Sticky Situation: PADI vs SSI

[ligersandtions]

Hi all! My husband and I are in kind of an interesting situation right now. We recently got married and were planning a trip to Playa del Carmen and Cozumel for our honeymoon....we'd wanted to get into diving for a while, and this was the perfect opportunity. Unfortunately for us, we got into the PADI certification class a little late and only had time to do the coursework and pool dives before we were leaving. Our instructor told us it was no problem and that he could give us referral forms so we could do our check out dives with a PADI instructor down in Cozume.

I got some suggestions of a dive op to go out with in Cozumel, so I checked out their website and contacted them. The website specifically said they were SSI and PADI certified, so when I talked to her, I made sure she was PADI (just in case) and it seemed as though everything was good.

We got certified June 4th and got our temp c-cards and have been waiting for the permanent cards to come in. I tried to contact the dive instructor to make sure we weren't supposed to do anything (she had said she'd take care of everything, but made us copies so we had our own proof). I emailed a couple times with no response, so my husband finally called her today to see what was going on.

Turns out she's not going to be able to get us PADI certified and wants to give us SSI cards. Now I know that SSI is probably an equally good certification to get, but I have a couple issues with it: 1. I didn't do SSI coursework and don't particularly want to go through the trouble of doing it (to do the certification correctly), 2. I think it might be a bit unethical to give us SSI certifications when we didn't do all the SSI requirements (presumably) and started out as PADI, 3. I don't know what kind of issues we'll have if we have SSI certifications but want to do PADI AOW, rescue diver, etc.

As of this moment, we are not planning to go pro, so we don't have the issue of needing to be backed by a shop to teach SSI, but I certainly wouldn't want to close that door if we don't need to.

So I'm just curious what your thoughts are on this....should we push for the PADI certification? If she can't do it, should we ask for a refund for the check out dive portion (check out dives are more expensive than just normal dives obviously)? I assume if we want the PADI certification, we'll have to have our instructor give us the check out dives even though we've already done them before....obviously he has no idea that we actually went diving, so he'd need to see that we are proficient in the skills before backing us with certification cards....

Anyways, sorry that this is long, but thanks for all your help.

 

[Ann Marie]

Sorry to hear this happened. (Also, welcome to ScubaBoard!)

What was her reason in not giving you what you paid for (the PADI cert)?

Were your temporary cards the ones from PADI or from SSI?

 

[ligersandtions]

Sorry to hear this happened. (Also, welcome to ScubaBoard!)

What was her reason in not giving you what you paid for (the PADI cert)?

Were your temporary cards the ones from PADI or from SSI?

Thanks for the welcome

The temporary cards are PADI cards....the referral form was a PADI referral form....she said she was with PADI (well, from what I'm gathering now, she was with PADI but is no longer current, but supposedly can still say she can do PADI certifications )....so up until about a week ago when all the communication stopped and we were running out of time for the temp cards, I thought we were all good.

She said that what we were supposed to do (she said it this morning, but when we were in Cozumel, she said she'd take care of everything) was to give the filled out referral form back to our other instructor, put it in that brown folder with our pictures on it, and send it to PADI. But from what I've gathered, since she did our fourth check out dive with us, she's our certifying instructor, so our first instructor can no longer do anything for us.

 

[Ann Marie]

Give PADI a call 1-800-729-7234 and explain what's happened to them. Have your paperwork with you because they will probably ask you for the instructor name and number. If she isn't active she can not certify you. If you want to be PADI certified, you will have to do the OW dives over with an "Active" PADI Instructor. I would make it very clear to PADI that she gave you the temporary PADI cards.

If she did not give you what you paid for, I would dispute the charges with my credit card agency. By telling you that she could certify you as PADI OW Divers and then not being able to, she is committing fraud.

 

[vondo]

Turns out she's not going to be able to get us PADI certified and wants to give us SSI cards. Now I know that SSI is probably an equally good certification to get, but I have a couple issues with it: 1. I didn't do SSI coursework and don't particularly want to go through the trouble of doing it (to do the certification correctly), 2. I think it might be a bit unethical to give us SSI certifications when we didn't do all the SSI requirements (presumably) and started out as PADI, 3. I don't know what kind of issues we'll have if we have SSI certifications but want to do PADI AOW, rescue diver, etc.

Can't answer #1 or #2, those are decisions you have to make. But for #3 the answer is "None." You can take another PADI coursee, SSI, NAUI etc with any Open Water card. I think most people here would encourage you to take future courses from an instructor that you can work well with and who you think will give you a good education. If that's (your current) PADI instructor, great. If it's not, don't worry about it.

 

[Web Monkey]

Turns out she's not going to be able to get us PADI certified and wants to give us SSI cards. Now I know that SSI is probably an equally good certification to get, but I have a couple issues with it: 1. I didn't do SSI coursework and don't particularly want to go through the trouble of doing it (to do the certification correctly), 2. I think it might be a bit unethical to give us SSI certifications when we didn't do all

You can be happy taking either card. It really makes no difference.

For an OW certification, both PADI and SSI have very similar requirements, and you wouldn't be "cheating" anybody or anything by taking one or the other.

With some differences, like the tables have slightly different times, and the recommended ascent rate (PADI recommends a 60'/minute ascent while everybody else says 30'/minute), if you qualified for one, you qualified for the other.

I'd recommend taking whichever card they give you and go dive!

Terry

PS. I'd also recommend sticking to a 30'/minute maximum ascent rate. And even slower on the last 15' to the surface. The slower you ascend, the happier your body will be.

 

[Walter]

It is unethical. While the SSI card is just as good as the PADI card, the deal you made was to complete a PADI certification. My guess is she did not renew her PADI teaching status. While there's nothing wrong with that, it is wrong to lie to you to get your business. I would ask for a PADI certification or a refund.

 

[muddiver]

I believe that PADI has reccomened a 30' per min. ascent rate since 2006, or earlier.

I have certifications from a number of agencies and it doesn't matter which agency it is from until you decide to become a SCUBA professional. Then the agencies want you trained using their materials, to their doctrin. Otherwise it doesn't matter.

If there was a price difference between the two certifying agencies and the shop in Cozumel charges differently for the two, then you might have an issue to take up with them. Otherwise I think it was very nice of the shop there to offer to provide you with an open water certification through a second avenue to avoid their lapse with PADI. Be happy they did not say that you must do the SSI version of the classroom and study material to get certified via the referral process.

Take the card and run.

 

[ligersandtions]

Can't answer #1 or #2, those are decisions you have to make. But for #3 the answer is "None." You can take another PADI coursee, SSI, NAUI etc with any Open Water card. I think most people here would encourage you to take future courses from an instructor that you can work well with and who you think will give you a good education. If that's (your current) PADI instructor, great. If it's not, don't worry about it.

Okay, that makes me a little more at ease. I didn't want to run into an issue of not being able to do the things I want to do just because I don't have the PADI card. I think I would prefer to get the PADI certification just because I did all that coursework and not the SSI stuff, but if it comes down to it, it's good to know I can still go ahead with the other stuff. And our LDS instructor is great....I would be more than happy to take future classes with him.

With some differences, like the tables have slightly different times, and the recommended ascent rate (PADI recommends a 60'/minute ascent while everybody else says 30'/minute), if you qualified for one, you qualified for the other.

I'd recommend taking whichever card they give you and go dive!

Terry

PS. I'd also recommend sticking to a 30'/minute maximum ascent rate. And even slower on the last 15' to the surface. The slower you ascend, the happier your body will be.

I'm definitely slow on the ascent and descent....I have ear issues, so the more I take my time, the more my ears appreciate it. And happy ears = happy diver

It is unethical. While the SSI card is just as good as the PADI card, the deal you made was to complete a PADI certification. My guess is she did not renew her PADI teaching status. While there's nothing wrong with that, it is wrong to lie to you to get your business. I would ask for a PADI certification or a refund.

That's where my irritation comes in....if she had told me upfront that she was no longer active, and thus could not give me a PADI cert, I would have looked for someone who could. She was a really great instructor and I had an amazing time with her, but now I'm irritated that she's not holding up her end of the bargain.

Our other instructor is in Fiji on a dive trip until tomorrow, so once he gets back, we'll go in and talk to him and see what he recommends. My guess is that he'll recommend doing check out dives with him and getting PADI certified the correct way. Then we'll just have to deal with getting a (partial) refund from the Cozumel instructor, since it's more expensive to do check out dives than just regular two or three tank dives.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

You completed an OW cert course. You are offered an OW cert card. It's not the same alphabet but it gets you to the same place. To get a cert card through anyone else will require more work and money. There will be no issue with further certifications unless you make it an issue.

I recommend you take the SSI cert card, read the SSI OW manual (from the local library or wherever) and count yourself fortunate. In the big picture this is a very very minor thing, not worth wasting another minute on!