[Jay]

Just a quickie to raise something which came across our desk (well, a few phone calls from Skippers and Dive Centre owners actually) this week.

Apparently a couple of YD’ers have been, for want of a better phrase, ‘using YD’s name in vane’ recently when out on charter boats (dealing with their skippers) and also dealing with the owners of Dive Centres. Obviously this is a practice which we must nip in the bud, as it works against both YD (it’s membership and owners) and the businesses selling services (gas fills and places on charter craft) to YD members – so no body wins if this is allowed to continue.

No names, this time, and no pack drill, but one dive centre owner and its staff were recently put in a position where they had to credit a £700 dive weekend, and take a rather heated debate about fills (head aches from allegedly ‘tinged fills’ – which the divers failed to check before getting on the boat and setting off - , which miraculously disappeared when the offer of the £700 credit was raised later!), whilst a skipper was harangued for mis-shotting a wreck (when it wasn’t even his shot on the wreck in question, they were using that of another skipper laying alongside!) when in truth the diver in question was the one who pulled the shot out, which resulted in a number of the divers coming in after him (some from his own dive group and those from a second boat) missing the wreck. He then blamed the skipper of his boat for his own poor actions. A condition of the £700 credit was that the divers in question do not come back to, or attempt to re-book with, that diving centre. A genuinely sad state of affairs for all concerned, I think you’ll agree.

Now we’ve all had situations where we’ve perhaps not got a ‘straight from the bank – full 230/250 bar’ gas fill (it goes with the territory when diving), and if you can show me a skipper who hits the mark with a shot EVERY time, I’ll show you the love-child of Stalin and Minnie Mouse. So these are things with which we have to live when diving – it’s nothing new and goes with the badge.

However, the YD’ers in question attempted to brow-beat (bully, in other words) the skipper and Dive Centre owner into giving refunds and credits for dives and fills with the threat: “You do as I say or we’ll simply do a write up slagging you off on YD…”

You’ll all hopefully understand and agree that this is behaviour (using YD’s name like this) which will not be tolerated by us as owners of this site – YD is meant to be a force for good in the diving community and attempts to bring ALL elements of that community together (divers, centres, suppliers and skippers), so we get a little concerned when its members decide that they’ll hijack our good name for their own ends.

So how can we address this?

Now whilst we accept that valid, firsthand, criticism can be worthwhile, we’ve asked the skippers and centre owners in question (and any others reading this) to take any further/future such threats, from ANYONE mis-using the YD name, as they occur and then report them to us so we can take any appropriate action against the perpetrators. Mistakes by divers, skippers and dive centres will happen: it’s how we deal them which counts, and simply offering to rubbish someone on YD is not a practice which we can allow to become anything like the accepted norm, by anyone!

Like I say, just wanted to bring this up so we’re all aware that it’s something we’re aware of. YD has worked too long and hard to build its good name and will not be put in a position where those supplying its members’ goods and services feel that they are being bullied, and certainly not by anyone mis-using the YD brand to suit their own ends.

We appreciate your co-operation in this matter