Primary Kit - Pay, Prove & Light

3. Pay

Straightforward...mundane...almost too obvious... Have some means to pay for stuff...right?

Of course...it's a fundamental requirement, but I submit that it shouldn't be taken for granted, with 'carry a wallet' being the only advice given.

My suggestion...bin the wallet, at least for work - save this for your personal life, have your motorcycle photos, library cards, whatever you want in that fine leather fashion-statement specimen...but on the job, carry cash and whatever plastic you need and is appropriate, stripped down to the essentials...you're not on a day out, you're not on your own time...you're working - act like it.

Cards are convenient...until they're not. Pre-paid cards are useful for expenses if they can be arranged with the principal/client…but don’t expect this for ad hoc type taskings…

There's ALWAYS going to be a time when for whatever reason - not accepted, damaged, etc - your plastic will fail you...and you'll wish you had cash - because cash is still the boss, despite the irritating push for a purely digital economy...so try and carry as much of it as possible, in sensible denominations - not too big, not too small, and in at least a couple of spots too - eggs/basket/one/don't.

Big bills are impressive, but smaller denomination notes are more flexible – money clips can organise different values easily, that can be identified without taking your hand out of your pocket. Not all bribes - I mean tips obviously - are worth a big ‘un, and it kind of spoils the mood asking for change...it's easy to add a little extra, as needed.

Anyone who has had to ‘financially encourage’ an ‘official’ in certain parts of the world will be acutely aware of the importance of NOT letting them see an opportunity to raise their prices on the spot…once they realise your budget...

Top tip - have an envelope to keep receipts together – note on the back of each receipt what it’s for, since after a day, or week, it’ll be just another slip of paper with faded numbers on it, and maintain a running tally of payments all written on the envelope itself – one per day works great for in-the-field accounting.

Obviously you need the means to cover all personal expenses throughout the course of your day-to-day life, task or not…but as many will know, making a single principal-related payment – just collecting a take-out lunch for instance – can clean you out…obviously you should claim this back…eventually…but this isn't always as timely as we would like, is it?

Local currency is obviously vital – but having a nominal sum for a frequently visited country…just in case…is advisable, and in certain overseas economies, local traders might prefer USD/GBP/EUR to their own currency – do your research.

Take steps to safeguard cards from malicious scanning/cloning, and avoid magnetic-strip corruption when storing cards together - again, there's a whole product industry dedicated to secure/convenient card storage...see what suits you...

Contactless payment methods via smartwatches/phones are becoming more popular and can significantly streamline making payments in restaurants, stores, etc, but exercise caution – any method that makes it easier to pay…also makes it easier to overpay, and worse…

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4. Prove

Like with Pay, straightforward - carry some identification...it's a no-brainer, right?

For sure, definitely NOT rocket-science…but…I'm not making any of this up...I've seen people who regard themselves highly, pay almost no attention to issues that ARE blindingly obvious...taken for granted...and come unstuck as a result, looking decidedly amateurish in the eyes of their principals and colleagues as a result.

Preparation and organisation - supposedly you're being paid good money by someone who trusts your abilities to predict and prevent problem situations, or otherwise resolve them - so take this notion and run with it, apply it first to yourself.

Carry ALL your ID...anything and everything that might be needed to join a casino, rent a car, prevent a further 'producer' from a police officer, leave the country, enter another country, etc...

It should go without saying to have a high-quality electronic back-up of everything – not just for security, but to be ‘agile’ and able to send what someone needs to get you up and running on a job immediately…so they don’t pick someone else, since they’re on the clock too.

It's not hard to carry around such credentials...there's an entire travel accessory industry dedicated to making this as convenient, secure, and discreet as possible...and hopefully they'll never be needed, but how are you going to look if you get that fast ball to leave the country, but have to go home to retrieve your passport first? How about being stopped by law enforcement, and because you don’t have ALL your license/registration/insurance/whatever documents on hand, you get a date to show up and produce them that conflicts with your principal’s travel schedule?

Especially if you're supposed to be 'that' prepared guy who is expected to make things happen?

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5. Light

Without going gadget-crazy...torches, flashlights, whatever - these can have a polarising effect on people...

Some? "Nah Bro...why bother?" "Only at night...Maybe..."

Others? "Give me ALL the lumens!" "I own the night...All your retinas belong to me.."

Day to day...in a professional capacity...carry a white light source.

These days you can easily get a 100+ lumen unit, that’s thumb size - easily enough to search under a vehicle, or check a fence line, when that definitely daytime-only job extends overnight...as they tend to – the size of your thumb…so how exactly have you got a reasonable excuse to NOT bother carrying it?

One point...I would definitely opt for rechargeable EVERYTHING these days – though check with some airlines that might not be so happy with lithium-ion power sources, but if battery-powered pick something that runs on what is likely to be easily sourced, something you can find at a corner grocery store...in Nigeria or Costa Rica maybe...you never know who stocks fancy lithium CR123A, but AAA/AA is everywhere.

Save the searchlight 'instant daylight' 1000+ lumen models for your secondary and support kit...primary kit? On the person? Enough to look under and into a car, find an exit in a power blackout, and similar, is all you need.

A common thought…no need to carry a dedicated white light source, since every smartphone has this amazing ‘flashlight’ feature…

Stop – yes, it is useful on occasion, for finding dropped ear-rings and suchlike…but you’re not searching a car with this, properly, or investigating the bottom of the principal's garden…whilst ON the phone to your team…and you ARE just going to needlessly run your primary device battery down…

Just carry white light. End of story.

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Primary Kit - Intermission

So far I appreciate that all this is very 'non-tactical' and therefore...why bother? As a Combat Operational Deity of the highest order...capable of growing MOLLE on a stone just by staring at it, why am I expending so much effort to make these points that seem ridiculously obvious? Where's the groundbreaking learned-the-hard-way lifesaving tacticool advice?

Or in other words..."Yeah, Yeah, we know all this...get to the exciting stuff that befits my expert self-image..."

Thing is, the fundamentals, the foundations, are always to the first to be neglected in favour of more 'specialised' material.

The very term 'special' can easily and accurately be defined as 'low-percentile' and seldom occurring - quite often the ONLY thing special about something is rarity...and this should be considered when attaching priority to what is, and isn't, important from a training...doing...carrying…perspective.

So far with the EDC stuff I've only scratched the surface, but I had to start somewhere...and I prefer to lead in with the either the most useful...or the most lacking...regardless of the subject concerned.

The 'learned-the-hard-way' advice I mention earlier? Very little of what I teach is a sermon…it’s all a confession – how do I know that something is SO important? Odds are it’s because I once really needed something…and didn’t have it. Pretty-much every job I do sees this scenario playing out to some degree – thankfully Amazon deliver everywhere…tomorrow…

Working the classic risk management 'likelihood vs. severity' model, it is absolutely true that not having the ability to perform an exciting needle decomp, for example, has a somewhat high severity score...and should be a big deal…but...likelihood? Compared to stuff that happens every day...every task...that gets pushed aside, ignored, because...boring?

Here's the deal...it isn't a choice - it's not a case of either do the boring basic stuff OR the advanced exciting stuff - that boring basic stuff is actually the foundation, the footings that you build more specialised skills upon.

What I have learned the hard way, and/or seen others get 'educated' with, is not having enough ID and having to spend almost an entire night sat in a car outside a high-end casino...and the look the principal gives...not being able to light a cigar for someone...and the look the principal gives...not being able to provide a light source during a power cut, or in a parking lot that is darker than was anticipated...and the look the principal gives...not being able to quickly edit an overhead image and send it to a driver so that he knows where to park...and the look a principal gives...sitting around a table with billionaires and taking notes with a cheap-ass pen and cheap-ass notepad...and the look the principal gives...

Not very often are you going to have to tap into your incredible underwater ninja knife fighting skills, saving lives and kicking ass, or get some high-speed Starsky and Hutch driving done, to prove how valuable and indispensable you are - but the daily stuff? The minor problems...massive likelihood, and by the way, you are generally employed as being 'the one' to fix all this...maybe paid quite well...so when you can't, all for want of putting a tiny bit of effort and consideration into the boring stuff...

That ‘look’ the principal gives? It's safe to say that it can generally be translated into "What use IS this person exactly...and why am I paying them so much money?"

Are you there with the intention of being actually useful...or do you approach the job as being like a day out with a rich friend?