As an Atlanta locksmith, a particular piece of news that I read today was very interesting to me. A law was just passed in the state of Oregon House of Representatives by a landslide vote of 56-3 that is requiring locksmiths to become licensed by the state. Locksmiths will now have to pass a test that proves that they understand the trade, and they will also be required to pass a background check.

It is amazing to realize that in most states, including the state of Georgia, you need to have a license to cut hair, but there are no licensing requirements for locksmiths whatsoever. If you own a locksmith company in Atlanta you would have to have a business license of course, but the state requires no professional licensing, no testing, and no background check.

Ethical Atlanta locksmiths have always found this lack of industry regulation to be kind of perplexing. I hate to put it like this, but locksmiths are people who know how to break into your car, your house, and your business. We know how to get past locks. You would think that if a state was going to regulate any type of industry at all, even the cosmetology trade, they would want to make sure that people who open locked doors for a living were licensed. And why they are at it, they might want to make sure that locksmiths are free of any convictions for things like, say, breaking and entering. Do you think that might be a good requirement for a Georgia locksmith license?

I’m a GA locksmith who does things the right way, and the recent locksmith scams that I have been reading about really make my blood boil because these characters are making it harder for real locksmiths. Scam artists create many different company names with fake addresses and get different phone numbers for them. Then they place ads in the Yellow Pages, and all of the calls to these numbers are routed to the same call center. When people call, these scam locksmith companies pull the bait and switch game. They quote one price over the phone, and then charge way more when they get to the job. If the locksmith industry was regulated and people had to be licensed and go through background checks and follow certain rules, these locksmith scams would be much more difficult to pull off. It seems to me that the lack of licensing requirements for locksmiths in Georgia and other states invites scam artists to try their luck as a locksmith.

I applaud the state of Oregon for passing this law, and I only hope that GA locksmith licensing is next. One thing that I want to make perfectly clear is that even though there is no licensing requirement for locksmiths in Atlanta and throughout the state, 24/7 Locksmith Services hires only qualified and reputable locksmiths. Our guys are clean as a whistle, we treat our customers with respect, and we always honor our quotes.