I purchased a tandem hang gliding "gift certificate" for my husband for his birthday, he had always talked about how exciting it would be to hang glide.
After deciding I wanted to get him this gift, I went to yahoo yellow pages to see what I could locate in my area. To my delight I found a sky gliding company operating locally, within an hour of my location, so I called the company and discussed their services with them and by the end of the call I had, using my visa debit card, ordered a $280 "weekday" certificate for my husband's gift.
Well, my guy decided to redeem the certificate and called the company to make arrangements. The date was set for this last Friday, May 23rd and my husband took the time off of work for this exciting adventure.
On Friday we got a call from the owner of San Francisco Hang Gliding Center, Bodi Kroll, cancelling our apt. Due to "bad wind conditions". My husband expressed concern about taking the day off and when he would be able to get more time off to use the certificate. They discussed the options. My husband asked about coming out the next day (saturday) or the day after, but apparently Bodi was all booked up.
Finally, it was agreed that the apt. Would be rescheduled for this last Monday which worked out great since my hubby already had that day off. We were instructed to call in Monday morning for a time and directions to the launch spot.
Monday morning we called in and were given a launch time of 1 pm. A few moments later an anxious Bodi Kroll calls back and says "Come now." "Now?" I inquired. "Yes now" replied Bodi "My other client who was scheduled for today says that his apt is for ANOTHER Monday so we need to fill this opening NOW." "OK" I replied, "give us ten minutes and we will be in the car!"
So, I informed my husband about the change of plans and how we had to leave immediately for San Francisco (we live in San Jose). I packed up my small children and my digital camera and we drove the hour and fourty five minutes to the meeting place where we met Eric, the instructor, who led us the rest of the way to the launch site.
When we got there I started inquiring around as to who was with whom. We were introduced to the instructors (Eric and Gordon) and met the person who was in charge of going down to the landing site and bringing everyone back up to their cars.
At this time everything was hunky dory, the view so lovely, my husband excited and busy getting instructions from his guide. I took the moment to snap a few photographs of my lovely daughter, up there on the peak of the mountain, the ocean below as the background. I was so happy to be there and looking forward to enjoying this time watching my husband fulfill his lifelong dream of hang gliding and then also spend some time on this lovely mountain top, with my children, doing photography and other silly things like - like looking for lizards (the main reason our youngest son wanted to go).
We were only there about 15 minutes before everyone was geared up and ready to jump. I walked over to my husband, who by that time was hooked up to the glider, to wish him well when I noticed that there was a puny little camera attached to the glider and NOT a video camera like the company promises. They promise an "in flight video of you and your instructor in flight."
"Hey, we are supposed to get a video of this." I complained. "Bodi's camera is broken" Gorden the instructor told me.
"We expected a video." I insisted. Then I decided to not be a wet rag and ruin my husbands fine time, and I stopped complaining about the lack of ADVERTIZED and PROMISED merchandise.
A few minutes later they were on the actual launch pad and within five running steps they were off and in the air!
Then the driver, charged with transporting from the landing back up to the launch, turned to me and said "well since you are here you can come down with me and pick him up"
"No" I said, "you are supposed to do that and the children and I planned on spending some time up here doing photography and looking for lizards"
"You need to come down to get him" she insisted. "Eric and I have other things to do"
I tried to resist, but ended up feeling like I HAD to go pick up my husband myself (despite the fact that I had been clearly told that they provided transportation from the landing back to the cars up on the hill), the driver insisting they had OTHER things to do.
"Come on" she kept prompting "we have to go... We have other things to do".
In disgust I gathered up my children, who had already been in the car for nearly two hours and had spent less than 20 minutes on the mountain stretching out, packed them in the car and went racing down the mountain (following the driver who had already been PAYED to do this service), down to the landing site.
By the time we arrived, the gliders had landed and my husband was getting out of his gear. As I walked up he was talking with Gordon and telling him how great the flight was. He even went on to say that he had friends he would recommend their services to.
You see, he was sailing high on his flight high and was oblivious to these issues that were happening around him, and I guess that was the best thing 'cause this was his gift and I did want him to enjoy it. I was really trying to not be grumpy but by this time I was SO angry at the unprofessional nature of this crappy sky diving service, first not having the PROMISED and EXPECTED video (we got a roll of undeveloped film) then the issue of the driver suddenly wanting to get out of their contracted job so they could run off to do whatever else it was that they planned on doing for that day.
"How convienient for you that I am here" I had said quite grumpily to the driver as she INSISTED I HAD to go get Thomas. If I hadn't been there they would have had to take him back to his car but since I was there I guess they felt like they didn't need to provide this service and it didn't matter what plans the children and I had, no none of this mattered, not when they had "other things to do".
With a final word to Gordon that I was TOTALLY unhappy about the lack of video etc. I corrected my husbands "and we will refer our friends here" to a "we will refer our friends here WHEN YOU DELIVER THE SERVICES YOU CONTRACT TO DELIVER" and with that we headed back to San Jose.
One would think that this would be the end of the story but no. On Wed, two days after the flight, Bodi Kroll the owner of this stupid unprofessional company called our house FIVE times.
At the time I assumed it was a courtesy call to see how my guy liked the flight and darn it, I was so angry still that I didn't pick up the phone. I really didn't want to ruin my husbands good time in any way so I thought I would just let HIM talk to Bodi.
Well, later that night when Bodi called again, I was feeling so peaceful and settled that I decided I could take the call without ragging about the services. "Yes he had a good time" I was determined to say.
To my surprise Bodi didn't call to ask about the flight, no rather he called to inform us that while he was looking over his paperwork he noticed that we had taken a HOLIDAY flight and therefore owed him an additional fee.
"Holiday?" I queried. And grabbing our certificate (that they hadn't even asked for when the flight was taken) I noted that it had TWO options "W/D" and "W/E".. I looked over the flyer that came with the certificate. No, nothing about Holidays, just weekday and weekend information.
"This was on a MONDAY" I offered. "Monday was a holiday" Bodi countered. "We were scheduled for FRIDAY, which YOU cancelled and then rescheduled for Monday" I insisted. "You are trying to take advantage of this situation" Bodi accused.
"Take advantage of this situation" I repeated in amazement, "YOU are the one taking advantage and trying to get more money! And here you didn't even provide the services we had CONTRACTED for!"
I told him about the issues I had, especially how burned I was about the transportation issue, and we ended our conversation with me telling Bodi Kroll that I would NOT pay additional money for a MONDAY trip when our certificate CLEARLY stated it was redeemable on a weekday and NOTHING about "holidays".
The conversation was not pretty, with Bodi first insisting we owed him an additional $125 for various services we had "taken advantage of" and me insisting they wouldn't get another red dime.
Imagine my surprise when I go to my online banking the very next day and see that BODI KROLL made an UNAUTHORIZED WITHDRAWAL for $50.
I have the certificate, the flyer and the original envelope it was all sent in. We redeemed it appropriately and in accordance with the certificates stated terms (W/D).
Bodi Kroll and San Francisco Hang Gliding Center promises services they don't deliver. Their guides are unprofessional and selfish, rather willing to sluff their contractually obligated responsibilities because they have "something else to do." Bodi Kroll must be REALLY CHEAP to not spend the few hundred bucks on a video camera so he can give his clients the merchandise they expect and payed for.
For the record, we payed $280 for this flight, didn't get the video, didn't get the promised transportation, got rushed to our apt to make up for some other client who bailed and THEN Bodi Kroll debited my account without my authorization, for some ficticious "holiday" which is NOT listed on the brochure and certificate!
Does this sound like a reputable service to you?
If you are reading this complaint after having found this site because you are looking for a REPUTABLE and HONEST sky diving company in the Bay area, try "Natural Flying (408) 779-7976" or one of the other few gliding companies. Bodi Kroll and his employees don't provide the service they contract to provide!
Amy
San Jose, California
U.S.A.
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