Rekeying After a Staff Change: A Checklist for Small Businesses
Someone has left and the key has not come back. Or it has come back and you have no way of knowing whether it was copied.
This is the most common commercial call we take, and it is usually smaller and cheaper than people expect — if you change the right things.
What does a commercial rekey cost?
Per cylinder, commercial rekeying runs in a similar range to residential work — roughly $25 to $50 each once a technician is on site, with a call-out fee on top.
The variable is how many doors are involved. A single storefront with two exterior cylinders is a short visit. A suite with interior offices, a stock room and a rear exit is a larger one.
Work outside trading hours costs more, and is usually worth it: the alternative is closing the doors during the day.
Work out what they could actually open
Before changing anything, list the doors that key opened. It is rarely all of them, and rekeying doors nobody had access to costs money for nothing.
For most small businesses the list is: the front entrance, the rear or delivery door, and whichever internal doors that role needed — a stock room, an office, a server cupboard.
If you run a master key system, this is the moment it earns its keep. A properly planned system lets you change one level without disturbing the rest, so the master a manager holds keeps working while the departed key is retired.
The checklist
- List every door that key opened, including any padlocks and cabinets
- Check whether a master or grand master also opens them, and whether it needs to keep working
- Rekey those cylinders and issue a new key to each person who still needs one
- Write down who received which key and have them sign for it
- Change alarm codes and any keypad entry codes at the same time — these get forgotten more often than the keys
- Remove the person from any access control or building intercom system
- Collect keys for anything else they held: post boxes, cash drawers, vehicles, gates
Do it out of hours if you can
A rekey during trading hours means propping doors, interrupted access and a technician working around customers. Most of our commercial rekeys happen after closing or before opening for exactly that reason.
It usually costs a little more per hour and saves more than that in disruption. For a storefront with two or three cylinders it is often under an hour, so an early morning slot before opening is enough.
How to stop repeating this
If you are rekeying more than once a year, the system is the problem rather than the staff.
A master key system planned around roles rather than people means a departure affects one level, not the building. Restricted keys — the kind that cannot be copied at a hardware counter — remove the ‘was it copied’ question entirely, because copies come only from the registered holder.
Electronic access is the other route. Codes and fobs are revoked in software with no locksmith and no visit, which for a business with regular turnover pays for itself quickly. It is a larger up-front job and worth quoting properly.
Need this done? See our Commercial locksmith page, or call (425) 675-6617 and tell us what you have.
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No, and you usually should not. Only the cylinders that key could open need changing. Working out which is the first thing we do on site.
Yes. Most commercial rekeys are done after closing or before opening. Tell us your hours and we will work around them.
A planned hierarchy where each key opens a defined set of doors — a member of staff opens their own area, a manager opens more, and one master opens everything. It means a departure can be handled at one level without touching the rest.
Keys whose blanks are controlled, so they cannot be copied at a hardware counter. Copies are issued only to the registered holder, which removes the question of whether an unreturned key was duplicated.
Same day is usually possible for a rekey after a staff departure, and we can schedule around your opening hours. Tell us how many doors are involved, and the technician will give you the price on site, before any work begins.
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