Private Investigator: Hard Work If You Can Get it

Forget those late-night reruns of Magnum PI. Being a private investigator is tough work, as Rich Harris of the East Bay Detective Agency explains: "People think it is glamorous, but it isn't. It's a lot of hard work, and a lot of responsibility." Patrick McKee, a private investigator who runs Excelsior Services, Inc., another detective agency, agrees: "It is not necessarily all that much fun."

Perhaps one of the most difficult parts of becoming a private investigator is the arduous licensing process. The State of California requires 6,000 hours of investigative experience, as well as a grueling written exam before an individual receives a private investigator's license. (Harris says he has known police officers with 10 to 12 years experience fail the test on the first try.) Those requirements can make breaking into the field extremely difficult.

Harris advises that "maybe 90% of the investigators I know are retired cops". For those with no law enforcement background, he recommends attending a specialized school (such as the Center-Pro Investigative Training School in Pleasant Hill, which offers a 10-week program that costs just under $5,000) and then seeking an apprenticeship with an established agency to obtain the certified hours of investigation. He cautions, however, that the field is "something of a closed shop", making apprenticeships difficult to obtain.

McKee concurs that entering the field is difficult. With a background in psychology, McKee says he spent years "banging his head against the wall" trying to get the 6,000 hours of investigative experience required to obtain his private investigator's license. "If someone is younger, I would tell them not to go into private detective work. Almost every police department is hiring right now, and they pay well. Go be a cop for awhile."