How to vet a dive shop

[Heatheroe]

How do you let divers tag along? We don’t allow that at all. Instructors, DMs and students. That’s it.

I would have been on the side of the pool if the instructor allowed it or in their observation room. Not in the pool.

 

[Marie13]

Groupon should have been a warning right away. Stay away from them.

 

[Heatheroe]

You've been disappointed for 8 years now. Maybe you just need to go to the place you had your best experience and get certified.

I think you are right. But while Utila may be one of the cheapest places in the world to get certified, getting there definitely is not cheap.

 

[Heatheroe]

Groupon should have been a warning right away. Stay away from them.

I know but we had not seen the groupon and didn't find out until we were in the first class and had already paid $600 for the 2 of us. We were the only ones who paid full price. I think he was cutting corners to save money since he had offered and sold so many Groupons.

I have let it go after all these years and surprisingly the shop is still in business. We saw him once a few years later at the airport in Bonaire. I'm sure he didn't recognize us but I gave him the stink eye the whole plane ride home, haha.

 

[yle]

I get this question quite often and have addressed it here before. I have a list of questions I recommend students ask. Two sets actually. One for the shop and one for the instructor. Both can be found in my book but to not run afoul and get accused of shameless self-promotion here are the basic questions. If you want more details on each, that's in the book. There's too much to post it all here.
For the instructor:

1. “When did you become an instructor?”
2. "Have you had any large gaps in your teaching career? How recently? How many courses have you taught in the past year?"
3. “What is your certifying agency?”
4. “How much time is required for the course?”
5. “How large are the classes?”
6. “What equipment do you provide and what do I as the student need to supply?”
7. “Is your class schedule set or flexible?”
8. “Do you teach skin diving skills?”
9. “What methods do you use to teach proper weighting?”
10. “What methods do you use to address the panic cycle?”
11. “Do you teach students to perform skills in a horizontal position from the beginning of the class?”
12. “Will I have time to just swim and practice the skills we learn?”
13. “Can I sit in on a class or pool session?”
14. “What methods do you use to teach buoyancy and trim?”
15. “How much time will I get to practice these skills?”
16. “Do you dive with students after class has ended?”
17. “Where do you do your checkout dives?”
18. “How many places have you been diving?”
19. “When was the last time you were diving?”
20. “How often do you dive for fun?"

In your book do you explain what reasonable answers to these questions should be? It doesn't really help the OP to tell her to ask the instructor all these questions if she has no way to evaluate the answers.

Even worse, if I had a potential student grilling me with this many questions, I would just imagine how difficult they would be in the water. As an instructor, I evaluate students from the beginning at least as much they evaluate me. And a student with this many questions would give me the impression they would demand far more than their fair share of my attention during the class, which would be unfair to the rest of the students.

Before they reached question 10, I would suggest to them that the instructor they need is a guy named Jim Lapenta. And then I'd point them in your direction.

 

[yle]

I have let it go after all these years and surprisingly the shop is still in business. We saw him once a few years later at the airport in Bonaire. I'm sure he didn't recognize us but I gave him the stink eye the whole plane ride home, haha.

Hmmm...

I read your earlier posts. It seems like the issue you had with this shop was scheduling of pool and OW sessions. You wanted to have your OW course done before a vacation, they gave you the impression it could be done, but then the scheduling didn't work.

And eight years later you're still giving him the "stink eye" over this.

Before trying to find the "right shop", you might want to work on figuring out why you feel so wronged by the owner of the first shop. Sounds to me like it has little to do with the owner's actions.

Once you're able to do that, find a local shop and get certified with them. But go in with realistic expectations. A wide variety of issues can cause scheduling problems... the availability of a pool, availability of an instructor, the comfort level of the students and the amount of time they need to become proficient in their skills, and of course the weather.

I've had students finish their OW course in a matter of a few weeks, and I've had some that had planned for a few weeks but ended up taking several months. The course can be done fairly quickly, but only if all the above factors fall into place just right. It has little to do with the competence of the shop, everything to do with just the way life is.

 

[Esprise Me]

OP, what are you hoping to get out of sitting next to the pool during your sister's training?

 

[wgw04024]

First shop I did OW with was 'ok' at best. It was cold, so not long dives, not fantastic instruction from one of the instructors. I had this gut feeling during, and confirmed it after. Did my AOW with another shop in the same city, and it was fantastic. Learned most everything from them. You may not know until you know...

 

[Steve_C]

Shops here will let you, one of them if you have ever taken a class with them will provide free rental gear including full tank for it. Just don't interfere with the classes.

You are not certified. You are a huge liablilty. If they let you tag along, then you become their problem and responsability. I can not think of any instructor who would let an uncertified diver tag along on a lesson.

Your sister is trying to tell you something. Listen to her. Doing 100 discover scubas is not the same training as taking 1 decent OW course and getting certified. Taking the first two weeks of a math course over and over and over is not the same as taking the course all the way through.

 

[Belzelbub]

If they are going to be diving together, then at some point I want to see them dive together. This way, I get to identify any problems caused by the 'seasoned' diver and make sure that they have the same signals and protocols. This is especially important if the 'seasoned' diver has learned bad habits or holds to some of the old ways.

That makes sense. I got to drive along with both my daughters during their classes. For the oldest, she was part of a larger group. Actually two separate groups from the same shop, but different instructors. When they were doing the skills part, I kept well clear, and really just observed and recorded on my GoPro. I did buddy up with her for other parts of the dive.

For the younger, she was in a much smaller group. Her, and two adults, so I was her buddy, and did all the skills along side her for each dive.

In both cases, this was all cleared with the instructors before hand.