Need Advice Plz!!!

[DandyDon]

I have a hunch that you did Referral dives in Mexico or the Carib? Rules are only suggestions down there...

I just wanted to get out of there as fast as i could. After going through this experience i`m totally turned off this once exciting hobby and don't think i have it in me any more to ever go again.And have mixed emotions about this padi?

I hope you are trained well enough to try some real diving, and find it as exciting as you should.

 

[chip104]

Hey log,

Sorry about your experience. That's not how they should do it. Just come over with your girl to the PI. Take the course here.

 

[Jeddah Aquanaut]

PADI sets the standards. There are very specific things you need to do both in the pool and in OW before you are certified. It's all clearly described and the instructors are all trained to understand and follow these standards.

It sounds like what you got was an instructor who didn't follow standards and/or had taken on too many students to finish in the time available. Both of these things are the instructor's responsibility, not the agency.

If I were you, I would give PADI a call and tell them about your experience and see what they say. They'll send you and probably everyone else who was there that day a QA form to fill in and depending on what people tell them, they'll investigate it and deal with the instructor.

Contact information for PADI Canada is 1-800-729-7234. Ask for the Quality Assurance department. I really would recommend calling. PADI is too big to police every instructor all of the time so they really rely on reports like yours to help them.



40 feet is the depth limit for the OW course. He might have filled it in like that to indicate that the maximum depth was within standards. It's a little odd to do that but there might have been some logic to it.



Clearly you need another instuctor. I wouldn't give up on diving because of this. Be careful to choose a good instructor. Get informed, ask them lots of questions (there are some good lists of questions on this board) and get recommendations from other divers in your area. Especially experienced divers will know who is good and who isn't.

R..

Definitely complain! Sorry for the incomprehension, but how is it that people have to even ask the question, of if cr***y service is standard, whether PADI or NAUI...If I were paying the money people pay for OW, and got **** for service, believe me, I'd have something to say about it, and not just on this website! At least this person is asking about it; too many people would just say, "Oh, well that's PADI." So, two points for at least being fair...

 

[oly5050user]

call PADI tell them your story..They will follow up on this..It is definitely not the training agency but the operator..Usually there is your story, their story and the truth..If this happened as you say there will be action taken..Padi will contact other people that had been on the boat that day and get their story to see how closely it matches yours..PADI does suspend and pull certifications from members(dm and instrs) who fail to adhear to standards..They do not want to have an incident/accident that would violate standards that would hold them liable under law..PADI is the only agency that I am aware of /there may be others/ that has a QA department to investigate this type of allegation..

 

[RonFrank]

I would avoid using the Operation that did your training in the future.

I observed a lot of OW students both at the Blue Hole, NM, and in the Keys where on a couple of dives instructors had students on the boat doing the checkout dives.

I've never witnessed the things you describe from either PADI, NAUI, or SSI which are the three agencies that I've observed doing certs.

I my Open Water checkout, if you did not pass a skill, you did it again. If you failed it repeatedly, then you would not pass the course, however that did not happen with any of the students in our checkout dives. But I was there, and they ALL did the skills, and some repeated them when they did not get it right the first time. So, YES, there are instructors out there who are very careful about how they go about the instruction, skill tests, and in general REALLY want to make sure that certified divers have the skills necessary to start diving.

Overcrowding a boat, not taking the time to make sure students understand how their gear goes together, and passing students who fail to meet the training requirmenets is unexcusable. In fact the students should not have passed the pool dives if they could not assemble their gear, or perform the skills.

You should be happy to note that this is NOT a PADI thing, or even an agency thing, but a Training issue with the Dive OP you certified with. If you feel so inclined, I would report this Dive Op to PADI, and note the issues you had with the OW checkout dives. PADI would definately take some sort of action if they were aware that people were getting certified that were not qualified, or at least I beleive they would...

In any event don't get discouraged. You need to find some seasoned dive buddys, take it slow, and start diving. This board is a GREAT way to meet divers, and I've dove with SB members from FL, to UT, to NM, and of course in CO. By in large SB divers are good divers. Having safe, solid and experienced people to dive with is a big help. Diving is awesome, and I think once you start doing so you will discover two things...

1) Diviing is a great way to spend a lot of money on Dive STUFF, and potentially even more on Travel to dive!

2) Diving is Addictive, fun, and opens up new worlds (literally). The first time I witnessed sea turtles, huge coral formations, thousands of fish, etc.. was just THRILLING, and I doubt I'll grow tired of it in my lifetime.

 

[grf88]

Sorry to hear of your bad experience. Don't let this sour you on diving or let it dampen your early enthusiasm. From your previous posts it would appear that you had intended to do an open water referral on Maui, anyway it looks like you ended up on a cattle boat. Take Ron's suggestion and find a group of divers in your area, it would be helpful if you provided a little more information in your profile as to where in Canada you are. Maybe there is an active dive club in your area or a group that other local SB members can direct you to. Don't bother listening to the various agency bashers there are good and bad to be found in any organization, just use other's knowledge and experience to direct you to the best.

Glenn

 

[pt40fathoms]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news... but this is absolutely PADI. .

What garbage! Let me guess, your probably going to say at some point further in this post that you ar not bashing PADI. It'll be interesting how you try and pull that one off.

PADI makes it's money from operations that herd you in and out... don't think they are not aware of this and are turnign a blind eye..

Turning a blind eye? Speculations and accusations such as this prove nothing other than your complete lack of knowledge on the subject. A simple search of the PADI web site shows that they in fact do take action.

To all of you who say I'm agency bashing, give me an example of the last time PADI or SSI pulled a dealerships license for providing this type of service..

See my reply above, then below!

As an SSI instructor, I can tell you that I have written direct complaints about similar practices at facilities which I worked in. The answer was always, "the owner has the right to run their operation as they see fit." Nevermind if it is dangerous, provides a horrible experience or is even outside the standards. The corporate PADI and SSI people do not care. And I'll stand in their corporate headquarters and shout it at them. I've already been on the phone with corporate SSI... and quite frankly - they're a joke.

I can't speak for what SSI does, and if you have a problem with them, then that is yours to deal with. But don't go applying what you see at some other agency to the rest of the world. I have seen bad operators and instructors get their certifications pulled, but PADI will not pull a certification on just the word of one individual. It's a serious matter, and one that needs to be verified fully before action is taken. The problem is when someone does not see a dead body and smoking gun the moment they speak speak up, they feel they are being ignored and "nothing ever gets done" statements start ozing out of them. As I said earlier, just a simple check of the PADI web site will show who has had action taken to address problems. The system works, but id depends on indivuduals who have had bad experiences to come forward and report them. They don't have crystal balls, and they don't have secret PADI Police trying to catch the bad guys.


It's sad when someone takes up the sport, only to be shown in the first few outings how its NOT supposed to work. Log Splitter, call PADI, tell them what you saw and experienced, it's a toll free call and will help ensure that this type of sad event does not happen. PADI Canada 1-800-565-8130

 

[blizzard]

Turning a blind eye? Speculations and accusations such as this prove nothing other than your complete lack of knowledge on the subject. A simple search of the PADI web site shows that they in fact do take action.

Hi,

Not to get in the middle, but can you provide a link to this information on the PADI site? I tried to find where they have investigated (or removed PADI affiliation) from a dive operator, but couldn't find it.

Also, this fellow seems to have done his dives in Maui (on referral), so wouldn't PADI Americas be better to talk to (unless he wants to go through the dive shop that did his class/pool training)?

 

[Diver0001]

Hi,

Not to get in the middle, but can you provide a link to this information on the PADI site? I tried to find where they have investigated (or removed PADI affiliation) from a dive operator, but couldn't find it.

Also, this fellow seems to have done his dives in Maui (on referral), so wouldn't PADI Americas be better to talk to (unless he wants to go through the dive shop that did his class/pool training)?

As far as I know an affiliation is something you buy from PADI. The number of stars you can have is linked to whether or not anyone at the shop is under QA but I don't recall ever hearing of a shop that lost it's affiliation for something one of its instructors did.

On the members side, PADI performs about 400 QA investigations on average every quarter. Measures can range from being expelled, suspended, retrained, forced to sign a compliance agreement and some cases are dropped once all parties have been interviewed.

I don't have any numbers for other agencies.

R..

 

[beachbum70635]

Hi,

Not to get in the middle, but can you provide a link to this information on the PADI site? I tried to find where they have investigated (or removed PADI affiliation) from a dive operator, but couldn't find it.

Also, this fellow seems to have done his dives in Maui (on referral), so wouldn't PADI Americas be better to talk to (unless he wants to go through the dive shop that did his class/pool training)?

Try this link: http://www.padi.com/english/common/courses/qm/report/ This should find the info you are looking for.