CMAS referral

[Porris]

Hey

I tried to look for a question of this, but could not find so apologies if this is already answered.

I am PADI certified and did pools and theories here in Finland back in the day and open water dives in tropics (hate cold, murky waters). My gf wants to get certified, but CMAS is the only line that is trained in the vicinity and she thinks like me that murky and cold waters are not something that she is happy with (can do if necessary but looking for options).

Is there similar possibility with CMAS as PADI referral papers? How would that work?

And I know that most probably the easiest and cheapest would be to do the course on where the open water dives would be, but the main point for this is to save time in holiday destination and we are trying to find if that is even possible before taking into consideration other factors.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Etmutt]

not sure i get the question but :

if your gf is certified cmas 1 star; most dive shop would consider she can dive with an open water level group

if your question is wether padi recognize cmas training as part of their open water courses; then the answer is no.

if you want to know whether a cmas instructor would recognize dive/training done with an other instructor; then there are no clear answer. depending on local regulations he could ; but you would want to confirm that with him before

 

[JMarc]

CMAS is closer to RSTC than to PADI. It is a coordination of national federations which have their own rules but recognize each other certifications.

Referrals to start a certification with one federation and finish it with another seems implausible to me, but some federations may have additional agreements outside of CMAS to allow them.

Starting with one instructor of a federation and finishing with another of the same federation is an internal matter of the federation. Those I'm familiar with allows it. But then it is up to the instructors to accept the usage of that possibility. You'd have to find at your vacation place an instructor of your local federation and ensure they accept the referral.

 

[Porris]

I think I wrote my question poorly. Sorry about that.

I meant that does CMAS recognize the concept of "referral papers"? Meaning if she starts with CMAS in Finland, can she do the open waters with CMAS in other dive shop / instructor? Is this common practice?

If we compare to PADI, this is known and common practice inside PADI instructors in different places.

I did not mean to mix things up and start her with CMAS and end with eg. PADI or SSI or anything else.

Sorry for the confusion!

 

[Etmutt]

ah ok then the answer is mostly no. you might find an instructor that would accept to finish a training started elsewhere but it is unlikely.

 

[lowwall]

If she just wants to dive warm water, then do the whole thing through a PADI or SSI shop at your destination. The key is to complete all the e-learning before you get there. If that's done, the confined water portion can be completed in a day and that's all the time you'd lose compared to a referral.

The training will normally be minimal compared to what you'd receive locally via CMAS. But it's good enough to safely dive in typical vacation destinations.

 

[Porris]

Thanks all for the answers!