Every private security company in Cape Town has to pay at least the same legal minimum salary for your grade. From 1 March 2026 to 28 February 2027 the National Bargaining Council for the Private Security Sector (NBCPSS) sets it at R7,003 a month for Grades C, D and E, R7,607 for Grade B and R8,184 for Grade A in its Area 1 and 2 districts, which include Cape Town. Shift allowances, overtime, Sunday and public-holiday pay come on top. So the name on the uniform matters less than your grade, your shifts and whether the company pays the extras it owes. Very few companies publish what they pay guards. Below is what the companies Cape Town jobseekers search for have and haven't published, and how to check any company and any offer before you sign.
None of them can legally pay a full-time guard less than the NBCPSS minimum for the grade the post needs, and we couldn't find a guard salary published by any of the companies in the lookup below. What moves your monthly pay from one company to the next is this:
The biggest mistake I see is guards comparing the headline figure on two offers without asking how many shifts, which shifts and at what grade. Ask for those three things before you compare anything.
The NBCPSS circular of 8 February 2026 sets these monthly minimums for security officers from 1 March 2026 to 28 February 2027, which is year 4 of the sector's Main Collective Agreement:
Those are the Area 1 and 2 rates. The circular lists the magisterial districts in that band, and the Cape Town ones include The Cape, Bellville, Goodwood, Kuils River, Mitchells Plain, Wynberg, Simon's Town, Somerset West and Strand, with Paarl and Stellenbosch also on the list. Districts that aren't listed fall under Area 3, where Grades C to E start at R6,726, so if your post's district isn't named, ask the NBCPSS which area applies before you accept the lower rate.
The national minimum wage is R30.23 an hour from 1 March 2026, according to the Department of Employment and Labour. That's lower than the NBCPSS guarding rates, so for a security officer the NBCPSS figure is the one to hold an employer to.
These amounts come from the same NBCPSS circular and apply from 1 March 2026 to 28 February 2027, whichever company you work for:
Put together, a Grade C armed officer in Area 1 who works 16 night shifts in a month is owed at least R7,003 + R168 (16 x R10.50) + R128 (16 x R8.00) + R32 = R7,331 before deductions. The allowances add a few hundred rand; overtime, Sunday and public-holiday hours are paid at higher rates, so they move the total more.
An NBCPSS circular of 19 August 2024 spells out how those hours are paid under the Main Collective Agreement. Ordinary hours are 12 a day and 48 a week, and anything beyond that is overtime at one and a half times the rate. Sunday work is paid at double, or at one and a half times if Sundays are part of your normal roster, and work on a public holiday is paid at double. The council says none of this may be folded into your basic salary.
On the deductions side, the 2026 circular sets the Private Security Sector Provident Fund contribution at 7.5% from you and 7.5% from your employer, and the 2024 circular lists UIF among the statutory deductions taken from the salary you earn. If a payslip doesn't show the allowances and the Sunday or overtime hours you worked as separate lines, ask why before the next pay run.
On 27 October 2026 we looked up each company below on the PSIRA business register, then looked for guard pay on the company's own website or careers portal. We didn't use job-board adverts, Facebook posts or salary-survey sites.
| Company (as searched) | PSIRA register | Pay published by the company |
|---|---|---|
| Fidelity (Fidelity Services Group, Fidelity ADT) | Registered, among other Fidelity businesses: Fidelity Security Services (Pty) Ltd and Fidelity ADT (Pty) Ltd | Not published. Its careers portal lists Cape Town vacancies, such as a Grade C security officer post at its Philippi branch and armed response officers for Fidelity ADT, with no salary shown |
| Sechaba | Registered: Sechaba Protection Services (Western Cape) (Pty) | None found |
| SJC Security | Registered: SJC Security Winelands. SJC's website gives a Brackenfell address | Not published on its website |
Each of them owes you at least the NBCPSS minimum for your grade and area, plus the allowances above.
Cape Town searchers also look up Tyeks, MCC, Recall, Wolf, Tracing Point, PRSS and Prosec. The register lists businesses under those names, in several cases more than one, and we couldn't confirm from a company's own site which of them is the Cape Town employer. That's why you should ask for the company's PSIRA number instead of searching by name.
PSIRA's website has a Business Verification search. You can search by company name, but the results are messy: on 27 October 2026 a search for "Fidelity" returned 2,067 rows, most of them applications rather than registered businesses. Ask the company for its PSIRA registration number, search on that, and check that the status reads Registered. PSIRA's notice of 4 September 2026 warned that suspected altered compliance documents had turned up in security tenders and told clients to verify directly with PSIRA, so don't treat a certificate on an office wall as proof.
Then get the offer in writing. Script: "Before I sign, can you confirm in writing my grade, the monthly rate, the area, and the night and firearm allowance per shift?" A company that pays properly can answer that in one message.
Walk away, or at least slow down, if you see any of these:
Raise it with your employer in writing first and keep a copy. The NBCPSS complaint form asks whether you did and what the employer said.
If that doesn't fix it, lodge a complaint with the NBCPSS. Its online form covers basic salary underpayment, allowances, overtime, Sunday and public-holiday pay, unlawful deductions and provident fund contributions. You need a copy of your ID; payslips, your contract and bank statements are optional but help your case. The council says you'll get a reference number by email within 48 hours once the complaint is screened, and its Western Cape office is on the corner of Loop and Waterkant Streets in the CBD (NBCPSS website, checked 27 October 2026).
If the problem is a fee someone charged you to get the job, section 15 of the Employment Services Act lets the CCMA, or a bargaining council with jurisdiction, conciliate and arbitrate that dispute. This page is general information, not legal advice.
At the minimum, Grade B pays R604 a month more than Grade C, and Grade A pays R1,181 more. Armed posts pay the special allowance as well, but they come with longer requirement lists: Fidelity ADT's Cape Town armed response advert, for example, asks for Grade C, two years in the security industry, a firearm competency for business purposes, a driver's licence and no criminal record.
Both Fidelity adverts we read ask for no criminal record, so it pays to have a police clearance certificate under way before you apply.
No company may pay a full-time guard less than the NBCPSS minimum for the grade, which from 1 March 2026 is R7,003 a month for Grades C to E in the Cape Town districts. Very few companies publish guard pay, so the real differences come from allowances, overtime, Sunday and public-holiday pay, the grade of the post and whether the company pays these correctly. Compare written offers, not company names.
Fidelity's careers portal doesn't show a salary on its Cape Town security officer vacancies (checked 27 October 2026). By law a Grade C officer in the Cape Town districts must get at least R7,003 a month from 1 March 2026, plus R10.50 per shift on armed posts and R8.00 per night shift. Ask Fidelity to confirm the rate and the allowances in writing before you sign.
Under the NBCPSS rates for 1 March 2026 to 28 February 2027, armed security officers and armed response officers get a special allowance of R10.50 per shift. Mobile supervisors, National Key Point officers, control centre operators and dog handlers get the same amount. It's paid on top of the monthly minimum for your grade, not instead of it.
Yes. The NBCPSS night-shift allowance is R8.00 per shift for all employees working night shift, from 1 March 2026 to 28 February 2027. It's added to your basic salary as a separate amount, so check that your payslip shows it as its own line and that the number of night shifts matches your roster.
Use the Business Verification search on the PSIRA website. Searching by company name returns many similar names, so ask the company for its PSIRA registration number and search on that instead. The result should show the business name with the status Registered. PSIRA also has an Individual Verification search for checking a person's registration.