Close protection glossary

Close protection proposals and contracts carry a vocabulary of their own: principal, advance, PPO, RST, BS 7858. This glossary defines those terms as they are used in the UK — the roles on a detail, the planning words, the home, the licences and standards, and the law an officer works within. Some come from British Standards and the law; others are trade usage, and the same job often has two names, as with bodyguard and close protection officer.

People and roles

Principal

The person a protection arrangement exists to protect. In UK proposals the principal is not always the client: a company, a family office or a parent may commission and pay for the work, while the routes, timings and positions are planned around the principal’s day. A household can have several principals, each with a different routine. The roles around them are set out in who’s who in a protection detail.

Family office

A private company set up to manage a wealthy family’s investments and affairs. In security terms the family office is often the client, and family members are the principals. Its security usually spans several homes, household staff, journeys and the public information that links them, and can be arranged as one family office security programme rather than a series of separate bookings.

Close protection officer

A person who protects one or more people against physical assault or injury — the activity the SIA licenses as close protection. It is the title used in UK contracts and proposals, and anyone doing the work under contract needs a current SIA Close Protection licence. Most of the job is planning: routes, timings, venues and who knows the diary. The title and the everyday word are compared in bodyguard or close protection officer.

Bodyguard

The everyday word for a close protection officer. UK law draws no line between the two titles: a bodyguard working under contract needs the same SIA Close Protection licence, and whether a licence is required turns on how the person is engaged, not on what they are called. In Great Britain armed protection is unlawful for private providers, whatever the licence.

Personal protection officer (PPO)

The officer closest to the principal, responsible for the space immediately around them, abbreviated to PPO. On a larger detail the PPO works to a plan set by the team leader. On much private work in the UK a single PPO is the whole detail, working with a security driver or doubling as one, and holds an SIA Close Protection licence like any other contracted officer.

Team leader

The officer who owns the plan and the decisions on a protective detail, also called the detail leader and abbreviated to TL. The team leader sets routes and timings, briefs the officers and the driver, and holds the relationship with the principal’s office or household, so that every change comes through one person. On a two-person detail the team leader is usually also the officer beside the principal.

Protective detail

The group of people assigned to protect one person or family for a period; UK proposals also say protection detail or security detail. On private work it is often one close protection officer and a driver. A team leader, an advance party or a residential security team is added when the diary or the assessed risk calls for them. Each person on a proposed detail should have a stated reason for being there.

Residential security team (RST)

Officers who protect a home and the people in it, rather than travelling with the principal; abbreviated to RST. The work is access at the gate and the door, visitors, contractors and deliveries, patrols of the grounds and a written log. It can be officers on site in shifts, visiting patrols or monitored systems with response, often combined. Most homes need a survey rather than a team: what a residential security team does sets out when one is proportionate.

The work

Close protection

The guarding of one or more people against physical assault or injury. In the UK it is a licensed activity under the Private Security Industry Act 2001: anyone doing it under a contract for services needs an SIA Close Protection licence, while someone employed in-house usually does not. In practice it ranges from one officer for an evening to officers and security drivers working a week of engagements.

Executive protection

Close protection for people in business: chief executives, founders, board members and executives visiting the UK. In UK law the work is close protection, licensed in the same way. What sets it apart is the calendar: exposure rises around results days, AGMs, restructurings and public appearances, and cover is usually arranged for those dates rather than year-round. See how executive protection is arranged.

Risk and threat assessment

A structured judgement of who might wish a person harm, how capable they are of acting on it, and how exposed the person’s routines, homes and information leave them. The threat is intent and capability; the risk is the threat weighed against that exposure. In UK practice the assessment comes before any officer is booked and sets the size of what follows, which can be nothing at all. Risk assessment explains how one is carried out.

Proportionality

Matching protection to the assessed risk: enough for what is likely, and no more. In planning it is the test for any proposal — whether each officer, vehicle and hour answers something specific, and whether the cover can end when the risk does. The self-assessment gives a first read on whether protection is needed at all.

Low profile

Protection arranged to draw no attention: one officer in ordinary clothes, a car that suits the street, arrivals placed and timed so that nobody notices them. Its opposite, a high-profile or visible detail, uses presence as a deterrent and suits some public appearances. Low profile suits most private work, where the principal wants an ordinary day rather than a visible one. A week of it should end with the neighbours unaware that anything was different. That is the standard we work to.

Planning and movement

Advance work

The preparation done before a principal arrives anywhere: walking the venue, timing the route, identifying a second way out, agreeing where the car waits, meeting the venue’s own staff and noting the nearest hospital with an emergency department. In UK practice it is done the day before or in the hours ahead, depending on the visit. On a small detail the team leader or a single officer does it; larger details send an advance party.

Advance party

The officer or officers sent ahead of a principal to do the advance work, written as SAP — security advance party — in UK proposals. A dedicated advance party belongs to busy public schedules, several venues in a day or unfamiliar places. On most private work the advance is done by the team leader or by the officer who will be on the detail. A proposal that includes an advance party should say which venues it covers.

Journey management

The planning and monitoring of a journey from door to door: the route and an alternative, departure and arrival times, check-in points, where the car waits and who is told if the plan changes. In the UK it applies as much to a school run as to an airport transfer, and it is what makes regular movements harder to predict. A security driver usually carries it out; on longer days the team leader holds the plan.

Security driver

A driver whose job is to protect the passenger, not only to drive them: planning the route and an alternative, choosing where the car waits, staying with the vehicle and knowing the way out of each stop. A driver whose duties include guarding the passenger against assault or injury under contract needs an SIA Close Protection licence. How the role differs from a chauffeur’s is set out in the security chauffeur guide.

Security chauffeur

A chauffeur with security training, or a security driver who also works to a chauffeur’s standard of service. The two titles overlap in UK usage, so the useful checks are the licence and the brief: if the duties include protecting the passenger, the driver needs an SIA Close Protection licence, whichever title the invoice uses. The security chauffeur service sets out what the role covers.

FBO (fixed-base operator)

An organisation granted the right by an airport to serve private and business aircraft, providing fuelling, parking, handling and waiting areas for passengers. For a principal arriving by private aircraft, the FBO is the first and last point of contact on the ground. For a visit to the UK, arrival times and where the vehicles wait are agreed with the FBO in advance; airside access is arranged case by case with the handler.

Homes and premises

Protective security survey

An inspection of a home as someone hostile would see it, ending in a written report; in the UK also called a residential security survey. It covers the approach and perimeter, entry points, locks and glazing, alarm and CCTV configuration, household routines, staff and deliveries, and what public information gives away. Findings are graded — fix now, plan for, monitor. We specify hardware and introduce accredited installers; we do not sell or fit it. See the protective survey.

Safe room

A room inside a home built or reinforced so that the household can shut themselves in and call for help. In the UK the term covers anything from a strengthened dressing room with a solid door to an independent room with its own communications and ventilation. What decides its value is whether the family can reach it in time and knows what to do once inside. The panic room cost guide sets out the levels, from around £6,000 to £250,000 and more.

Panic room

The popular name for a safe room: a room a household can lock themselves into and wait in until help arrives. In the UK the two names are used interchangeably, and a lighter conversion of an existing room may be called a reinforced refuge. The definition and the costs are the same whichever name a quote uses.

PAS 24

The British Standards Institution’s specification for the security of doorsets and windows in UK homes, tested against the methods of the casual or opportunistic burglar. The current edition is PAS 24:2022+A1:2024. When a survey recommends replacing an external door or window, PAS 24 is the standard to ask the supplier for, and the product’s test evidence should name it.

EN 1063

The European standard, published in the UK as BS EN 1063, for testing and classifying security glazing by its resistance to bullet attack. In the UK it appears in specifications for ballistic glazing, for example where a higher-level safe room has a window. A product should state the class it has been tested to under the standard; that class, not a word such as “bulletproof”, is what to compare between suppliers.

TSCM

Technical surveillance counter-measures: searching premises, vehicles and devices for hidden listening devices, cameras and trackers, often called bug-sweeping. It is a specialist discipline with its own equipment and training, separate from close protection and from a security survey, and it belongs with a specialist firm. We do not provide it.

Licensing and standards

SIA

The Security Industry Authority, which regulates the private security industry in the UK under the Private Security Industry Act 2001. It licenses individuals, not companies, for specific activities — close protection, door supervision and security guarding among them — and keeps a public register of licence holders. Companies can apply separately to its voluntary Approved Contractor Scheme.

SIA licence

A licence issued by the SIA to an individual for a specific licensable activity. For protection work it is the Close Protection licence, needed by anyone who guards people against physical assault or injury under contract; it also allows door supervision and security guarding. A front line licence is for someone who does the work in person. The licence confers no special powers. How to check an SIA licence walks through the public register step by step.

SIA Approved Contractor Scheme

A voluntary SIA scheme that approves private security companies, as distinct from the licences it issues to individuals. Approval is awarded on a pass/fail basis, and the SIA’s register of approved contractors shows whether a company holds it. It is a company-level status and does not replace checking that each officer holds a current licence. When a provider says it is approved, the register is where to confirm it.

BS 7858

The British Standard for screening people who work in a secure environment, a code of practice whose current edition is BS 7858:2019. Its aim is to give an employer enough information to make an informed decision about employing someone in a secure environment, and it applies at every level of seniority, directors included. In UK close protection it is the vetting standard that sits on top of the licence. Every officer we deploy is screened to it, and the file is kept.

BS 8507-1

The British Standard code of practice for close protection services within the United Kingdom, published in 2008. It gives recommendations for the management, staffing and operational accountability of close protection providers, and the BSI notes it may also be used by those buying close protection. Our operations are aligned to it; the credentials page lists what else can be checked independently.

Law and obligations

Reasonable force

The force the law allows anyone to use. In England and Wales, section 3 of the Criminal Law Act 1967 permits such force as is reasonable in the circumstances to prevent crime or to make or assist a lawful arrest. The same test applies to a close protection officer as to a passer-by, and the licence adds nothing to it. Whether force was reasonable is decided afterwards by the police, prosecutors and the courts. See what a bodyguard may and may not do.

Any-person arrest

The power of arrest held by anyone who is not a constable, often called citizen’s arrest. In England and Wales it is in section 24A of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984: it covers indictable offences only, and only where arrest is necessary to prevent injury, loss or damage, or someone making off, and it is not reasonably practicable for a constable to act. A close protection officer’s powers of arrest are no wider than anyone else’s; bodyguard powers sets out the limits.

Duty of care

A legal obligation to take reasonable care not to cause others foreseeable harm. In UK security the phrase is used in two ways: the care an employer or family office owes staff whose role exposes them to threats, and the care a provider owes both the people it protects and its own officers — sensible hours, rest and a proper briefing. How it applies to a particular organisation is a question for a solicitor.

Non-disclosure agreement (NDA)

A contract in which one party agrees to keep another’s information confidential, abbreviated to NDA. In UK protection work it covers the principal’s identity, addresses, routines and family, and anything seen or heard on the detail. We sign your non-disclosure agreement as a matter of course, and we are registered with the ICO. The FAQ covers confidentiality and how an engagement begins.