Trustworthy Private Investigator? Trustworthy Client?

Mutual trust between a Private Investigator and the client is essential and the trust needs to go in both directions, so why is it so important for a client to hire a trustworthy private investigator and vice versa, why is it important that our clients are trustworthy also?

The reasons why a client needs to be able to trust their chosen private Investigator are probably more obvious in that a client is going to hand over their hard earned money to an Investigator in the hope that they execute the case in a professional and responsible manner as well as return with useable results, delivered in a timely way.

A client needs to feel that the Investigator is knowledgable and experienced in the field of investigation, understands the relevant law and is based in the right location. So how would a client go about this?

I have contacted my competitors in the past as a prospective client, in an attempt to highlight the issues a client faces when choosing a trustworthy investigator and I found out that coming from the perspective of an inexperienced client, that there were many "professionals" who were all too willing to take advantage of me and my "situation" additionally, as a professional Investigator I have picked up cases from clients who have been ripped off by these same "professionals"

As a prospective client, how do I know that the Investigator is trustworthy?

My advice is to do the following:

1) Pay close attention during initial contact.

Once you have made contact via email (I recommend that all initial contact is made this way so that the investigator has an understanding of your case and requirements and is ready to advise you) set up a telephone call appointment. This way you can be sure that the investigator has time to help you and is not in the middle of a fraught surveillance.

Pay attention to how the investigator sounds. Are they interested in you case? Are they asking you questions about the background of the case or establishing detail to help them work out the logistics of the case and so on. My telephone calls to prospective clients are very much a two way communication. I want to help the client in the best way that I can and to do that I need to understand everything and in detail. An investigator who just gives short or one word answers is not interested in your case or doing a good job for you so move on.

2) Location

Whether or not you intend to meet with the Investigator in reality or not is beside the point but it can help to feel out the reaction you get when you ask whether the Investigator would be prepared to meet with you to discuss your case. I do not mean that a prospective client should set up a meeting and then not show up but some Investigators pretend to be based in locations that they are not geographically present in, in order to make their business look bigger than it is. Once they are hired by the client they then farm out the case to a local investigator to run the case for them and will sometimes pass the local investigators work off as their own. This raises the cost for the client as the middle man Investigator takes a cut for simply passing on the case. Additionally the client loses control of the the quality of Investigator running their case for them.

If your case takes place in a country that is different from the one you reside in, hire a local investigator yourself and check their telephone number matches the country they say they are located in.

3) References

While it is true that it can be difficult for a Private Investigator to get references from clients simply due to the fact that most clients prefer their cases to remain private and confidential, a good established Investigator of any repute will be able to provide a prospective client with references if requested but how do you know that you are not just contacting one of the Investigators friends rather than a genuine past client?

Personally I provide the following:

The CEO of a large company established in another European country.

A Partner at a reputable law firm (Local to me)

A lawyer working in the legal department of a huge multi-national company in the States.

A private client of international repute in the science community

The quality of the references will tell you all you need to know. If the references request is denied or you are offered "Tom" on +420 *** *** *** then you might want to think again.

So now we have taken an overview of how a client can establish whether an Investigator is trustworthy, lets look at why an Investigator needs to trust the client?

We understand that the information that a client gives us in order for us to work on their case is often sensitive and personal and all information given to us is treated as confidential. We need to be able to trust that the information given to us is accurate to the best of the clients knowledge in order for us to be able to work the case effectively.

It is more common than you might think for clients to start off their contact with us by lying to us about who they really are as well as the facts surrounding the case. In my experience this happens, mainly for two reasons.

1) The prospective client is confused or mis-understands to role of a Private Investigator.

2) The client believes either correctly or incorrectly that the Investigator will not take the case if they disclose the real reason they are presenting the case.

Why does this happen?

Many people have a preconception about our industry and may feel they need to try to hide their identity from us in keeping with the perceived mystery and secrecy surrounding our work. I actually can not answer the question as to why people do this but only speculate, and it happens quite a lot.

A professional Investigator will always know who they are working for and so this approach only serves to waste everybody's time.

A prospective client may wish to hide their identity for fear of the target of the investigation ever finding out about the investigation and who is behind it, which is why a little due diligence when hiring an investigator is wise so a client can be confident in the investigators ability and integrity.

It is also not uncommon for a prospective client to lie in an attempt to not pay the investigator for their work but there are measures in place to prevent this from happening and this is also futile. Although it would be nice to be able to trust our clients to pay for our work, many years ago, bitter experience has taught that I am unable to trust a client to pay me, especially if the result of the case is not what they wanted to hear and so this is an area where (unfortunately) we now have a policy that we do not trust any client to pay us and therefore do not release results of investigations until they have been paid for as well as accepting a deposit to cover our costs to begin an investigation which is deductible from the end cost.

Clients will also lie to us as to the real nature of their case for fear that we would not undertake the case if we knew the truth. An example of this is where someone effectively tries to employ us to stalk an individual on their behalf or gain private information they have no right to obtain. Fortunately we are able to spot when this kind of thing is happening very quickly.

A responsible Private Investigator will also be taking into consideration the mentaL health/state of the prospective client and as this is quite a large topic I have decided to write a separate blog about it so I will just comment that this factor can have a huge effect on an investigation and we do our best to establish what we can in relation to this prior to beginning work.

People who are not in a good state of mental health may not realise that this is the case and so we have to exercise caution when trusting the information given to us until we can satisfy ourselves establish that the client is in a reasonable mental state.

Please see my blog about this issue here

In conclusion...

Trust between an investigator and their client is a big factor and needs to first be established and then maintained throughout the duration of the investigation.

A few simple checks will help a client to find a reputable investigator and an open, communicative relationship should follow while the investigation is executed. Do not be afraid to ask questions as a good investigator will have no problem answering them or meeting you face to face if required.

A prospective client should expect that an investigator will want to get to know their client, establish detail about the case and will ask questions to establish the integrity of the client and the nature of the case. A two way trust relationship needs to established by both parties and in the same way a client needs to trust us to do our job and do it with ethically and with professionalism, an Investigator will also need to establish that the client and the information given is of a trustworthy nature.

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