March 2010    Download the Entire Issue (PDF)

Vol. 25, No. 3   What's this?

Where’s Your Customer Service, Scubapro?

a reader’s detailed 30-minute video is met with silence

from the March, 2010 issue of Undercurrent  

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Undercurrent reader Richard Welk (Moodus, CT) had problems with his new Scubapro BCD. Having used Scubapro gear nearly exclusively for 30 years, he made a 36-minute video last summer, with his wife holding the camera and him comparing his trusty Scubapro STAB jacket to his new Classic Plus. “There’s no sleight of hand, we’re not lawyers or tricksters,” Welk said on camera while standing in front of his garage, surrounded by his dive gear. “We’re just trying to show the problem with my new BC.”

Welk, a big man, bought a new Classic Plus in XL, the same size as his old STAB jacket. He went through two that didn’t fit right, then his dive shop owner put him in an XL Classic Plus. Again no dice, and BCs in size large were too small. Welk believes Scubapro has shortened the backpack and lowered it too far down on the bladder. He measured the difference from the top of the backpack to the top of the BC for each. It’s 3.5 inches for the STAB jacket, and eight inches for the Classic Plus, a difference of 4.5 inches. This was all in his video, which he sent to both Scubapro and its parent company, Johnson International, in August. He might as well have tossed it in the trash can. He got no response from either party. ...