Corporate Foreign Diving ousts Dive Palancar

[Chichibe]

Anybody who has dived the south end of Cozumel is certainly familiar with Dive Palancar, an operation that has been there for 22 years. Dive Palancar provides the true Mayan/Mexican experience in Cozumel. 3-1/2 years ago they were displaced from
the Occidental Allegro by ProDive Mexico, a German-owned operation that rents their divemasters, rents their boats, rotates in new PADI instructors every 6 months from all over the world for $125 a week and a place to stay and a return ticket back to
Italy, Norway, Switzerland, Germany or wherever to do 5 dives a day. These guys know the reefs? NO. Cattleboat herding and rules rules rules--YES. Dive Palancar has been operating out of the Occidental Grand, but now no more. The owners have 50 employees, all Mexicans, most with families and kids, and they take care of their employees, paying Mexican taxes and social security. The new dive operators at the Grand? ProDive Mexico. With far less overhead than Dive Palancar, the greedy owners of the Allegro and the Grand (that would be Occidental Hotels Corp., from Spain) can collect more for the concession, and so local workers are now out of work, and the only dive services offered at these two hotels are with Europeans. We've got corporate dentistry in the USA, and now corporate diving in Cozumel.

Dive Palancar lives on! Anybody who has planned a visit to the Allegro or the Grand, don't let the hotel BS you about DP leaving the island--it is not true. Contact DP by email before your trip and tell them your plans, they will pick you up at any hotel you stay at on the south end. And do NOT let the Iberostar or any other hotel with a pier BS you about not letting anybody else pick up at their pier--piers are part of the marine park and are open to all.

 

[DandyDon]

:cheerleader: Yay DP...!

They are a good op, but they lost their contract there when they seemingly injured a number of people and did not even have a portable CO tester to find the problem. They fixed the problem, but bad history is brutal. Getting by on the same old same old won't work in a competitive market.

The beaches are open to the public if they can get to them, but dock owners can charge fees. It's not a popular subject, but it's legal.

 

[Christi]

Don - sorry, but your comments are based on your own speculations and assumptions.

 

[halocline]

:cheerleader: Yay DP...!

They are a good op, but they lost their contract there when they seemingly injured a number of people...

This is a pretty serious accusation, got any evidence? Or is the word 'seemingly' your way out of needing any.


And I'm not sure about the statements "a good op" and "injured people" in the same sentence.

Ahh, the internet......

 

[letterboy]

It can't be on the Internet if it's not true.

 

[cicopo]

They lost their contract at the Allegro after an issue where someone left a vehicle running too close to the compressor intake. Several tanks were contaminated and yes they were put into use resulting in a serious "incident". That was probably 3 years ago but it did happen and is likely in the Accidents & Incidents" section.

 

[Chichibe]

Geez, my post was not about why they left the Allegro--there was a compressor incident, but they left mostly because ProDive offered more for the concession. Just like now at the Grand.

My post was about the travesty of people out of work who live here being replaced by foreigners who dont know the reefs. And by a German Corporation running the concession, as hired by the greedy Spanish Hotel owners instead of local operators.

Matter of fact I saw a training dive for a boatload of ProDive instructors who just arrived in Cozumel, They took them out to Palancar Garderns, put them in the water and said here is where youll be diving. ONE or TWO training dives? Darn, that is rude.


Reporting from Cozumel (18 weeks and 146 dives in 2013)
DUDZ IN WITT!!
Chichibé

 

[jfcl01]

Does anyone know of other ops that are doing this same thing? Bringing in Canadian/European/US students who work as DMs for nearly nothing and in the process, displacing Mexican DMs? I started hearing such rumblings on my last couple trips there this year. And before people start flipping out on the right/wrongness of the whole thing, and how dare I even concern myself with something that happens in another country...let me make it clear that I ask only for MY interests, as it matters to me which ops I support, and those would be ones that don't do this. I expect tourists who visit my town to patronize the locals (me and my neighbors), therefore, I strive to support the locals in whatever locale I travel. I have no investment in trying to change anyone else's mind on this.

 

[Mike]

My post was about the travesty of people out of work who live here being replaced by foreigners who dont know the reefs. And by a German Corporation running the concession, as hired by the greedy Spanish Hotel owners instead of local operators.

Welp... Mexico is the last place that I worry about locals in the dive industry losing their jobs to foreigners.

Unless Mexico changed the laws that's just about impossible, or ProDive is breaking them and getting away with it. Mexico has some of the most protective anti-immigration, foreigner employment laws on the books, which of course is ironic when you consider the Draconian nature of their laws while they basically condone the opposite for their citizens crossing into our country. You want to talk about displaced jobs? You're going to need to substitute countries for your point to be valid.

Like I said, unless they are breaking the law, if they have 5 foreign employees, they have to have 45 Mexican ones on the books.

 

[cicopo]

Dressel does that too BUT they (the DM's) play a role in helping international travelers dive. Although it's been many years since my stays at the Iberostar I did meet & dive with people who spoke languages the locals wouldn't understand but Dressel's staff did. Going from memory they tried to have staff that speak most common languages from around the world.