DC Skydiving Center

The manager at this business actually said he welcomes negative reviews because it, "shows future customers we are serious about our policies." What it shows is that they are VERY okay with poor customer service. Apparently, they are also okay with cursing at customers and being generally rude. I would never recommend this company to anyone concerned with how the employees treat paying customers.

I purchased a Living Social deal with DC Skydiving Center back in March and made a reservation for May. On the day of the jump, my friend (who also made the same purchase) and I were in the car on the way to the center when we got an email (not even a phone call) just before the jump saying it was cancelled due to high winds. I appreciate the safety aspect here, but the timing was really poor. We had to turn around and head home. It would have been nice if they had made the call a little earlier. I called and rescheduled for July. This is where the problem started. Two days before the jump, something came up and I had to cancel. The girl I spoke with informed me that because I was calling within 48 hours of the jump, I would have to be charged $50 the next time I called to reschedule. I argued that I was only 45 minutes short of that 48 hours and she wasn't willing to budge. I figured I'd just eat the $50.

I called yesterday to reschedule and was told I would now be charged $100, $50/person in the reservation. This is their cancellation policy- this I understand. I thought this was a bit much considering I was only 45 minutes late in cancelling. I was directed to speak to the office manager, Sean. That is who I spoke with today. The conversation started off well, and he was very thorough in making sure that I knew that everything was handled electronically and it was out of his control that I was within the 48 hour cancellation window. I tried to explain that I thought it was slightly absurd that they cancelled on us for the first jump just moments before it, but because I was a few minutes late, I would now be charged $100. The manager began to use curse words and did not seem to comprehend or care that I was disappointed. Furthermore, he said I should have been charged back in July. I told him that since I would not be rescheduling at all now (due to his attitude), I would not be paying that $100. It became clear I was getting nowhere with him, so I ended the call and thanked him for his time.

Note that Living Social also called him after I called to complain about the customer service and they, too, came back to me and said he was rude and difficult.

Finally, I noticed that right after our call, my credit card they had on file from the booking deposit had been charged. I had clearly ask they hold off on this but Sean of course did not care. I called to ask why he had done this and he said, "Oh well since you should have been charged in July, I took care of it for you so you're all set- would you like to reschedule now?" I told him I would never be booking with them and I was unhappy about the $100 charge. This was a complete waste of time, energy and money. Living Social seemed to agree with me and issued me my money back into my account.

Before visiting this DZ, I was under the impression it was a tandem factory, unfriendly to fun jumpers. I first arrived expecting to be turned away, and was surprised to find just the opposite. One of the TIs, Rico, gave me a tour of the DZ and landing area. The DZ manager Chris, and one of the regulars, Tom, pulled up an aerial view of the landing area and showed me the current spot, landing patterns, and where some good outs were.

Some bad decisions on my part led to a hard landing, and the staff showed genuine concern that I was ok, over chastising the poor decision I made. They even contacted the DZO the next day from my home DZ to make sure I was ok. Not sure where some of the negative reviews on here stem from, but I have nothing but positives to say about this dropzone. The only negative is that the packing area could be bigger, but it's designed for tandems, and there's a good amount of shaded grass for fun jumpers to pack on.

I went over to the DZ I pass it twice a week so I decided to go and check it out, because I had my gear with me. It was a light day as far as I could tell. So I looked around and a few things just bothered me. When I asked where the DZ map was one employee looked at me like I was speaking another language and then I was told by another to pull it up on my phone. The Bill Booth video was playing on a screen hanging from the wall but no one was watching it or even concerned that it was playing. I guess mostly I just didn't like that fact that I was clearly looking for a kinda DZ orientation but no one working there cared. This is not anywhere where I would go to jump which is too bad because I go past it all the time. In all fairness this might not be a DZ geared to fun jumpers.

I gave services a 3 because I cannot really comment on them because I didn't use them.