1800skyride scam

I just received this from a friend thought I should pass it on.

AB


Greetings,
I felt compelled to let you know that if you plan to use the
1800Skyride.com service, it is a bullshit scam, which did not really
surprise me. Unfortunately I agreed to use them even though the pay they
were offering for tandems they scheduled to come to my DZ is so low, I am
embarrassed to admit I agreed to it in the first place. I asked two of the
customers (that came out to my drop zone after they scheduled through
Skyride) what they ended up paying. It was then that I learned that the
people are getting charged an additional $40 "Port Fee" per jump. The
customers asked me what a Port Fee was and I told them that it must be a
scam fee from that company and I had no idea what a Port Fee was supposed
to be for, other than getting more money out of each customer. Of course I
will not see any of that additional fee. There were other fees attached to
their bill that drove the price up even further.
Bottom line-they are screwing any of the customers and drop zones using their system.

It doesn't sound so much like a scam to me. It looks more like some clever people decided that they could make money by brokering some jumps for whuffos. I think it is only a scam if you don't actually get your jump.

What is the total charge that the customer pays???

I am going to have to disagree totally here. Our dropzone is one that participates in the program and it has brought me (the RPC manager) not less than seven customers who were all satisfied (to say the least) with the service they received here at Raeford. While it's true that the service might have you driving past closer dropzones to get to one of their participating centers, that is not the fault of the service. It's the fault of the potential customer for not looking at all the other available services which might lead you to a closer dropzone. Hell, even looking at a Parachutist would have you driving past other (non- USPA) dropzones, so where do you draw the line? At any rate, our dropzone has benefitted from participation in the program. Another point is that the price people pay (to my knowledge) is no different than they would have paid me if they had just shown up anyway. Feel free to PM me for more on this subject.

Chuck Blue
D-12501
Raeford Parachute Center School

I agree. We participate in the 1800skyride program and are very happy. They perform their own marketing at their own expense, they pay for the overhead, they pay for the phonelines, accounting, office rent, etc. They sell the jumps at a price which recovers their expenses and makes them a profit. That's business and it was a good idea someone had. If they severely overcharged their customers, the customers would not pay.

There are far more important things in skydiving to get upset about.


Buzz Fink
Skydive San Diego, Inc.

That sucks. We don't need poeple having a bad taste in their mouths about skydiving, when they could be treated well. How likely are they to come back and make a second jump if they get screwed out of all their cash on jump 1?

Yea ! I got screwed out of all my $ after my first tandem jump.
I had to pay to do it again!
Then I had to pay for AFF!
Then I had to pay for my rig!(which I love)
Not to mention I have to pay for my jumps and all that beer.

Skydiving is such a scam

you are very correct sir

What a great response to this post

For I have also got scamed out of alot of cash
but I love it

So, Buzzfink, adding a middleman to take more money out of the coutomer's pocket is good business? No thanks...

In our experience, people don't pay the skyride people a penny more than they would pay here at our dropzone. The customer pays skyride, then they show up here to make their jump. Once the jump is complete, we have them sign their faxed reservation as confirmation of their jump. We then fax the signed copy back to skyride for US to get paid. WE (the dropzone) make slightly less per tandem doing it this way, but that's OK because it brings us business we would not ordinarily get. Once again: there is no price increase (at least using our dropzone) over what you would pay if you just walked in off the street. The dropzone gets paid slightly less, but we make up for it in the additional traffic. I hope that explains it. At any rate, it's working great for us.

Chuck Blue
D-12501
Raeford Parachute Center School

Does this operation sell video for the DZ too? Or is the DZ able to sell video for full price to the Sky Ride customers?

Quote

So, Buzzfink, adding a middleman to take more money out of the coutomer's pocket is good business? No thanks...

It's very good business, and is used ethically and efficiently in pretty much every industry.

Any program that brings more students to a DZ is a good thing for the DZ, and if you believe that students are the lifeblood of the sport, then a good thing for it, too.

_Am

Here, our TMs and Vidiots get paid the same amount as if the customer was a walk-in. On our dropzone, there is no "separate" video concession; they work for me.

Chuck

Quote

Once again: there is no price increase (at least using our dropzone) over what you would pay if you just walked in off the street.

Chuck, if that is the case withall dropzones using this "service", then that is a good thing ... the impression I got from the original poster was that the consumer would end up paying more for the skydive using this service than if they walked in off the street. Thank you for your perspective.

Hey mixologist,
Whatcha doing buying all that beer if you could be shaking beer-light martinis?

I just mean, people already think we're nuts (which we are, sort of), so we don't need the bad publicity of also being jerks.

Of course some people have plenty of cash to burn and will come back even if they more than it's worth to do that first jump. Me -- I was a budget student I wouldn't have been able to stay in the sport if someone had taken advantage of my niavete, and taken my money!

I'd like to hear from any DZO that has done business with SkyRide.com

TIA
.

Kind of sounds like "port fee" is the cost of ferrying the plane. DZs normally pay a ferry fee to get a plane in for a boogie, so it doesn't sound that unusual to me.

1800skyride.com = Cary Vincent, Marietta, Georgia.

Mark

This sounds a lot like 1-800-DENTIST where dentists pay to have their names put on a list, and people call in and are told the closest dentist on the list. They do provide a service (advertising for the dentist/DZ, locating a dentist/DZ for the customer) and they do charge money for it. From what I've read it doesn't sound like a scam, after all, 1800Skyride is probably the first place they've heard tandems advertised.

Quote

In our experience, people don't pay the skyride people a penny more than they would pay here at our dropzone. The customer pays skyride, then they show up here to make their jump. Once the jump is complete, we have them sign their faxed reservation as confirmation of their jump. We then fax the signed copy back to skyride for US to get paid. WE (the dropzone) make slightly less per tandem doing it this way, but that's OK because it brings us business we would not ordinarily get. Once again: there is no price increase (at least using our dropzone) over what you would pay if you just walked in off the street. The dropzone gets paid slightly less, but we make up for it in the additional traffic. I hope that explains it. At any rate, it's working great for us.

Chuck Blue
D-12501
Raeford Parachute Center School

***
If it's the same price or close to it,
Why wouldn't a dropzone approve?!

It's all about getting traffic...
More customer exposure.

A DZ I worked at had a neat program going.
The DZO had a bunch of classy looking
business card / coupons
printed up that he would distribute to the 'regular' jumpers.

On it was a 20.00 discount for the first jump course,
The distributing jumper signed the back...
If 5 cards came back with your name on them
you got a free jump ticket...
10 cards equals a repack.

Within 30 days the number of 1st time students doubled.

Re-posted:

We participate in the 1800skyride program and are very happy. They perform their own marketing at their own expense, they pay for the overhead, they pay for the phonelines, accounting, office rent, etc. They sell the jumps at a price which recovers their expenses and makes them a profit. That's business and it was a good idea someone had. If they severely overcharged their customers, the customers would not pay.

There are far more important things in skydiving to get upset about.


Buzz Fink
Skydive San Diego, Inc.

Check out our post on rec.skydiving.

Do not know how to post on two seperate newsgroups
:(

Skydive Greene County
Xenia, Ohio

The part I disagree with in this is that the skyride folks have bought out other URLS, such as "skydive Philadelphia", which DOES detract from business the local DZ could get. Skyride is NOT a DZ, and shold not advertise to be one. The customer, thinking they will skydive in Philly, calls the number, buys a jump through a non-DZ and is referred to cross keys or the likes. It's false advertising in my eyes and IS detracting from teh normal business the local DZs would get.

Just my 2 cents.

__

Thanks Stacy!

Somebody has finally figured out this "scam"

Again, thanks Stacy

Lee

Why would you pay someone else to send skydivers to your place, if they are driving past other DZ's that may be as great as yours, and many hour out of their way?

You our dear dzo friend, are promiting SPAM in what was once our great skydiving world.

Lee and Jim

written by Lee

Skydive Greene County
since 1961