Dahab - Rude Manager at Red Sea Relax. Buyer beware

[black_sea]

This little drama is a perfect example of poor customer service by management. I am posting my negative tripadvisor review and the reply to it from Red Sea Relax manager Paul McBeath here.

Before you read further, please be aware that this is the first negative dive operations review I have posted online, ever, and those of you that know me can see from my past post history that I have always left praise and positive review for dive centers that I have dived with. Perhaps the correspondence you find below will explain why I deem this negative review justified...

My tripadvisor review
I booked a 10 dive five day diving package online. Paul the manager confirmed my booking. When I arrived shortly after 6pm, he had gone home for the day. As a diving instructor, I make it a rule to speak to the manager about their diving activities, safety standards, ratios and overall diving strategy before making the "final plunge". I asked to speak to the diving manager, and the person at the reception said he had gone for the day and would not want to speak to me. I insisted, explaining that I only had a
couple of questions. Paul was short and curt on the phone and simply said that "diving is different every day", refusing to give any details.

Needless to say, I went across the street to another dive center, "Dahabs Crocodile". At that different diving center I was personally greeted by the owner, who proceeded to introduce me to the instructor that would be going out tomorrow, told about the dives planned for the day, weather permitted, explained that they had a small group for the next week and that they would be very flexible in accommodating my diving desires and demands. This is the type of service divers should insist on!

I did not go back to Red Sea Relax. It felt like they did not want my business nor care about customer service. If you are a serious diver that demands quality service, I would suggest you stay away from Red Sea Relax

End of my review
I have re-edited my review on tripadvisor and resubmitted it - I had made a spelling error and wrote 6AM instead of 6PM.

And then this is the email I get

from Paul McBeath
subject getting a life !!
Good afternoon Alex,

I hope you have arrived home safe and refreshed from you holiday in Dahab.

I usually make it a rule not to respond to idiotic comments made by self proclaimed serious divers like yourself but I have decided to make an exception this time.
Now everybody who has read your ridiculous comment on tripadvisors knows you are a complete imbecile with absolute no diving credentials. So much so they have taken down your sad, malicious comments as they have seen how petty and very childish they were.
Next time, before you make a rule, think it through. Not everybody in the diving industry is here to pamper to your every whim. As a diving instructor, I would have thought you would have the courtesy to come and talk to me face to face instead of calling me up while I was having a birthday dinner with my family and then making such totally insulting and unprofessional comments about us without actually having stayed or dived with us. You called me curt when I was actually just trying to be factual .I am now being curt!

Just one final comment. Crocodile dive centre in an unlicensed dive centre that has been closed down by the authorities on two occasions because of their safety record. You really are a good judge when it comes to diving centres!!

So in closing, I would like to say that I am sure we will be able to survive without customers like you.


I wish you the best on any future diving endeavors and I hope that some time in the near future you manage to get a life!!!!!

have a nice life .

End of Pauls email
Now I myself have calls from customers at very strange hours, let alone 6pm. If I am not available to take that call, I redirect them to a member of the staff that can answer their questions. And if no one is available, I simply ask the customer to come back in the morning, telling them that I will do my best to accommodate them and their diving needs.

I am not commenting on Paul's email as I think it speaks for itself.
In closing, avoid diving with Red Sea Relax and Paul McBeath, unless you enjoy rude service.

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A ScubaBoard Staff Message...

For the operation's response, see this post: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/re...red-sea-relax-buyer-beware-2.html#post6281176

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[Hillmorton Scubie]

SOME PEOPLE ARE WEIRD.
Insisting on discussing ratio's, safety etc at 6.00 p.m. when the dive shop manager has gone home is just plainly strange. Your questions could have waited until early the next morning or requested details in an e mail before the trip.
People have a right to go home and be away from work for a few hours without being bothered with silly questions.
I suspect you also asked the airline what colour seats they have on your aircraft.

 

[lv2dive]

I think discussing safety of the dive op I'd be going out with the next day is different than the color of airplane seats.

Anyway, people can judge from the OP's review whether the manager's actions were appropriate or not, for me, the managers email response to the OP's review (not the manager's original actions) are what would keep me away from that operation. Sounds like the manager has an short fuse.

 

[Red Sea Leonfish]

From my experience, most Egyptian dive centres tend to start early and close earlier than you would expect of a similar outfit in the UK. Many start at 7am and so, for them, expecting the dive centre manager to be taking calls at 6pm would be like expecting a UK centre to be answering questions at more like 8pm in the evening.

I do think that it is a bit much to decide, without actually speaking to anyone with knowledge of an operation, not to dive with them because no-one would answer questions about diver/guide ratios at 6pm. After all, all of those such questions could easily have been addressed either by email in advance or early the next day. I certainly wouldn't have insisted on calling the manager at home after he had left the centre for the day.

That said, I am looking at Dive Centres in Dahab at the moment and Red Sea Relax was one place I had considered booking. I'm not saying that I would not book with Mr McBeath on the basis of this one review (particularly because I think that your expectations were slightly unreasonable) but his email was clearly uncalled for and would certainly make me think twice (or at least seek out further independent reviews) before booking with them now.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Sounds like a colorful character! I think I'd dive with them just for the fun of it. I like crusty, cantankerous types.

 

[VooDooGasMan]

black if all you had was a couple of ?'s and was still not happy when you talk to him, then went across and dove with someone else, you did not experience what they had to offer. you have know way of knowing which operator was more fun and safe on the water. After all he is just the manager not the captain or DM or instructor right.

 

[Solly]

I think that regardless of the incident itself as we only hear it from one side, the response email is not professional at all !

 

[Crowley]

Sounds like a colorful character! I think I'd dive with them just for the fun of it. I like crusty, cantankerous types.

Takes one to know one, eh, Jim!?

I've sort of refrained from posting here until I saw what others would think and although I see a point in the original complaint, I think I have to side a little bit with the dive centre manager.

To put it in point format
- the OP called after hours, while the manager was attending a private function
- other staff were at the dive centre, and the receptionist or possibly another instructor might have been able to answer those questions without the need to insist on talking to the manager directly.
- if there were questions about group size and safety standards, these could have been addressed up front via e-mail
- arriving at the dive centre during the day time would have been better. Most of us open at 7:30 and 6pm is already a long day.
- if that was not possible due to flight times, then it could have been discussed before activities commenced the next morning
- the review was posted on the internationally recognised Tripadvisor website, demeaning a dive centre over a curt, unnecessary, out-of-hours telephone conversation without any experience of the dive centre itself, or their practices. Just a negative phone call
- Negative publicity is not what anybody needs, especially when it's unwarranted.
- The manager was very angry about this
- the e-mail sent in reply was very unprofessional
- everybody has bad days.

From my point of view - look, the dive industry in Egypt is really struggling at the moment, all of us. The review of the dive centre is not representative of the centre itself, just the fact that the manager didn't want to be disturbed right then and there and the fact that the information that was being sought is freely available from other sources. If I read that review on tripadvisor about my centre, I'd be seriously peeved off myself, even just as an employee, not a manager, especially because I personally could have answered those questions, along with pretty much every single employee of the dive centre with the possible exception of the tank boys, who don't speak much English but would at least say "Oh yes, very safe". (If they laugh when they say it, don't dive there! )

The e-mail in reply - well yes, it's hardly the most professional but, put in a similar circumstance, I don't think I could say that I wouldn't write something similar.

One very interesting thing about the complaint and Mr. Paul McBeath's subsequent reply is this. I have no experience of either dive centre except for I like Relax Bar very much. But, this link is to the CDWS dive centre blacklist. Right there, amongst the list of illegal operators in the Red Sea (and the CDWS might not be functioning at full strength, but it is still operational), is Dahab Crocodile. Red Sea Relax can be found on page 2 of the licensed operators in Dahab, with website and full contact details.

I just thought I'd add that, to see if it stirred up the conversation any.

Cheers,

C.

 

[Red Sea Leonfish]

I was not aware that the CDWS 'blacklist' was available online. Thank you for that Crowley.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Yep and while I do take calls 7 days a week I screen them at certain times. If somone had an employee call me when I was in the middle of a function, family or otherwise, after they were told I was gone for the day I'd not be happy. Nor would I likely be pleasant. Some people just have this expectation that everyone should drop everything and put their lives on hold for them. Sorry to say that outside of my GF and some family (not all of them) you are not that important. Get used to it.