Eunomia has been appointed by the Security Industry Authority (SIA) to develop a demand forecasting model for the number of applications for security licenses in the UK.

The SIA is the organisation responsible for regulating the private security industry in the UK. It vets and issues security licenses to all private security staff including security guards, CCTV operators, those who deliver cash boxes and others. There are currently around 340,000 active security licenses in circulation.

Forecasting the demand for these security licenses is made challenging due to a number of factors. These include seasonal fluctuations, summer festivals and sporting events that require large teams of security staff. Policy changes, such as those as a result of Brexit, may also have an impact on future applications.

The SIA has commissioned Eunomia to develop a model that can forecast the demand for licenses that takes various external factors – such as seasonal peaks and troughs and other relevant national policies – into account.

Project manager and econometrician at Eunomia, Tanzir Chowdhury will be using the data on historical licence applications from the SIA along with the data on other relevant external factors, and applying advanced time-series econometric techniques such as seasonal ARMAX to build the demand forecasting model.

The project is the first of its kind for Eunomia who are usually approached with briefs from the environmental sector. The project team will also be engaging with stakeholders over the coming months, before a final report is due to be published in February 2018.

Security photo by followtheseinstructions (CC-BY-2.0), via www.flickr.com