Doing your Open Water course? Absolutely TERRIBLE - stay away!
As a trusted Google Local Guide, I take pride in providing genuine and sincere reviews of my personal experiences. My aim is to help others in similar situations, to make informed decisions.
Quite simply put, my experience with Abyss was absolutely horrible.
This was due primarily to our Open Water instructor - Jarrad B.
I would highly discourage anyone from doing their Open Water scuba diving course here.
Trust me on this do it elsewhere. You want to enjoy the experience, not hate it.
The Abyss motto was "We want to keep you diving". Despite being an avid outdoor adventurist, I can guarantee I will never dive again after this experience.
In order to remain unbiased despite my horrendous experience, I will provide a fair and honest review.
1. The Good:
- The owner, Peter L., was absolutely lovely. He was very funny, kind, knowledgeable and passionate about diving.
- Good price for the Budget Open Water course.
- Heated vest was helpful in staying less cold.
- Instructor had strong technical knowledge and demonstrated competency.
- Instructor was reliable, responsible, and generally well organised.
- Instructor was very prompt in issuing the PADI eCard certification after course completion.
- The part time instructor Stephen G. was absolutely amazing. A true professional, amazing teacher and instructor.
2. The Bad:
I have done an endless number of courses, and have come across a wide range of teachers. Great teachers, terrible teachers, and everything in between.
Our Instructor, Jarrad B. hands down, is by far the worst teacher / instructor I have ever come across in my life.
My main criticism of Jarrad B. would be his complete and utter inability to teach.
Qualities of a good teacher are those who are patient, caring, kind and nurturing. Jarrad B. possesses none of these qualities, and I would say, is the complete opposite.
When he was nice, he was fine and generally helpful. But when he was nasty, he was absolutely awful. He was aggressive and would yell and scream at a female student while she was trying her best to learn.
He brought one of the female students to tears on two separate occasions.
His, at times, aggressive and passive aggressive responses when asked questions, discouraged further questions which is so important when learning something new.
Early on in the course when asked questions, he gave responses such as "You should know that by now", and arrogant responses such as "It's not that hard". This discouraged any further questions from students for the remainder of the course.
It was clear he was pushed for time to complete the course on schedule and because of this, he was impatient with his students.
On countless occasions he had blamed the students for mishaps by saying, "YOU chose the budget course". Somehow implying we were second class citizens, not entitled to the same standard or quality of learning and customer service as other students. This was absolutely horrendous and unprofessional.
When attempting to help summarize a skills test for a fellow student, I was aggressively cut off by Jarrad B. He stated "I've already explained it several times". Unbelievably rude and unprofessional.
He would often state that "rental equipment is sh*t", openly criticizing his employer's quality of rental equipment. Coincidentally, the very same "sh*t" rental equipment was provided to all students. Go figure!
3. Conclusion
I absolutely DO NOT recommend doing the Open Water course with Abyss, due to the horrendous instructor who teaches it, Jarrad B.
Having read additional reviews after my experience with Abyss, I would recommend doing it with Sydney Dive Safari. This is based solely on the honest and genuine reviews I have read online, which appear to speak quite highly of the quality of teaching there.
I could be totally wrong, but if I was to recommend a dive centre to family and friends, or if by some chance I ever decide to dive again, it would most likely be with Sydney Dive Safari. read more
