Training should not be sought on the basis of the card you receive, but rather for the skills, knowledge and capability you will gain.
Of course, for a scuba diver walking through the doors of an unknown dive center, proving your skills, knowledge and capability over the counter can be a hard thing....
I think DevonDiver has nailed it. I could not care less about what gold-colored, laminated cards divers have in their wallets or purses while they are out getting wet (or sometimes staying dry
) and about to enter an environment that requires attention, training, and some skill to survive. What is worth more to you, the bragging rights or experiencing the wonderful marine environment
safely and
responsibly so you can share it with your kids and families afterwards?
The fact of the matter is that log books, while useful in some cases, do not, and can not, absolutely vouch for a diver's skill and ability; nor can a cert card. I have seen divemasters and personally know instructors with 100's of dives that are nightmares IMHO. Then I also know OW and AOW divers that are fantastic divers and that have more control and skill than many other divers I have encountered. My point is that real skills are practiced habits that have become second nature to a diver. If those skills were taught incorrectly or not reinforced enough and left unrefined during the training those bad habits will most likely haunt a diver's diving career forever without them often realizing they need some improvement. After all, they got the T-shirt, bought the postcards, did the pool sessions and completed the open water cert dives. Everyone is a master diver after that right? Or so you would believe if you listened to some divers who got the card this morning and are having a couple of beers at the bar in the afternoon.
I don't blame the guy behind the counter at the dive operator who has policy instructions from his boss to attempt to dissuade suspected newer divers, who often turn out to be OW only; i.e. not AOW certified, from doing more rigorous dives. Deeper is not always more dangerous but it does add an extra environmental factor that requires more honed basic skills at shallower depths first. So how do you realistically assess a diver's ability when he hands his OW C-card to you and says I've done 100's of dives? The answer is you can't, it's a crap shoot. Most people who have done more than 50 dives or so are
usually AOW certified, partly because of the continuing education crap so many dive shops spout ad nauseum because they want the $$$, but also because it is a natural evolution for divers to explore greater limits to their newfound passion and training is a good way of doing this. It would be interesting to see the stats but I would not be surprised if those who never got AOW certified but that are still competent divers, while I am certain they exist, are in the minority.
So, for liability sake I understand why dive ops often seem to have what may seem to be the rigid rules engraved in stone about depth and correlating cert levels. In our litigious society today I would also probably err on the side of caution, and while I would not remain totally inflexible because the sign on the wall says "No AOW? No Deep 60!", I would likely try to explain the situation and encourage an OW to do a shallower dive first so a DM can check him or her out (skill wise of course) in real water first before doing deeper dives. If he is obviously a cousin of Triton, then allow him or her to decide what to do; perhaps have him sign a waiver, pair him up with a Rescue Diver buddy, ask the DM to keep a good eye on him and let him do dive 2 and 3 past the glass bottom barrier at 60'. If he is an obvious jack-in-the-box who is bouncing out of the water because he overloaded on weights and overinflated his BC to compensate, then perhaps he doesn't qualify to the deep side of the pool just yet. While you likely may have a cranky customer on your hands for refusing, and while you may likely lose his business, you at least steer clear of the lawsuits that could cost you your business because Chuckie decided to embolize on his way up after panicking at 90' after his buddies dared him to do a deeper dive over the beers they had yesterday afternoon at the bar.
Like Captain Barbosa would have said "the code is more what you would call guidelines than actual rules".
.
