Pros
Working with a dog is something I always wanted to do. There is plenty of work if you don't mind doing pop up assignments that destroy your social life.
Cons
The starting salary is $2.00 less an hour than it was 20 years ago. Now it takes 3 years to make what guys were making during the 1990's. The pay is okay for security work, but it should be a lot more for the specialized field of being a Bomb Dog Handler. 99% of the work is in Manhattan, so tack on an extra hour of commuting time and related stress each way to deal with that. The Scheduling Dept is the worst. You have to turn your phone off on your days off for peace of mind. They are constantly calling you to work same day or next day assignments they forgot to fill. Then when they screw up it takes a thousand phone calls and six months to get paid for an assignment they forgot to put in the system. If your worksite closes for the day due to weather or any other reason your are not compensated for it even though you were scheduled to work and agreed to work that amount of hours for the day. Unless your a chosen one assigned to a cushy spot you will be pushing 50 hours a week and the company considers you a "per diem" employee so they don't have to give you the benefits of full time employees. On the other hand, they break your chops to work more hours if you are under 40 hours for the week because they want their money out of the dog. You are required to have a car to transport the dog to and from work/ training and they also use your personal cell phone's GPS to track your location when you sign in and out. You are also required to spend hours a day on your days off training the dog without compensation. The monthly stipend amount has not changed in 25 years and it does not even begin to cover your expenses. They hold the dog over your head. There are plenty of horror stories about how they take your dog away if it gains weight, if your out sick for an extended period of time, if you resign or if they promised the dog to the original handler (without ever informing you that it would happen.). The dog who is only property to them, becomes part of your family and they snatch it away from you before you know what happened. Most of the older guys only stay because they don't want to lose their dogs. A handler who has recently left the company has since been arrested for not returning his dog. It's amazing this kind of treatment goes on in today's times.
