rjhartman
New
I am a Dive Shop Owner and am both a PADI & SSI instructor. As a Dive Shop owner, I prefer when my Universal Referrals are returned to me. Someone else mentioned about Instructor Credits. At this point in my career, I do not need any more Instructor Credits. The main reason I like to have the Universal Referrals returned is that I get direct feedback from the refered customer about their Referral Instructor or Facility. I like to know that if the next customer that walks through my door wants to go to perform their certifcation by referal, then I have a list of places that have done well by my previous customers. The ones that get PADI-ised, I rarely see again. The ones that bring the paperwork back, tend to be the ones that go on future trips (with or without the LDS) and stay active in the sport. Ultimately, they started off as the customer of the LDS and hopefully will remain a customer of that facility.
Problems that I have encountered in the past is that the students on referal that are processed at the destination is that they either never receive their C-Cards from the resort destination or have an error on the card (wrong picture, typos, wrong level, etc). This is not the norm, but does happen from time to time and can be difficult to rectify. When the student returns to their LDS, it is their home base. They will have someone locally to follow up with if there is a problem with their C-Card.
Also, I have had students that were processed by the Internation Affiliate of the destination training agency and not the US Headquarters. The Training agencies have gotten better about co-ordinating this information, but sometimes when a student looses their card and they want to get a replacement it can be difficult tracking down their original information to verify they are a certified diver. When the student returns to their LDS, they are gauranteed to be certified by the US Headquarters and should never have a problem getting a replacement again.
This is just my perspective on it as a Dive Shop Owner. There have been some interesting points raised, but I ultimately think it is better for the Diver to return all paperwork to the initiating facility to prevent any mistakes and there is someone to follow up with them.
Problems that I have encountered in the past is that the students on referal that are processed at the destination is that they either never receive their C-Cards from the resort destination or have an error on the card (wrong picture, typos, wrong level, etc). This is not the norm, but does happen from time to time and can be difficult to rectify. When the student returns to their LDS, it is their home base. They will have someone locally to follow up with if there is a problem with their C-Card.
Also, I have had students that were processed by the Internation Affiliate of the destination training agency and not the US Headquarters. The Training agencies have gotten better about co-ordinating this information, but sometimes when a student looses their card and they want to get a replacement it can be difficult tracking down their original information to verify they are a certified diver. When the student returns to their LDS, they are gauranteed to be certified by the US Headquarters and should never have a problem getting a replacement again.
This is just my perspective on it as a Dive Shop Owner. There have been some interesting points raised, but I ultimately think it is better for the Diver to return all paperwork to the initiating facility to prevent any mistakes and there is someone to follow up with them.