For private clients

Do you have a personal matter that you don’t know how to solve? Are you unsure whether to use a private investigator?

We’ve found that lawyers are very familiar and comfortable with using private investigators. Business owners and executives also have a pretty good idea of what we can do for them. But domestic clients with personal cases have almost never used a private investigator before, and they have questions.

We’re regularly asked: Is this something you even do? Is this legal? Am I crazy asking this? How much will it cost?

So we’ve put together a list of some of our recent cases, and how much they cost our clients. You may see a similar situation to yours.

• Dating background check. Our client suspected the person she was dating was married. We did some database checks and brief surveillance and confirmed he did have a wife and kids he wasn’t telling her about. She ended the relationship and was able to move on.
  8.5 hours + mileage. $896 + GST
• Cheating husband. Our client had suspected for a while. We followed the husband for a few days, and caught him out while he was supposed to be going to the gym. Her suspicions were proved right.
  27 hours + mileage. $2,852 + GST.
• Finding an address for court proceedings. Our client was taking someone to court but needed their address. This is a very common case for us and we have a standard trace service.
  Standard trace fee. $300 + GST.
• Cheating wife. Things weren’t quite right and he knew it. She was regularly out with ‘friends’, the gym, shopping. He hardly saw her and she paid him little attention. But he owned her car so we were able to put a GPS tracker on it. After a month we identified a pattern (including when she was likely meeting a lover). Some short surveillance confirmed it. 
  9 hours + GPS tracker + mileage. $1,987 + GST.
• Life and business partner background check. Things were getting serious in our client’s new relationship. She was considering bringing her partner into her life, her kid’s lives, and her very successful business. We did extensive surveillance and other enquiries and identified a few lifestyle areas of concern. Given the opportunity, he was open and honest about them to the client, so she was able to proceed, albeit with steps in place to address the issues and mitigate any loss to her if necessary.
  185 hours + mileage. $19,593 + GST
• Teenager welfare check. Our clients were worried about their only daughter’s lifestyle. We followed her for 3 weekends in a row for 24h each day. We had to use 2 agents as it was a difficult follow. There were significant areas of concern with her lifestyle that they were able to address.
  288 hours + mileage. $29,232 + GST.
• Locating a scammer. Our client paid for something online and never heard anything again. The scammer was based in NZ though. After some digging, we were able to find out where they lived and recover the money.
  7.75 hours + mileage. $879 + GST.
• Dispute with a cowboy builder. Our client’s project was half completed but the builder was hardly ever there to finish it. He had all the excuses in the world. And there were cost over-runs due to various events. We were able to fact-check these and found that all of them were false, he was taking them for a ride. They took these facts to the disputes tribunal and won their case.
  32 hours + mileage. $3,378 + GST.
  
• Checking on a potential child. Our client had a short relationship and thought he may have fathered a child. If so, he wanted to make sure the child was being well cared for. We were able to find the mother, and establish paternity. It wasn’t our client’s and he was able to move on.
  12 hours. $1,200 + GST.

Seen a way we can help you? Talk to us now.

Articles on personal and domestic cases for private investigators.