No dive ops have replied to my emails!

[parrotheaddiver]

Planning :11: ?! What's that jawfish?
We don't need no stinkin' planning.

I don't mean to answer for jawfish but I think she is saying that if you want a certain dive op and that dive op only has one boat that can only accommodate 6-8 divers and if you wait until the last minute to book that op may be full. There are probably 99+ other dive ops on the island to choose from though.

 

[UltimateAg]

Yeah I understood parrot. I got who I wanted though, Christi w/ BXTS! :dazzler1:

 

[WaterWayne]

At the risk of whipping this tired horse...

...these are places that all say that they prefer email. Some have online forms that they request one fill out. I can certainly understand that some people prefer not to use email ... those individuals would be better off not saying they prefer it.

Precisely. Additionally, especially given the known problems with local connections, as Christi explained, companies should always provide alternate contact information.

Case in point: I tried to reserve rooms at the Fiesta hotel in San Carlos, MX, that boasts on their website: "Reservations by email are faster, more reliable and cost nothing." They have no telephone number listed at all. When they didn't respond to two emails in four days to their account on Hotmail, I had to contact the dive op for the hotel's phone number. (The hotel's website-advertised rates were too good to pass up, and most other lodgings were already sold out for my relatively imminent trip.)

Another case: I selected my dive op in Cabo Pulmo, MX, based on email exchanges. It's ironic because this op (Pepe's) worked off intermittent satellite connection straight from the beach. Miguel S. was still able to respond better than ops in town (Cabo San Lucas), most of whom didn't answer at all for whatever reason.

As for me, I prefer email as a first choice because I can quickly post the same basic questions to multiple businesses by copying-n-pasting. Not only that, but I'll have a name associated with written quotes (from their own hands, not just my phone call scribblings), and an email thread that I can reference from any Internet cafe on my Yahoo account (or Hotmail, etc.)

Bottom line: If an outfit touts email but can't work it, then what else might be faulty with their advertising?

Cheers,
Wayne

 

[ggunn]

At the risk of whipping this tired horse...

Bottom line: If an outfit touts email but can't work it, then what else might be faulty with their advertising?

Well, it might not be their fault. As Christi pointed out, the major cable ISP on Cozumel has over the last few months had severe probs connecting its customers to the internet. The websites which are on servers work fine; it's the link to the individual customers that has probs and sometimes (frequently) isn't working at all. I don't know the particular cases in point, but it may very well be that the ops in question have little or no incoming email.

 

[thinkingdiver]

Try www.divecozumel.net
It's slow season in Cozumel too- you should be able to find any number of operators.

I'm starting to get a bit nervous. I emailed my preferred Cozumel dive operator (not that I've been to Cozumel before, but reading lots of posts here gave me a clear and strong preference for a particular company) a couple of weeks ago with particulars of our trip about 6 weeks later, what days we wanted to dive, etc. I got an auto-reply saying that they'd gotten the email and would reply before long. After nearly a week with nothing further I phoned, only to learn they were fully booked for much of our stay. They nicely provided names of two alternates. Now, neither has responded to emails from last week, or at least I haven't received any replies.

I prefer email for this sort of thing because I can get my thoughts organized ahead of time to make my request succinct and clear and because it gives me clear responses. Plus, I don't have to try frantically scribbling down everything during a phone call. I know Cozumel hasn't had the most reliable internet service lately, but I'm wondering if it can really be that bad or if it's me. I'm starting to worry that we'll show up in July and be stuck using Scuba Du at the Presidente.

 

[scubawife]

Keep in mind that some of them that have one boat are the whole business. They are the DM, gear washer, reservations dept and manager. If they've got a week of a full boat, it can be a long hard day. Anyone who is running a business on their own anywhere can appreciate that sorting the mail (post or electronic) sometimes has to wait if there are customers at your door. I don't think it's right to automatically assume that just because you don't get an immediate reply they aren't a good business. When you're on the boat getting a days worth of personal attention, someone else isn't getting an immediate reply to their email.

 

[Christi]

Keep in mind that some of them that have one boat are the whole business. They are the DM, gear washer, reservations dept and manager. If they've got a week of a full boat, it can be a long hard day. Anyone who is running a business on their own anywhere can appreciate that sorting the mail (post or electronic) sometimes has to wait if there are customers at your door. I don't think it's right to automatically assume that just because you don't get an immediate reply they aren't a good business. When you're on the boat getting a days worth of personal attention, someone else isn't getting an immediate reply to their email.

Great post Scubawife and I for one appreciate it!

Jeremy is a perfect example of that! Although I don't dive every day and I have a full-time divemaster, I have alot of other responsibilities if I am not diving or working with a student. I spend alot of time seeing the boat off, meeting during SI's, picking up the gear when the boats come back in, and attending to a variety of customers needs while they are actually here on the island as well as a plethora of other business and personal related obligations.

While the e-mails are certainly important, patience is also very much appreciated, because you are right...those of us with smaller operations wear MANY hats...sometimes I feel I need to be Superwoman just to get through the day. I know that people simply don't realize what goes into getting them out on that 4 to 5 hour dive trip Having set office hours has certainly helped, but also keeps me from e-mails when people are in the office checking-in or even just wanting to chit chat...that's part of what this business is about...building relationships and making sure people enjoy their vacations.

Moral to the story...go easy on your dive op if they don't get back to you immediately...none of us want to turn away or lose business by ignoring e-mails and we do try to respond as quickly as possible

 

[diveborg]

You answered your own question in the first post "they are fully booked" so why waste time answering e mails when there is going to be no return on it for them.

I can think of 2 reasons. Politeness and good customer service. Even if they are full this time, they might not be the next time the customer is looking to book some dive trips.

 

[mstevens]

After a few more days, Deep Blue did respond to my emails and we'll be doing some diving with them. After the initial lag, all other email seems to have gone off without a hitch. Dive Cozumel responded almost immediately to emails about some IANTD courses we wanted to take with them.

I guess the bottom line is that divers need to be aware that Cozumel has unreliable internet service. Operators might want to discourage email via their websites in favor of having people phone (it's not that expensive, and SkypeOut is 8 euro cents per minute).

 

[WaterWayne]

Moral to the story...go easy on your dive op if they don't get back to you immediately...

Absolutely, Christi (and others); I don't want to come across as some impatient jerk. The point I was unsuccessfully trying to bolster was the one about operations that tout email as their preferred method, and therefore don't provide phone numbers, but who are then not reachable by email.

That's obviously not the case with Blue XTSea, whose website provides an email option, as well as Mexican, U.S., and Canadian phone access. The additional invitation to follow up within 24 hours should be used as an example in the first class of the course titled "Your Business on the Internet."

Not incidentally, Christi, since I'm a long-time technoid who's worked professionally with TelMex and several other providers around the world, your details filled in some answers to some long-standing, non-diving questions of mine about local businesses and their services.

Cheers at the conclusion of this transmission,
Wayne