guard's actual teaching point: 'every word out of your mouth gives them a reason to stick around longer... once I gain compliance, I thank them and I shut up.' Winning the argument is not the goal. Them leaving is the goal.
• Okay — I'm calling the police now. — 🔴 What you say when they refuse, and then you back away and call. That's the whole plan. You don't repeat yourself, you don't debate whether it's really private property, you don't follow them, and you never touch them. You make the call and you let police handle it.

De-escalation: an angry or intoxicated person

• Hey, is everything okay? I noticed you've been here a while. — The check-in before it becomes a confrontation. It's a genuine question and it treats the person as a person. A surprising number of tense situations never start because a guard opened with this instead of a challenge.
• Give me some space. — 🔴 A real line from a guard's own successful de-escalation with an aggressive, intoxicated woman — said calmly, while backing away. It asks for distance without threatening anyone, and distance is your actual safety tool. You can always keep backing up; nothing on this property is worth standing your ground for.
• Okay — let's look for it together. — 🔴 The pivot that ended that same real encounter. She was accusing him of stealing her vape pen; instead of continuing to argue that he hadn't, he said 'alright, let's look for your vape pen.' Her aggression dropped instantly. Giving someone a problem to solve with you beats winning an argument against them.
• I'm not arguing with you — I just want to help you sort this out. — Naming what you're doing, out loud, when someone is spoiling for a fight. It's hard to argue with someone who's audibly refusing to argue. Keep your voice flat and slow; your tone is doing more work than your words.
• I hear you. Let me see what I can do. — For someone who's angry about something real. You're not agreeing and you're not promising — you're acknowledging. A lot of anger is just someone who doesn't feel heard, and this sentence costs you nothing.
• I'm going to step back and let you cool off for a minute. — Disengaging on purpose, and saying so. Walking away is not losing — it's the trained move. There is no rule that says you have to finish a conversation with someone who's escalating.
• I'm going to leave it there and call my supervisor. — 🔴 Your exit from any situation that's going the wrong way. Nothing at your post requires you to keep standing in front of an angry person. Break contact, get distance, and call your supervisor or dispatch per your post orders — that's the escalation path, not you.

🔴 Emergencies: getting safe, calling 911 & when NOT to intervene

• 911, what's your emergency? — The first thing the operator says. Don't wait until you can build a perfect sentence — answer in a few plain words: 'There's a fire at my building' or 'Someone's hurt.' If you freeze or hang up, help isn't sent. Clear and slow beats correct grammar, always.
• I'm a security guard at 400 Harbor Street. There's a man with a knife at the north gate. — 🔴 The whole 911 opening: who you are, exactly where, and what's happening. Address first if you can — a call that drops after those two facts still gets help sent. Say the address before the story.
• I'm at a safe distance now — I'm not approaching him. — 🔴 Get to a safe distance FIRST, then call. This is the lesson a guard drew from having a gun pointed at him: 'I shouldn't have approached the subject without having called 911 first.' Distance first, phone second, and you tell the operator you're staying back.
• What's your location? — The operator will ask, and it's the most important thing you say. Give a street address, a gate name plus a cross street, or a landmark. If you're unsure, describe what you can see. Don't just name the property — 'the north lot behind the blue warehouse on Harbor' beats 'the office park.'
• He's a white male, maybe thirties, red hoodie and jeans — he's walking east toward the parking structure. — 🔴 Describing someone factually: what you can see and where they're going. Clothing, build, direction of travel, vehicle. NOT what you think they're planning, NOT 'he looks like he's about to do something' — that's speculation, and it goes in nobody's mouth, not on the phone and not in your report.
• I'll stay on the line. — Say it and mean it. Dispatchers keep you talking because you're their eyes until officers arrive, and because they want to know if things change. Don't hang up to go do something — stay put, stay safe, keep reporting.
• Someone's hurt — we need an ambulance. — 🔴 The moment anyone is injured, this is the call. Say it first, then the location. Getting an ambulance moving beats anything else you could be doing.
• I'm not a medic — I've called 911 and they're on the way. — 🔴 An honest, correct thing to say. A guard is NOT a medic. Your mandatory training covers responding to a medical emergency; it does not certify you to treat anyone. If you personally hold a current CPR or first-aid card, you act within that card and nothing beyond it. Otherwise: call 911, keep the area clear, and wait.
• The fire alarm's going off in Building B — I'm following the evacuation procedure in my post orders. — 🔴 Fire is a post-orders answer, not a heroics answer. Direct people out per your site's written evacuation procedure, call 911 if it's a real fire and not a test, and do not go back into a building to search for people. Your post orders and your training define the limit — nothing else does.
• Shots fired at 400 Harbor Street. I'm getting to cover. — 🔴 Active threat: get to safety, do NOT approach, call 911, give location and description. This is real — a guard's account of a party call that turned into gunfire ends with the guards going over a fence and calling 911 from a safe distance. That's the correct outcome, not a failure.
• My supervisor told me not to approach — to find a spot and wait for law enforcement. — 🔴 A real quote from a real guard, and the correct call. When police themselves suggested he 'bum rush' a trespasser if he came back, he and his supervisor declined — that informal advice would have exceeded his authority and put him at real risk. Follow your post orders and your supervisor, not somebody's off-hand suggestion.
• I'm calling my supervisor — this isn't a 911 situation. — For everything short of a real emergency. There is no universal guard hotline and no app — your two escalations are 911 for a genuine emergency, and your supervisor or dispatch, per your post orders, for everything else. Know your dispatch number before you need it.
• I don't feel safe — I'm withdrawing and calling it in. — 🔴 The sentence that keeps guards alive. Weapon visible or suspected. Alone or outnumbered. Violence already happening. Anything legally murky. In every one of those, the answer is the same: withdraw, observe from a distance, and call. You never owe anyone a confrontation.
• Sorry, could you say that again? — Your single most important line under stress. When a 911 operator or a police officer speaks fast and your mind goes blank, this buys a repeat without panic — native speakers use it constantly. 'Slower, please' also works. Never pretend you understood and guess; in an emergency, a wrong answer sends help to the wrong gate.