Read a job description for one of these today and thought it was interesting! how do you apply to be one and what qualifications do they need?
what hours do they work?
whats the pay like?

I know my old force started employing civilian SOCO's but all they were able to do was deal with car crime incidents and I don't beleive the pay was that great.

Most of our SOCO are civillian

Our lot are a mix of coppers and civvys. We also have the state lab which is all civvys I believe.

As for hours, from experience its strictly 9-5 monday to friday lmao

Major stuff they will come out "out of hours" but its at a push

As for pay I havn't a breeze

Our SOCOs got sent to some other nick

When I was on work experience with Avon and Somerset, I believe some SOCOs were based at HQ in the Crime Lab. They all seemed to be civilian, and were very helpful at showing us around and the different techniques they can use to solve crimes.