Sound familiar?

[OceanSpirit]

Over the weekend my girlfriend and I went to our local dive shop to get her kitted up for her OW in May. She needed the basics plus a BCD, regs and drysuit. Not an inconsiderable outlay financially. After 1/2 hour of looking at kit and me explaining the various merits/pitfalls, we still hadn't been approached by the two assistants. I am a bit behind when it comes to drysuits so I asked what they recommended, I was told "What we sell". Helpful. Ignoring this, we went on to select a Scubapro reg and when asked "We need an octopus" were told "try the fish shop".This was all done straight faced and without a flicker of humour. Now I can give and take a wind-up but when you're looking at spending £1500 or so, I would like some service (preferably with a smile). We left what we had selected on the counter and went a couple of miles away and found the attitude at the next shop to be 'if you don't buy the best, you'll end up disappointed'. Our original estimate ballooned to £2200 with the advice of the shop owner. When I pointed out that for a warm season diver who was only going to 25m, was it really neccessary to have a Mares Abyss? The guy just looked at me as though I was a dribbling idiot. So we ended up nearly 100 miles away in a shop I use near my work. We had coffee, a good chat and some excellent advice which left her kitted up and £200 under budget.

Do dive shops consider a practically captive audience not worth the effort of customer service? Although we are a small island, we have relatively few dive shops selling pretty much identical gear. With this as the case, I would have thought that shops would be falling over themselves to impress. Hmmmm.......

Any thoughts, people?

 

[Rick Murchison]

Sure....
But they aren't politically correct.
Rick

 

[Aegir]

OceanSpirit that sounds disgusting. It really makes you wonder how they make a living. Could you tell me the name of the shop which was so rude?

I have used http://www.simplyscuba.com and http://www.sdswatersports.co.uk for over a year now. I buy most of my gear from them because of the great service they provide. If something breaks then they are usually more than willing to send a brand new replacment. I agree with you in that there are hardly any decent fully stocked shops around in the UK at all. In addition to this i too have experienced very poor customer service (including blatent rudeness) when visiting most small local shops. My local scuba shop sells only a couple of different brands of gear and if you ask them to order something that they dont stock it takes them an age to get hold of it. But i definately recommend simplyscuba (kent) and sds watersports (sheffield).

 

[OceanSpirit]

Aegir,

I think it would be unwise to name this shop on an open forum. I posted this not to slag off a particular place but to stimulate some discussion which will hopefully give a picture on the standards in dive shops worldwide. It would be my guess that Stateside things are very different and that good customer service is the rule rather than the exception. We'll see!

 

[Fishkiller]

there are Three dive shops within 5 miles of my home. if I could take all three and put them into a single shop. that would be the greatest shop anywhere. one has good products lousy service another good service limited products the other has a lousy location, I'm learning to be a consumer.

 

[large_diver]

Don't hold your breath -- dive shop customer service here in the US is probably just as variable as the experiences you've described above.....although to be in a shop for 30 minutes without being spoken to -- that is pretty bad.

Service at the shops I frequent here in the Boston area varies from helpful to hard sell-pushy ("this brand is the ONLY solution to your diving needs....and I just happen to have one in stock") to clueless. I also find that the service I experience at a particular shop can really vary from day to day depending on the person working in the shop at that moment. I've come to realize that at certain shops I have to ensure that certain folks are working on the day I want to make a more expensive, involved purchase.

That being said, I can sympathize with the plight of the shop owner. It is next to impossible for shops to ensure that everyone they hire is knowledgable, friendly and reliable. In the "full emnployment" job market that has characterized the US economy over the past few years, it is extremely hard to find employees that meet all the criteria mentioned above. I am not a shop owner -- but I do a lot of interviewing and hiring for the company I work for. Not an excuse for poor customer service -- just a sign of the times. I have noticed a general drop in customer service anywhere I go shopping these days. Unfortunately, good service now seems to be the exception rather than the rule.

Perhaps the looming US economic "bump" will change this....

 

[Tavi]

Ocean Spirit,
After I certified on vacation my wife and I started checking out shops near home.We were looking for a place to do her training, and I was looking for equipment.At the first shop the guy had the personality of a rock, always straight faced, would answer a question but never expand on the answer. Anything we wanted to know we had to drag it out of him. At the second shop a group of guys were sitting around talking about wreck dives and making fun of those who do "warm water, pretty fish dives". The third shop the coarse prices were high and I wasn't interested in the brand of equipment they sold.The fourth shop was a beautiful place, Big showroom,classroom,pool,and nice service department. But when I asked to see one brand they would show me another. At one point they wouldn't even give me a price on a reg because they wanted to sell me a different one. Also the salesman had the attitude that if you didn't train there, you weren't trained very good. All the prices here were high and they offered no discount's.
So we ended up at a shop about an hour and a half from home (All the other shops were a twenty minute drive or less). The people here are great! freindly, helpfull, and I get nice discounts too. They'll offer advice, But they will sell me what I want. For me the service is worth the extra time on the road.

Tavi:tree:

 

[OceanSpirit]

Well, it would seem by the replies so far that dive shops all over need to get their acts together. I find it quite disappointing that given that most divers I know (including those on this board) are plain passionate about their sport and yet the people selling us the kit can be rude, lethargic and apathetic.

Keep the replies coming in, people!

 

[dmentia]

North of Chicago where I am, it seems you either get really nice people that don't seem to be able to answer the questions you want, or more often, the used car salesman type that wants to sell you their choice, not yours. In either case, it is really difficult to make a purchase, since you can't get a good answer from one, and you can't get a straight answer from the other.
I guess the one positive is that you do get service right away, and both types of shops are willing to help, just in their own way. Maybe if I was not a newbie diver I would be okay, but not having much info to go on makes it frustrating when talking to the shops around here!

Aegir, do you have any problems with the internet buying? I like that idea since I can do my own research, ask some questions on this great board (so easy to ask my stupid questions when I can't see everyone roll their eyes at me!) , and then buy from the internet.
dmentia

 

[Aegir]

Dmentia & All..

Nope no problems thus far from buying off the internet. Although i did e-mail the main manufacturers (Apeks, scubapro, diverite, OMS, etc etc) to make sure the sites i bought from where infact authorised dealers of the said brands. Out of about 15 or so UK online scuba shops i chose to stick with the ones i mentioned in my previous post due to there prices and high standard of cusromer care/service.

I have never bought anything else off the internet other than scuba gear so i certainly dont buy everything off the net. I buy off the net due to the huge choice of gear available and i can get it next day delivery if need be. But i should mention that the online scuba shops i buy from are drivable for me (around a 1 or 3 hour drive).

At the same time i try to buy from my local shop as and when i can ( if the price is right) since if everyone bought off the net then the shop wouldn't last 5 minutes. So if i see the same product in my local shop then i will buy it from there, even if sometimes it costs a little extra. (im talking like 10 or 20 pounds on a 3-400 pound product).