Socal Chartered Boat Dive Protocol

[Codyjp]

...snip...
2. Saying that "No one really knows when the boat will leave..." is totally unfair. IF you were one of the people on this boat, you would know that at 6am we pull the roster and do a roll call... if everyone on the roster says "here" we leave.
...snip...

Just so we are clear. You DID do a roll call at 6am correct? Were all 18 people on board? Are you saying you had 18 people say "here?" Didn't you know you were leaving 2 people behind? Did you try to call them? Phillip can you please clarify this for us?

Thanks

 

[limeyx]

Just so we are clear. You DID do a roll call at 6am correct? Were all 18 people on board? Are you saying you had 18 people say "here?" Didn't you know you were leaving 2 people behind? Did you try to call them? Phillip can you please clarify this for us?

Thanks

I dont think it's the boat or charters obligation to be calling anyone honestly (unless the boat is cancelled).

Once the departure time hits, the boat leaves -- no questions.

However, I do agree in this case that the departure time sounds really (needlessly) confusing.

"Get here at 6, boat leaves at 7" seems way simpler to me, and if everyone happens to be checked in at 6:18 then by all means leave then.

If the charter/boat is so concerned with getting away "early" -- make it check in at 6, leave at 6:30 (or even check in at 5:3) -- easy, and cannot get messed up.

The "check in" time puts some thought in people's heads to actually leave enough time to get their gear on board before departure, but IMO you need a simple hard "we do not leave before XX unless everyone is 100% onboard" statement. Nothing vague.

 

[merxlin]

So (as usual) there are the 3 sides of the story: his, hers, and somewhere in the middle, the truth.

 

[ScubaCenterTemecula]

Peer pressure has nothing to do with the offer to resell. Neither Karen or I thought of that option while on the phone. Or if she did, she didn't mention it. But as aleady established by Karen's earlier post and confirmed by me, I did offer seats on any other trip in 2008. In fact, since you are going to be here March 6, why not stay a couple more days and go on the March 8 trip that is on the schedule?

AND FYI... the offer stands. I said it, I stand by it. Use it or sell it, be my guest.

Phillip

Well, this is unfortunate. As Karen's dive partner for this trip, I was holding back from posting assuming Phillip at Scuba Center Temecula would do the right thing. His hard-line approach through 95% of this however (yes I see the offer to resell after peer pressure was applied) is most disturbing. I've been on several charters in several areas, the general protocol is as most people have stated - there is a time when you can start to check in and there is a departure time. Yes, there are those who are late for departure times but usually we wait 10 minutes to be good sports. There's no complicated double-speak to decipher, or secret drop-dead times when trips really leave despite whatever his newly-modified website says.

Yes, I too was dumb-founded to see the boat had left when Karen and I arrived at 6:30. It usually takes us all of 15 minutes to get our gear squared away on a typical boat. We're usually the ones laughing and helping others with spare o-rings or whatever. Those who know the Bottom Scratcher will know there is a bait stand right at the pier where the boat is docked. I went in and talked to the guys in there at 6:30 (ask them if you like next time you're around). They were kinda surprised the boat took off at 6:15 but that's what happened. Karen and I sat in our car and made several cells phone calls to try and find another charter operator. I'll hunt around and find a way to post that bill online if requested so everyone can see we were not lying about being there at 6:30 as Phillip makes it sound.

What's troubling is we talked to the shop the night before the trip about exact weights needed for the trip (we went diving with another operator that saturday and needed to tweak a couple things). The shop knew we were planning to show up. On Sunday, after we missed the boat, we waited for the Temecula shop to open and we called - we asked if we had screwed up the departure time as we missed the trip. The kid at the shop, Jason, said "no" - the departure time was 7am on his paperwork. So, even the shop employees didn't know about the ultra-strict time rules Phillip has for his trips! That's one of the two things that bother me about all this - I don't think everyone really knew the rules were that strict. The bottom line is Phillip made a mistake I think in assuming all were on board, and now he wants to hide behind all this flim-flam about check-in times vs. departure times vs. roll-call times or whatever. Why not just say, hey I made a mistake, my bad, here's the money or here's a trip you can resell. No, just no refund for any reason about a 100 times in a row.

The other thing that bothers me is his characterization that Karen changed the story several times to weasel some money out of the guy. The truth is we were there at 6:30, plenty of time to ensure a 7am departure, period. We did all we could beforehand to call and confirm reservations, weight and air rentals, etc. There was no need to leave early. Karen also did not say she was going trash the guy on the board or sue him or whatever. I was there - she was actually going to be too polite and forget it, thinking she had made the mistake. I said I thought we should demand a refund. What's best about her is she has a hard time being mean to anyone. I, on the other hand, have no problem working hard to ensure this guy does the right thing. There's no need to paint Karen as a flake when it's Phillip's operation that has the poor process and confusing procedures. I will guess the offer to transfer or resell the two spots will be revoked when he reads this, which is fine. I'm more interested in proving a point here than prying some money out of this guy's grubby hands. So, if the dive industry is evolving into a place where everything has to become a bare-knuckle fight just get things settled then fine, I can adapt. I will miss however the sport where people were decent and the golden rule applied.

- Rod

 

[ScubaCenterTemecula]

Just so we are clear. You DID do a roll call at 6am correct? Were all 18 people on board? Are you saying you had 18 people say "here?" Didn't you know you were leaving 2 people behind? Did you try to call them? Phillip can you please clarify this for us?

Thanks

As I said I pulled the roster, the roster on the boat is made up of names of people that have checked in. Check in was clearly "No later than 6am."

For the life of me, and maybe I'm just crazy or something, but I still don't understand the confusion. It was abundantly clear that check in was "BY 6am"... As I see it... we waited 15 minutes not just ten, but 15... if they HAD shown up, of course we would have waited... but they didn't. They were, according to the dive partner, 30 minutes late for check-in. How long should we wait for someone? 30 minutes, an hour, two hours? How long do YOU want to sit around waiting for someone that may or may not show up? You made it on time... why didn't they? Not every trip, but many trips have people that just don't show up.. for one reason or another.

 

[merxlin]

Whether we agree or disagree with the check-in versus departure time policy, it is the shops policy. I am sure if people were missing boats all the time they would either be out of business or have changed it by now. The shop has been consistent in their take on this and has made an offer to let the OP recoup her $$.

The bottom line is things happen. I for one just wanted to see how the shop would handle it, and it seems that they have at least tried to work with the OP. I hope that the next round of posts are from the peraevum with offers to sell a boat trip for 2.

Just my $.02 ($.0083 after taxes)

 

[peraevum]

First of all, thank you Phillip for reaching out and offering resell-able credit to us. If it is actually possible to sell the two spots to someone else and essentially get that cash back, it would be hugely appreciated. However, I am not sure how easy a task like that would be. I assume it would involve advertising on various message boards and, if successful, waiting for a check in the mail. Although I would be glad to spend the extra time to advertise and sell the spots, I worry most about the risk of not being able to sell it off. (Does anyone have experience selling single spots on Scubaboard? If it's not that difficult, I'd be open to doing so.) Would it be possible to sell the spots through your operation? I am not certain, but it seemed like you were able to sell every spot on that Bottom Scratcher trip. If you typically are able to sell out your spots, then it might go smoothly for everyone if we can sell the spot through your operation.

As for the suggestion that Rod spend a couple more days in Los Angeles to claim my credit, that may be a possibility, but I cannot speak for him and the terms of his business trip. His boss and his company don't have an obligation to pay for extra hotel days or allow vacation time because of this ordeal. Our dive trip to LA had a definitive beginning and end, and I would rather be safe and assume right now that he cannot make such promises to actually extend a trip. Again, not saying this is impossible but would rather be safe and not make promises.

Refunds and credits aside, I think it's important right now that I speak up about any accusations brought up against me that might affect how I'm viewed on this board:

1) I never made up different times of arrival while speaking to Phillip over the phone. If we would all like to get technical, we were at the dock two or three minutes after 6:30am (does 6:33am still count as 6:30?). By the time we circled the area a couple times and then figured out what happened from the people around the dock, it was a little after 6:40am. To save the trouble of explaining all of this while frustrated on the phone with Phillip, I simply said we had arrived at 6:30am. I NEVER told him I arrived at 6:15am. If I had arrived at 6:15am, I would have seen the boat leave and possibly been able to call it back! The bottom line is that we spent about 15 minutes on the dock doing some detective work on what exactly happened. That would be between 6:30am and 6:45am. I'm almost certain I gave the same info to the helpful people behind the Bottom Scratcher. So if Phillip says the Bottom Scratcher told him I was there at 6:45am, that would be within the range of time we spent on that dock. I am not really worried about syncing timelines with everyone because it still means we arrived with all our gear in hand before 7am and would have had about 30 minutes to get aboard. Again, though, I never said we arrived at 6:15am...not sure where that accusation came from. I hope that clears this issue.

2) I never said I'd trash Scuba Center Temecula and never even mentioned any message boards. After being told numerous times that he would not issue a refund, I told Phillip that we would have to "agree to disagree" and that "I will do whatever I can to get my money back" as I really do (and did) think I deserve it. What that consisted of was opening an investigation with American Express, the people who I thought COULD get me my money back. Posting on ScubaBoard was an afterthought, and it was not my intention to trash anybody. When I wrote that first post in this thread, it was not my intention to trash Scuba Center Temecula or to have this become a public boxing match. The goal was to find out if the dive shop's policies were commonplace in LA because I had never seen such a thing while diving in other cities. I understand that the situation can become heated when it comes to these types of things, and I will admit I have gotten more incensed the longer I think about this. However, I've tried not to let it color my posts, in which I've tried to only include facts and my reflections about the whole process of dealing with this problem over the past few weeks. It seems like it is getting a little out of hand now, and for that I apologize.

After reading Phillip's thoughts on this matter, it seems that this whole thing was caused by some initial miscommunication and then a series of faulty assumptions. What I heard was that check in was at 6am and departure was at 7am. I still stand by that statement, and both Jason at Scuba Center Temecula and Carla at the Bottom Scratcher were surprised over the phone to hear the boat had taken off before 7am. Carla later said that "the owner of the dive shop who was on the boat had given the order to take off early at 6:15am." My situation aside, I think it would be beneficial to future people who sign up for these charters to be told simply that they must arrive and check in before 6am, and that departure is up to the charterer. There's no need to say "we'll leave no later than 7am" if that is what the dive shop typically says, especially if they will not attempt to wait until that time even when they know two divers are missing from the boat. Another faulty assumption was that Rod and I had decided to cancel without calling. Some people who reserve spots on charters may do that, but the fact is that we did not, and Phillip really could have just taken a couple seconds to call me on my cell phone to make sure. If I had been given his cell phone number, I definitely would have given him a courtesy call had we even thought we were late for something.

Anyway, at the very least, reading this thread will hopefully make other divers more cautious about double checking check-in and departure times when reserving spots on SoCal charters.

 

[ianw2]

Thanks, Phillip!

I've been meaning to get in to the shop to see about a longer hose for my Pony Bottle set up. I wanted to ask your take on this thread.

I knew something was hinkey because it just didn’t sound like the Phillip I know. Captain Greg is pretty loathe to leave port until he’s sure everyone whose coming aboard is aboard. The Bottom Scratcher is a great dive boat and its crew are terrific people, too!

In the interests of full disclosure, Phillip owns my LDS. I trust my service of my regs AND my wife’s regs to Phillip for service. I do so for two reasons: 1) Phillip knows what he's doing, and 2) he CARES!

Temecula is a long way from saltwater by road. Phillip and Scuba Center are assests to the Temecula Dive community. Check into local dive clubs and the dive clubs at the local schools. Who is the sponsor/supporter? Phillip and Scuba Center.

Cheers...

Ian

 

[ScubaCenterTemecula]

I appreciate what you've said... it's good to be able to put this one to bed. Karen, I'll contact you off board. I'm sure this can be wrapped up to your satisfaction.

Phillip

 

[Empty V]

Phillip, please answer this post:

My question is, was there any attempt to contact th OP? If you knew that you were short 2 divers why not find out where they were? From my experience I've never seen a check in time on a boat. It's always been, be on the boat with all of your gear and all of the paperwork filled out before we leave, that's it. IMO a check in time an hour before the boat's normally scheduled departure time(if that's what it is) is just going to create problems, obviously. Maybe you should switch to the normal boat protocol that has work for so many years.

My $0.005

P.S. appreciate you posting your side

Billy