I live in a country where everybody can go diving without cert and everybody can found his own agency and can say I am instructor and is allowed to teach. So I know people who print their own cards for their own agency. Also I know 2 people who teach cave courses without being cave instructor from any recognised agency.
For recreational diving you have (W)RSTC, a group of agencies that set guidelines. These guidelines must in Europe be within NEN/ISO to be recognised. We have in Europe also the EUF.
Of course none of these self founded agancies is within these groups. But especially beginners in diving don't know that this can be important abroad.
There is an agency here where I did my first course that talked about 'herkenning' instead of 'erkenning'. These words are in Dutch different, but in English, both are more or less recognition. Happely my second cert was from an RSTC agency, so I never had problems abroad. But I did not know as beginner.
To get the iso/nen, this is quite expensive.
A couple of years ago we had in Germany an agency that said they were member of CMAS and said you get a CMAS cert according to the CMAS rules. But the real story was that they were member of CMAS (that was possible in that time), but were not allowed to certify CMAS certs. Also TDI and IANTD for example were member of CMAS, but you never got a CMAS cert there. So member of CMAS was not lied, following the CMAS rules also not, but you did not get a real CMAS cert, you got a cert with a waternymph that looked like the real CMAS logo but it wasn't.
After CMAS said in 2018, no individuell members anymore, this agency changed his name, but then it stated they had an ISO cert. The real thing was, they paid to use the ISO-logo. A big difference.
In technical diving, there is no real iso/nen, so everybody can print cards, teach, whatever and then it is just what divecenter accepts the certs. Certs from TDI, IANTD, GUE are most times accepted everywhere, but some got already problems with IART. Also agencies as SSI had problems in the past (the reason was according to the divecenters who refused tech certs from ssi that instructors who never did any technical dive were in 1 weekend normoxic or cave instructor). Not IART and SSI seem to be better accepted.
An argument you hear in my country quite often is for example from divecenters and instructors that you need a cert for drysuit diving, otherwise no insurance. That is complete ******** and nonsense. Another argument is that you don't have insurance if you dive outside certification limits. Also that is nonsense. In my country this is all within the normal health insurance everybody needs to have.
It can be different abroad, then you have to read your travelinsurance. They sometimes speak about a maximum depth, never about the requirement of a drysuit or sidemount cert.
When I started diving, I have done everything that was outside certs. So as open water diver I did nightdives to 24m. When I got my aow I started experimenting with decompressiondiving on a single tank on air. I also started solodiving. And the complaints from others came. I always said: 'What kind of law this is written in what you tell me? ' And as there is no law, they cannot complaign. I also have taken people on an introduction dive when I was just 3*/dm.
A couple of months ago we had a discussion in my diveclub about a member who was doing dives on his own without being certified as ow/1*. Some really got angry at that diver. I said, as instructors we cannot get angry, we cannot complaign, we only can advice. And we can set rules that he cannot dive without instructor on a club dive. But what he does in his free time, we cannot say anything about it, only advice.
And complaigning about behaviour of others is very easy and is sometimes really talking behind backs. You see it on social media, 'asking about behaviour of others' and then just seeking agreement. But why haven't you asked the diver you are talking about for a reason of why he did things? That is how you have to do it.
In the Thai cave rescue were some divers involved that haven't done any cave course. But nobody was complaigning. They were heros. So even in such a difficult part of diving self training is possible. Probably not for 99.9% of the divers who better can take a course, but it is possible.
I am also an autodidact in diving. My club was too slow, but started complaigning about my diving. But they did not help me to find out what I wanted to do. So I had to do myself. But because of the way people complaign I have done all tech levels withing 6 months. I was 18 months after my open water full cave certified and 2 years after my open water full trimix and did my first 100m dive. Ok, my certifying dive for full cave was dive no. 390 and for full trimix 521. So I have dived a lot in 24 months. But I wanted.
When I look back, I can say that I did not learn anything from aow, nothing from nitrox (just read the book yourself and you know the same), nothing from my normoxic (The certifying dive was just 4 meter deeper than my dive for ART, calculations are all the same, did the course with 1 stage). I learned from my full trimix and my full cave as I had never been in caves before. I learned myself drysuit, sidemount, I learned myself dpv including cave dpv, ccr cave and I learned myself diving with a dual/bo ccr.
Now I only teach normoxic with 2 stages as then it is more than just a few meters deeper from ART. I teach full trimix with 3 cylinders (2 is allowed, but no, too less in my eyes to get prepared for a real 100m dive).
For dpv I was doing that before there were courses, same with the bo ccr. So without people that start doing things, courses will never come. Courses will come when there is a need or an ask for. But there will always be a first without a course. And maybe I am a dinosaur in diving as the CCR cave is there only from about 2010 as course, dpv cave from about 2014 I guess and bo ccr just a year. And when I teach now for example ccr cave, I follow the standards, but I also can tell about my own experience and mistakes. My own mistakes are no secret.
I think that this is also important, don't hide mistakes you made, others can learn about it.
For recreational diving you have (W)RSTC, a group of agencies that set guidelines. These guidelines must in Europe be within NEN/ISO to be recognised. We have in Europe also the EUF.
Of course none of these self founded agancies is within these groups. But especially beginners in diving don't know that this can be important abroad.
There is an agency here where I did my first course that talked about 'herkenning' instead of 'erkenning'. These words are in Dutch different, but in English, both are more or less recognition. Happely my second cert was from an RSTC agency, so I never had problems abroad. But I did not know as beginner.
To get the iso/nen, this is quite expensive.
A couple of years ago we had in Germany an agency that said they were member of CMAS and said you get a CMAS cert according to the CMAS rules. But the real story was that they were member of CMAS (that was possible in that time), but were not allowed to certify CMAS certs. Also TDI and IANTD for example were member of CMAS, but you never got a CMAS cert there. So member of CMAS was not lied, following the CMAS rules also not, but you did not get a real CMAS cert, you got a cert with a waternymph that looked like the real CMAS logo but it wasn't.
After CMAS said in 2018, no individuell members anymore, this agency changed his name, but then it stated they had an ISO cert. The real thing was, they paid to use the ISO-logo. A big difference.
In technical diving, there is no real iso/nen, so everybody can print cards, teach, whatever and then it is just what divecenter accepts the certs. Certs from TDI, IANTD, GUE are most times accepted everywhere, but some got already problems with IART. Also agencies as SSI had problems in the past (the reason was according to the divecenters who refused tech certs from ssi that instructors who never did any technical dive were in 1 weekend normoxic or cave instructor). Not IART and SSI seem to be better accepted.
An argument you hear in my country quite often is for example from divecenters and instructors that you need a cert for drysuit diving, otherwise no insurance. That is complete ******** and nonsense. Another argument is that you don't have insurance if you dive outside certification limits. Also that is nonsense. In my country this is all within the normal health insurance everybody needs to have.
It can be different abroad, then you have to read your travelinsurance. They sometimes speak about a maximum depth, never about the requirement of a drysuit or sidemount cert.
When I started diving, I have done everything that was outside certs. So as open water diver I did nightdives to 24m. When I got my aow I started experimenting with decompressiondiving on a single tank on air. I also started solodiving. And the complaints from others came. I always said: 'What kind of law this is written in what you tell me? ' And as there is no law, they cannot complaign. I also have taken people on an introduction dive when I was just 3*/dm.
A couple of months ago we had a discussion in my diveclub about a member who was doing dives on his own without being certified as ow/1*. Some really got angry at that diver. I said, as instructors we cannot get angry, we cannot complaign, we only can advice. And we can set rules that he cannot dive without instructor on a club dive. But what he does in his free time, we cannot say anything about it, only advice.
And complaigning about behaviour of others is very easy and is sometimes really talking behind backs. You see it on social media, 'asking about behaviour of others' and then just seeking agreement. But why haven't you asked the diver you are talking about for a reason of why he did things? That is how you have to do it.
In the Thai cave rescue were some divers involved that haven't done any cave course. But nobody was complaigning. They were heros. So even in such a difficult part of diving self training is possible. Probably not for 99.9% of the divers who better can take a course, but it is possible.
I am also an autodidact in diving. My club was too slow, but started complaigning about my diving. But they did not help me to find out what I wanted to do. So I had to do myself. But because of the way people complaign I have done all tech levels withing 6 months. I was 18 months after my open water full cave certified and 2 years after my open water full trimix and did my first 100m dive. Ok, my certifying dive for full cave was dive no. 390 and for full trimix 521. So I have dived a lot in 24 months. But I wanted.
When I look back, I can say that I did not learn anything from aow, nothing from nitrox (just read the book yourself and you know the same), nothing from my normoxic (The certifying dive was just 4 meter deeper than my dive for ART, calculations are all the same, did the course with 1 stage). I learned from my full trimix and my full cave as I had never been in caves before. I learned myself drysuit, sidemount, I learned myself dpv including cave dpv, ccr cave and I learned myself diving with a dual/bo ccr.
Now I only teach normoxic with 2 stages as then it is more than just a few meters deeper from ART. I teach full trimix with 3 cylinders (2 is allowed, but no, too less in my eyes to get prepared for a real 100m dive).
For dpv I was doing that before there were courses, same with the bo ccr. So without people that start doing things, courses will never come. Courses will come when there is a need or an ask for. But there will always be a first without a course. And maybe I am a dinosaur in diving as the CCR cave is there only from about 2010 as course, dpv cave from about 2014 I guess and bo ccr just a year. And when I teach now for example ccr cave, I follow the standards, but I also can tell about my own experience and mistakes. My own mistakes are no secret.
I think that this is also important, don't hide mistakes you made, others can learn about it.
, would regularly come around on boats and check each dive boat for the certification and insurance tickets around the common dive sites.
