Pirate Divers
Pirate Divers
5
Scuba & Snorkelling
This location was reported permanently closed
About
Pirate Divers is located in Haad Salad, mentioned in the lonely planet as one of the most beautiful beaches in island. We offer a wide range of Padi Courses, including Bubble Makers for children for children. Our Aim... Here at Pirate Divers our Padi Pros always strive to give there best in customer service and attention to detail. With guaranteed small groups you are sure to walk away with an unforgettable experience.
Ko Pha-Ngan, Thailand
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Most Recent: Reviews ordered by most recent publish date in descending order.

Detailed Reviews: Reviews ordered by recency and descriptiveness of user-identified themes such as wait time, length of visit, general tips, and location information.


5.0
5.0 of 5 bubbles213 reviews
Excellent
186
Very good
18
Average
5
Poor
0
Terrible
4

Bonnyboff
Manchester, United Kingdom47 contributions
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Jul 2015 • Couples
Thanks so much for a fantastic dive experience. Callum came in on his day off and his birthday to take my partner and I out on a Discovery dive. We couldn't have done it any other day and this was our last chance before flying back to Bangkok. The tour guide had phoned a few other places but Pirate Divers were the most flexible. I had read the recommendations and feedback so was pleased that they could make our dive possible. The conditions wasn't the best however, this took nothing away from the experience. I am a certified diver but my partner hadn't even snorkelled before and was apprehensive and didn't know what to expect. The patience and calmness that Callum possesses really helped my partner to put his trust into him and eventually he started to get to grips with breathing underwater and enjoying it. We even got collected and dropped off. Heartfelt thanks to a professional dive outfit in a beautiful and practical location. We will definitely be back but until then, we will wear our Pirate Dive tshirts with pride. :)
Written July 19, 2015
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Juanma596
Reading, UK430 contributions
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Nov 2015 • Friends
We took our first contact with the diving world with this company and it was an amazing experience. A really professional crew that picked us up in our hostel and was really friendly. 100% recommended!!
Written November 27, 2015
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Montoya C
Saint-Gilles-Les-Bains, Reunion Island13 contributions
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Aug 2017 • Couples
Super plongée, très sympa et prudent, un bateau très agréable et un chouette repas et petit des, top!!! Je recommande ce club sans aucune hésitation !!!
Great dive, they are really nice people, the boat is great too end lunch and breakfast great. A really good day! I recomand these dive center, it was a fabulous day !!!
Written August 24, 2017
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Pip K
Wolverhampton, England, United Kingdom59 contributions
1.0 of 5 bubbles
Dec 2011 • Couples
Absolute disgrace to the PADI name! Avoid like the plague!

My boyfriend and I booked a refresher course after having 18 months away from diving. We were picked up in the morning from our guest house by the boss of pirate divers (Nick) and again we mentioned us having not dived for 18 months. This was made extremely CLEAR!

We were taken to dive in extremely turbulent weather, high waves and strong currents. There were 4 people diving in our group. 2 of the BCD regulators were not working, however replacement equipment was not provided and the two boys were expected to dive using their back up regulator only. My boyfriend's flipper broke after 2 minutes in the water and he was unable to dive for the whole day due to no spare equipment being provided. I then buddied up with the instructor Steven who was the only positive thing about the dive company. However we lost the other couple under the water who were diving with us so if the boy with the broken regulator had suffered a problem with his air, God knows what could have happened. This was a bad enough experience thus far............

I had not received any of the refresher course that we had asked for and was legally required. When we arrived back on shore Nick came to collect us to take us back to our Guest House. This was were he started to make arrogant and aggressive demands that we pay for the damaged flipper that had broken on my boyfriend. After recoiling in horror at Nick's attitude I asked why we had not received our refresher course. I was told that we had not paid for a refresher course in a dismissive and arrogant tone. Despite being assured that this was what we had paid for only that morning!! I informed Nick that we would not be paying for anything and instead would be asking for a refund, to which he laughed in my face! He told me the flippers cost more than the diving session we had paid for (so more than £60, but I later saw them for sale for just £15) I explained that his shoddy equipment had cost my boyfriend a days diving and was simply not safe to be using. He absolutely denied this, telling me the equipment had only just been serviced! Quite frankly his attitude was absolutely disgusting. He treated us with no respect at all and behaved in a money grabbing aggressive manner.

Luckily we only lost the money for the course and did not pay a penny for anything else as he'd not taken any information about us and not even checked our PADI certification so we simply went to our Guest House after denying him any payment. However I was shaking with anger by the time we did get to the guest house and was a little put off diving until we reached our next destination and had a much more positive experience.

Please do not waste your time and money with these cowboys! It's only a matter of time before their casual attitude towards safety ends up with someone getting hurt!
Written January 14, 2012
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Hi thank you for your review. However there are some discrepancies in your review of us. When you booked with us you booked 2 fun dives, the fun dives do not include a refresher course the price of the refresher course is a bit more, and then you would have dived with another instructor in your own group to do the refresher course. As a qualified PADI diver you are trained to take your own responsibility, nothing was said to the instructor about a refresher course on the boat during the dive briefing or in the interval. Regarding the fin that was lost these fins where only 1 week old and not broken. The fin was either not correctly attached to the foot and come off during the dive or was broken on the dive. When you fill out the booking forms in the morning you sign to say you take responsibility of the equipment you rent so you are therefore responsible if its lost or damaged. All our equipment in serviced every six months to ensure our equipment meets diving regulations and was serviced 3 weeks before you came diving. The equipment is also used by our staff to ensure all the equipment is being used and not left sitting in the shop. Regarding the divers that went missing. These two divers have been diving many years and wanted to dive own their own. However we do not permit divers to dive on their own, all our groups have a dive professional with them. The two customers swam off on the instructor so they could dive on their own this is not the instructors fault or the dive schools fault. Unfortunately we live in a world where we cannot predict the weather and as a diver we very rarely get perfect conditions to dive in. In December we had particularly bad weather where some trips where cancelled, but on the day of the customers trip the weather had cleared up and conditions were perfectly safe for diving. If they were not the captain of the boat, a very experienced seaman, would have made the decision not to allow divers into the water. Waves and currents are something which a certified diver has to deal with if they want to dive, we have no control over mother earth. We are sorry that you feel you where spoke to in appropriately, however the staff, owners and managers do not come to work to be made to feel intimidated by our customers. If they are made to feel this way their tones or words may change as for anyone who is put into this position. English is not a first language for everyone who works at Pirate Divers so if they are intimidated this puts them at a disadvantage as they are not speaking in their native language. At Pirate Divers we take our training very seriously there is no casual attitudes here. We follow PADI guidelines and standards to the letter whilst ensuring our customers are having a good time. We are very proud that we have a 100% safety record and no one who has been or is diving with has been hurt during a trip this is a record we intend to keep. Best Wishes Alex Sharp Pirate Divers
Written February 9, 2012
This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of Tripadvisor LLC.

Leigh F
Wolverhampton, UK41 contributions
1.0 of 5 bubbles
Dec 2011 • Couples
My girlfriend has made a review, and in response to the review the company are now not providing truthful responses.

In the morning of our dive the company did not ask us to sign anything or even look at our Padi licence card. We made a booking over the phone so they also didnt look at this card in the shop.

It is not true that we didnt tell them that we wanted a refresher course as I mentioned this within each phone call (I made three phone calls because the owner didnt know at first whether we would be diving due to the weather).

It is inconsequential that English is not the first language of some of their instructors as our instructor was from Liverpool, England. I also had a conversation with him about not having dived for over a year, they did not take this opportunity to flag that perhaps the dive was not for us.

In relation to the fact that you sign paperwork stating that you have to pay for lost equipment, maybe, but we didnt pay for anything as the company could not produce the paperwork in question as Pirate divers were not professional enough to ask us to sign anything and therefore did not have the documented information of our health and other important details.

In response to being 'intimidating' there were two male instructors present, my girlfriend is 5'4'' and certainly no shot putter! We both remained polite, if a little shell shocked by the experience. The company did not like when I stated with politeness but authority 'If you can produce paperwork with my signature stating that I agreed to pay for lost equipment, what ever the reason I will do so', I believe this put the companies nose out of joint. On leaving to return to my accomodation I made sure that I made it clear that my disappointment due to poor organisation and lack of maintenance of equipment had no reflextion on the instructor who was working in difficult conditions. The instructor was new to the company and I did not want my complaints to affect his working relationship. I do not believe that an intimidating person would have taken the time to praise the instructor in spite of disappointment.

In summary this company were not professional enough to ask us to sign any paperwork (as inexperienced divers we have learnt that if a company doesnt present us with paperwork to sign, we would be best to not use them). I now believe that the lack of professionlism demonstrated by the lack of paperwork and two (out of 4) regulators without mouthpeices portrays a company that I would not advise others to use.
Written February 11, 2012
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Again thank you for your response. You and your girlfriend seem to have a personal agenda against us. What you are writing are malicious lies which are not only harmful to the company which we have worked hard to maintain a very good reputation, but also to the staff who works here. The staffs who work here follow all of the PADI standards and you are questioning them at their job which is totally unacceptable. Regarding the paper work every diver or snorkeler who comes through the front doors of our office fills out paperwork you are just trying to hurt our company by making these lies saying no paperwork was done. The fin that was lost this was a new fin and not damaged in any way, you must not have correctly put the fin on. If you borrow something from a friend, and you would break it or lose it, would you replace the item? I’m sure you would, so what’s the different from when you borrow an item from a company, you directly assume that it’s not your responsibility to take good care of the item? PADI does not require a scuba review to be made, when a diver hasn’t dived in a while, it is recommended, but not mandatory, so if a customer doesn’t pay for one, we won’t make one. If a customer pays for a scuba review we will happily do a scuba review a day before they’re going on a boat trip, since the boats leave early in the morning, it wouldn’t be possible to go into a swimming pool to make a scuba review on the same day and the next day they will be in their own group with their own instructor (not diving together with other certified divers). But you didn’t want to pay 1,000 THB for a scuba review to be performed the day before the boat trip to Sail Rock. You and your girlfriend where not polite in any way towards us, during the whole day, and now you seem to have made it even more personal towards our whole team… We appreciate feedback; we want feedback so we can make our company bigger and better. But we do not appreciate feedbacks that are hurtful lies that have the intention to damage our company and reputation. For any of you reading this, please read all the other truthful reviews made towards our company, and you’ll see that this couple has a personal agenda towards us… Best Wishes Pirate Divers Team
Written February 15, 2012
This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of Tripadvisor LLC.

Flyingseb
Antibes, France508 contributions
1.0 of 5 bubbles
Feb 2016 • Solo
Where to start?
The manager is a rude South African who will tell you from 6am how much he hates most of the people on earth, then when after a long drive you arrive at the dive center where you can find below average diving gear, that you will choose quickly then load randomly in a pickup.
The "guests" are being carried at the back of the pickup for the less fortunate, on the bumpy and narrow roads of Koh phanang.
Then a long wait on the dock before boarding a dodgy and very unstable boat, with no shelter from the burning sun. You have to get a suntan, or a sunburn if like us you go to Koh tao for a 2 hours trip.

Then why shall we go that far as the visibility was so bad there anyway? We could have stayed a lot closer to see nothing anyway.

The divemaster did a very poor briefing before the dive, not explaining much about the dive site and specially not about safety. She was also picking up things from the bottom and chasing fishes which you should not do.
Then when after 10 hours with the "team" you would like to go back home, you still have to wait a while for the manager to make some time to drive you back, while rating the divers by nationality, quite rudely as usual.

I have over 400 dives experience and these 2 dives with Pirates divers were one of the worst.
In one word: AVOID.
Written March 13, 2016
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Hi FlyingSeb, We are really would like to apologize that we response your review very late, we’ve been thinking a lot on how to response. Our whole team was very surprise that we receive this review from you, because you seem happy and didn't tell us that you had any problems on that day, so we could have had a chance to fix things for you, but please allow us to explain something to you. Firstly Julian want to say sorry to you for the conversation that might make you not comfortable with, he just tried to make a joke, he also confirm that he didn’t try to be rude or want you to felt that way and we really sorry that it doesn’t please you. Secondly, we would like to explain about our gear that you said it’s below your average. Our diving equipment that we uses for any costumers, the BCD are Scuba Pro rental BCD (which was produced to be stronger that normal used BCD) also we use Scuba Pro regulators as well which is just the cost of the BCD and Regulator are about 40,000 Baht for each set, this is not included the cost of wet suite, cylinders, fin, weight belt (almost 70,000 baht) and the service cost every 6 months. We’re a ScubaPro dive team center, which means our equipment has to be of the high end scale of standard. We are sorry that it’s still not good enough for you, and we hope you to understand us that we makes very cheap tour so it mean that we couldn’t afford more fancy gear. For the transportation to the pier, we have to use the truck cause the road of Koh Phangan are narrow and in Thai Style and we cannot do anything about it, the road is built and maintained by the government so it’s up to them if they would like to make it better or not, which they actually are at the moment… Thirdly, about our boat, it was rebuilt from Thai fishing boat same as other diving boat in Thailand. Thai fishing boats are built to be out at sea in any conditions, so they’re built to move with the waves. Our boat has two floors that mean you can avoid from sunburn by siting on the first floor if the roof on the second floor cannot protect you enough, Thailand has very strong UV so it’s easy to get a sunburn, that’s why we always ask every guest to bring, sunglasses, sun screen and swimming wear with them for the trips. Bear in mind you were on a boat, there’s reflections from the water all day even in places of shade. About our dive master Olesya, she experienced for choosing the right size of all gear for costumers, normally she don’t need long time to choose the best gear for each guest. Olesya also said she picked up things while diving but there were some fishing line and some garbage that need to be taken out from the ocean, otherwise it can damage the coral and sea life. She also would like to apologize that her briefing of safety and dive site is not enough for you, because she though you go out for fun dive which is she thought that, too much information can make people get bore and she will show you around and be by your side all the time anyway. For the poor visibility on Koh Tao, we had the contact with you from your hostel, so we had very short conversation and your reception told us that you need to talk in French which is our French instructor not in the shop. So the booking is done very fast on the phone so we couldn’t have a chance explain much about visibility or anything, we would like to say that the day before you go dive with us, the visibility at Sail Rock was drop down to 5-8 meters visibility. So our whole team were aware of it might be drop more (but we couldn’t know how it going to be, until we are at the rock) so we have our plan B if it not clear enough to make a dive we will move to dive at Koh Tao instead. So on that day before you jump in, we had sent our staff to check visibility and it was 0-1 meters! Which mean all costumers that paid for dives won’t be able to see anything, So we ask all the people to move the boat to Koh Tao which is an hour far away from Sail Rock and the visibility was not the best but it’s ok to dive (about 5 meters) in many places in the world 5 meters of visibility could be considered amazing… We didn’t ask any of our guests to pay anything for the extra service, that we were the only boat that offered, we offered the more expensive trip for the pleasure of our guests. Most boats turned around from Sail Rock and went to dive at Koh Phangan instead, knowing very well that the visibility at Koh Phangan was even worse than Sail Rock, but our captain knew better and therefore headed to Koh Tao, just so you know our whole team tried our best to service you even we have to spend more time, more energy, more cost of the fuel. Thank you again for spending your time to write the reviews for us, we will keep up our work and develop ourselves more. At least our food is good. Hope you have a happy life where ever you are in the world! Best wishes All of Pirate team
Written August 11, 2016
This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of Tripadvisor LLC.

Felipe C
5 contributions
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Jun 2016 • Solo
I have dived at Sail Rock and Olesya Yan was my dive master and it was the best dive ever! Olesya was so attention and has so many experience and extremely professional, I felt so safe with her. She did a brief description of the marine life before the dive and during the dive she showed and pointed to a lot of different fishes and crustaceans. It was by far the best dive of my life. Thanks very much Olesya!

Pirate divers picked me up at my hotel, there was breakfast and lunch on the boat and brought back to my hotel.

I will definitely dive again with you guys!!!

Cheers!
Written June 29, 2016
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

VICKI B
Goolwa, Australia20 contributions
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Oct 2015 • Couples
My second trip to Sail Rock but my first coming from Koh Phangan and using Pirate Divers. Tony was my DM, Just the two of us. Thorough briefing, kit up and into the water, a good deep dive with lots to see and accomplishing all we set out to do in the briefing. Good food back on board while we wait for the second dive. We descend down the chimney, the vertical cave at the start of our dive then on to a more relaxed dive with less current than in the morning. Great vis with lots of life. Back on board and fresh fruit that always tastes so good after a dive. Tony took lots of Photos and video that he sent on to me later. Thanks for a great days diving Tony and Pirate Divers.
(submitted by Roy, Vickies husband)
Written October 4, 2015
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

peterlindhgbg
Gothenburg, Sweden1 contribution
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Aug 2014 • Friends
This dive shop is one of the most Service minded and down to earth shops in the entire Samui/Tao/Phangan area. And lord know there are many dive shops, especially on Koh Tao. But this is Phangan, and that means much dives on Sail Rock, which is the best site in the gulf of thailand

Pirate Divers is in the Haad Salad area. But you can dive with them easily even if you are living elsewhere. Those times me and my friends were picked up by the staff with a car in the morning to go straight to the Pier.
Very unique feeling as you easily become one with the "family" =)
Also, the owner owns the centrepoint resaturant on the beach in haad salad.
Which has one of the best Laab Moo's in Thailand (IMO) =)
Written July 16, 2015
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

SixDenSwag
Karlstad1 contribution
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Mar 2015 • Friends
Oh my god, where do I start? Well, me and my two friends went to Koh Phangan on vacation and we wanted to try some scuba-diving. We saw the Pirate Divers office when out walking and it looked really professional so we chose Pirate Divers over the other options. When we spoke an employee we quickly found out he was swedish, just like us! Apparently the Pirates speak many languages including swedish, english, russian, thai and even hebrew! We decided to get our Padi certification for open water diving. We got a great instructor called Nick who tought us so much in the little time it took to get our certificate. After we completed our confined water skills we went to sail rock wich was amazing! The boat ride was great with breakfast and lunch included. The diving at sail rock was amazing, we saw lots of different fish and corals, and we even saw a huge whale shark!

I definately recommend Pirate Divers to anyone who wants to try Scuba Diving. Great instructors, great diving and all of this to a very affordable price, even for a poor student like me! 10/10
Written March 29, 2015
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

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