Why not a PADI diver number?

[Damselfish]

This violates one of my rules of bureaucratic behavior -- never attribute a decision to intelligence when it can be explained by ignorance. The most likely explanation was that someone wrote the code years ago and assumed people would always write their name and birthday the same way and it would be easy to search (in case anyone actually wanted to search). It just never occurred to anyone at the time to set it up with a single number because they were focused on name and birthdate which I'm sure was a hold over from when they kept records by hand, in alphabetical order.

That's kind of my thinking. They probably started from an old paper system, then coded more or less the same thing, poorly - with no one who knew better being involved. All too common. Even if they realize it's a bit lame there's no business incentive for them to spend money to fix it.

 

[tlt]

I guess you kind of need to ask yourself, about a company who is not continually investing in their infrastructure and keeping up with the times. I am not trying to be critical of dive certifying agencies but this applies to any company. It typically is a sign of the demise, you have to invest to keep up with the times, and in PADI case, the huge numbers.

It would be a real intelligent thing to do, to update systems, standardize things, and allow users to update their contact details etc. I would want to know who and where my clients were, and to be able to continually engage them. In the case of dive certifications, it might be good for business. Maybe they know something we don't, some statistics, etc. Perhaps it is not worth the investment if only 5% of divers stay active and do additional training after initial certification for example. My figures are not scientific, but provided as an example... But it seems like it would make that smaller group of divers more important to be in tune with.

 

[SteveAD]

The padi filing system keys on name and birthdate. It is unfortunately a very literal system and will give back "record not found" for any mismatch like presence or absence of a middle initial.

 

[Beyond_Diving]

i like being many different people... yeah me too... and me.. woohoo!!!

 

[rligon]

vrykolakas(s), does that mean you use 3 times the air the rest of us do?

 

[Beyond_Diving]

Considering I dive (most days) 3-4 dives per day (6 days/week), I guess I do..:mooner:

 

[boulderjohn]

I guess you kind of need to ask yourself, about a company who is not continually investing in their infrastructure and keeping up with the times. I am not trying to be critical of dive certifying agencies but this applies to any company. It typically is a sign of the demise, you have to invest to keep up with the times, and in PADI case, the huge numbers.

I think Damselfish already answered this one:

Even if they realize it's a bit lame there's no business incentive for them to spend money to fix it.

What would be the point in this investment? How will they benefit from it?

I believe they are investing their time and resources in other ways. In the last few years they have made a number of significant program changes, and they have more coming down the path in a year or so. A change which has no real benefit will be a comparatively low priority.

 

[cloudswinger]

That's kind of my thinking. They probably started from an old paper system, then coded more or less the same thing, poorly - with no one who knew better being involved. All too common. Even if they realize it's a bit lame there's no business incentive for them to spend money to fix it.

The development progression was probably: paper form -> excel spread sheet -> access db

If they were more tech savvy, a lot of data could be collected and stuff marketed to the people in the db. If they had the info, they could do something like: people in your area that took that ow class with you are taking advanced classes now, or are going to roatan, or whatever else the data mining algorithms pop up. It's scary how much data can and has been collected on people though, I know Amazon still has records of books I bought from 1999, and reminds me of that, saying things like "you bought so and so book on such date, and if you're no longer using it, you can sell it, or we have other books to recommend" All that work is expensive though.

 

[kvp]

If you, your instructor, or the shop use your middle initial one time and not another, you are two different people. According to my last call to PADI on this, it cannot currently be corrected in the database. You could try to redo a PIC card w/wo the initial, but you would still be two different people.

I agree that it would make things a lot simplier, if a single number were issued.

You can get the info corrected in their database. My last name was spelled differently on various c-cards. Sometimes a space, sometimes the entire name together. When I was getting ready to go pro, my shop did a check and said that I didn't have all of my certifications. A quick e-mail to PADI and they combined all of my certs under one name.

I would ask PADI about this again. It can be done.

Ken Van Pelt