Differences between certification bureaus

[jessecurry]

Spurred by a recent discussion I'm wondering what everyone feels(thinks) are the differences between the various certification bureaus.
I was told that PADI is more commercial, while NAUI was more academic. I was also told that PADI sells it's mailing list, which is something that I would frown on.
I haven't received and SCUBA related junk mail, so I can't say one way or another.
What are everyone else's impressions?

Also, have you noticed any difference between where the certifications are accepted? Is there a big advantage in taking one or another?

 

[Fish_Whisperer]

I'm certified through MDEA. It's probably one of the smallest, newest, and little-known of all of the organizations. (In fact, it's not even on SB's list!) I've never had a problem. Once the dive-shop/boat captain/whomever sees my AOW cert. card and I sign their waivers, they're happy and I'm happy.

-Frank

 

[PerroneFord]

You're going to see all kinds of posts saying that the instructor is more important than the agency. I agree. But the agency matters. At least in my view it does. Chances are, if you search out the best, most experienecd instructors, they'll generally be affiliated with only small number of agencies. That's the way it worked out when I started my search for the best instructors I could find.

There are always exceptions though.

 

[Bruciebabe]

PADI does have excellent educational materials and everyone worldwide is familiar with the C cards.
Here in the UK we have BSAC which is a members club. In fact the largest dive club in the world. Training is more geared to UK conditions of cold, low viz, big tide diving. So you get into rescue and deco training earlier. Being a members club it costs less to train and once you have trained there are lots of club activities.
On the tech side I have trained with IANTD so far and cannot fault them. Except for the quaint manuals.

 

[PerroneFord]

LOL quaint! Truer words were never spoken. We used alternate manuals for my IANTD Nitrox courses. They were of great help.

 

[drm]

Agency is important, but the instructor is more important. Having a good instructor is the difference between a great learning experience and just getting by. Research for a good instructor and then look at the agency the instructor is affiliated with. Sometimes, instructors are instructors for more than one agency, which means you can choose which agency you want to associate yourself with.

Dave
www.divingindepth.com

 

[rmannix]

I can only speak of SSI. SSI spun off NASDS and later merged with NASDS. Maybe I should say "acquired" them, as any lost NASDS cards will be replaced with SSI.
As an instructor I could only work thru an SSI store, c cards would only be mailed to the store. All SSI training manuals back then were from Jeppesen which is more well known in aviation training. SSI was relatively unheard of then (early eighties). Had 1 ex-student that moved to LA, visited with him on a business trip out there in 1990 and dove Catalina for the weekend I was there. The PADI divemaster on the boat wasn't going to accept his SSI Specialty Diver card (impossible to get without OW but he couldn't find his OW card). Only showing my instructor card and vouching that I had been his instructor got him on board. Also got upset when we made our second dive with max depths of 60 ft with TBT's of 70 minutes. We were the only ones on board with computers.

For most open water we used a private facility on Lake Travis and were the only local shop that used it. The owner who I eventually got to know well enough that he used me on local commercial dives (which I really appreciated after being laid off from my day job) wasn't the easiest guy to get along with. We shared that facility with many PADI and other groups from Dallas and Houston and from my really-trying-to-be-unbiased observations on their pre-dive lectures and water work I thought we had a much better class. Also must in their defense add that they were coming there for open water work after however many pool sessions while we were able to use 1 pool session (no pool sessions at first, but people wanted it) and do all OW afterwards being local.
Yes we had instructors I would call "below par". I occassionally would get make-ups that missed an OW session from anothers class and dreaded getting them from one in particular.