I think diversteve is confused. The Universal Referral Program is not a WRSTC program, so it matters not who is a member of the WRSTC. In fact, it is not at all clear just who runs the URP anymore. All the links seem to be dead.
SSI Letter of Referral Accepted by PADI for OW Course?
- Thread starter noreuqob
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I think diversteve is confused. The Universal Referral Program is not a WRSTC program, so it matters not who is a member of the WRSTC. In fact, it is not at all clear just who runs the URP anymore. All the links seem to be dead.
It's not a matter of being "more conservative" - it's simply a matter of following standards. PADI has standards for an instructor to follow when receiving a referral from another agency, and those standards require that the student complete the skills assessment and OW final exam before moving on to the open water dives. Easy peasy.
Again, in the spirit of clarification, those are the standards to provide a PADI certification to the referred student. There are no PADI standards if the instructor chooses to accept a referred student from another agency and send that student back to get the cert card from the referring instructor.
It does not matter which card you got for advancement. My OW was SDI. Along the way I have cert cards from SDI, SSI, and PADI whichever was at the right time and by an instructor that I liked. My Solo was SDI and my Dive Master is PADI. Now things would change a bit if I wanted to go on to be an instructor, which I do not, since then there are a couple hoops if you want to cross over but lots of folks jump through them.
LOL. I was trying to bring the discussion back to the OP's questions and the core of the thread.
Not to take this in a different approach, but my question should be along similar lines...
I am PADI certified (OW, AOW, Rescue) and would like to get my Master Scuba Diver cert. I'll be taking a drysuit certification class from an SSI shop. Will I be able to use the SSI drysuit cert as one of my 5 required specialties for MSD, or do they all have to be PADI?
I am PADI certified (OW, AOW, Rescue) and would like to get my Master Scuba Diver cert. I'll be taking a drysuit certification class from an SSI shop. Will I be able to use the SSI drysuit cert as one of my 5 required specialties for MSD, or do they all have to be PADI?
Sorry, they all have to be PADI.
The shop Is correct if they are going to issue you with a Padi certification. To meet standards you would also need a Padi manual and take the Padi quizzes and final exam. This means you are repeating what you have already done with SSI.
Find another shop who will allow you to just complete your OW dives and then send you back to your SSI instructor for the issue of your OW certification.
Padi leaves it up to the individual instructor whether to participate in any cross agency referral scheme.
Personally I am both a Padi and a Naui instructor. Any referral other than Padi I wear my "Naui hat" which eliminates any issues as Naui does encourage Universal referral participation
Find another shop who will allow you to just complete your OW dives and then send you back to your SSI instructor for the issue of your OW certification.
Padi leaves it up to the individual instructor whether to participate in any cross agency referral scheme.
Personally I am both a Padi and a Naui instructor. Any referral other than Padi I wear my "Naui hat" which eliminates any issues as Naui does encourage Universal referral participation
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