Pay comparison
Police Pay vs Civilian Salaries
The question every officer thinking about leaving asks first, and the one nobody answers straight: would you actually be better off? Set your rank and pay point below and every civilian career area is ranked against it — on real take-home, after tax, National Insurance and pension on both sides.
Some of these will pay less than you earn now, particularly if you are at the top of your scale. Those are shown as plainly as the ones that pay more.
You take home £1,896 a month on £31,164
| Career area | Typical salary | Take-home | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Compliance & Regulatory | £64,000 | £3,863 | +£1,967/mo |
| Risk & Resilience | £56,000 | £3,476 | +£1,581/mo |
| Cyber Security & Digital Forensics | £49,000 | £3,091 | +£1,195/mo |
| Security | £48,000 | £3,034 | +£1,139/mo |
| Facilities & Operations | £43,000 | £2,751 | +£855/mo |
| Close Protectionindicative | £41,000 | £2,637 | +£742/mo |
| Fraud Preventionindicative | £36,500 | £2,382 | +£487/mo |
| Intelligence & Analysisindicative | £36,000 | £2,354 | +£459/mo |
| Investigationindicative | £34,500 | £2,269 | +£374/mo |
Compare a single career area
Security →
Security Manager, Corporate Security Manager, Loss Prevention Manager
5 common destination roles
Investigation →
Corporate Investigator, Private Investigator, Special Investigations Unit (SIU) Investigator
5 common destination roles
Fraud Prevention →
Fraud Investigator, Counter Fraud Investigator, Financial Crime / Fraud Analyst
5 common destination roles
Compliance & Regulatory →
Compliance Officer, Compliance Analyst, Compliance Manager
6 common destination roles
Risk & Resilience →
Risk Manager, Operational Resilience Manager, Business Continuity Manager
5 common destination roles
Intelligence & Analysis →
Intelligence Analyst, Security Intelligence Analyst, Threat / Cyber Threat Intelligence Analyst
4 common destination roles
Close Protection →
Close Protection Officer (CPO), Executive Protection Officer, Residential Security Team (RST) member
Indicative figures — thin salary sample
Facilities & Operations →
Facilities Manager, Facilities Coordinator, Operations Manager
5 common destination roles
Cyber Security & Digital Forensics →
SOC Analyst, Cyber Security Analyst, Digital Forensics Analyst / Investigator
6 common destination roles
Ready to look?
Every role on this site has been matched against what police experience actually translates to — not keyword-matched.