Personal details

We are required by law to hold your personal details for a period of 7 years. We will treat these details with respect and they will be kept confidential. We won’t hold any card details after full payment has been done.

 

Your safety

We love that you have chosen to spend your holiday diving with us. We do ask that you refrain from using any alcohol or drugs before your dive.  Our number 1 concern is your safety.  We reserve the right to prevent you from going on your dive if we think you may not be in a fit state to dive.

 

Personal belongings

We take no responsibility for any items that are damaged or lost in and around our dive centre. We always recommend you leave your valuables in a safe place. Please remove any precious jewellery off before your dive to avoid disappointment.  We cannot be held responsible for the loss or damage of any belongings on site. We strongly recommend not taking any valuable items to the dive site.

 

Dive Medicals

By law, anyone wanting to dive in Malta or Gozo is required to fill out one of these forms.  We’ll send you a copy of the medical form via email when you book. Read through it and answer it honestly as dishonesty can put you and the dive leader in a dangerous situation. If you think the answer to one or more questions might be yes, let us know and we may refer you to a dive doctor. We recommend doing this before you arrive. Otherwise, we can organise a visit  to our local dive doctor and assess if you are fit to dive for an extra fee.

 

Payment

In order to reserve your spot, we ask for a deposit when you book online to secure your place. The amount for the deposit will depend on what type of diving you sign up for. Once you arrive on site, we request full payment before the start of your course or dive package. If you decide to sign up for any more dives or courses we can arrange that once you arrive subject to the availability of our instructors. We take cash or card payments (3% charge on top). We do not accept cheques and reserve the right to withhold certification in the event that the full course price has not been paid.

 

Course agreement

The Ritual dive team aims to provide you with exciting, fun and safe courses. As with any course, you’ll need to invest some time in reading and learning the material. You’ll need to do some independent study prior to the academic sessions. Read the sessions assigned by your instructor before and complete the quick quizzes.

 

We’d like you to agree to:

1. Follow the course procedures outlined by your instructor and ask questions whenever you don’t understand anything. Show up on time and be prepared to start your diving day.
2. For non-entry level courses, you’ll will be asked to complete a check dive before beginning the course so that our instructors can gauge you skill level, refresh any areas required and ensure that you prepared to take the course.
3. If the your diving level is not adequate to begin the course, for your safety, we reserve the right to postpone your course start date and provide you with options to reach the required level for the associated appropriate fee.
4. If all course objectives and skills are mastered and the instructor and dive centre are satisfied that you have reached a safe level to be certified, then we will certify you. If you fail to meet the requirements, as with any other course, we reserve the right to suggest remedial training dives or sessions at additional costs.

 

Induction

Induction to Ritual Dive covers:

• Health and safety on premises including fire procedures and general safety matters
• Personal health and safety issues that relate to diving. If you are already a qualified diver, then it is your responsibility to evaluate your own health and safety.
• Medical fitness to dive
• Overview of facilities on site
• Review of course prerequisites and entry requirements
• Use of equipment during the course and associated fees
• Course content and associated fees – no hidden costs
• Course schedule, requirement for attendance and notification of non-attendance

 

Scheduling

We like to operate efficiently and on time. If  you are late for our scheduled time of departure then your dive leader will most likely have to leave without you. Because we will have saved your space, we will not be able to refund you the dive trip/s. The reason is that we value our instructors time and we will have refused someone else for that trip. Obviously we appreciate that some factors may be beyond your control such as medical issues, delays or bad weather. If this is the case please chat to a member of the management team.

 

Cancellations, Rescheduling & No Shows!

1. ‘No Shows’ are when you fail to turn up for a scheduled session without giving us any notice. Payments made for the session will not be refunded or credited to a future session.
2. Should you need to reschedule a course or experience with less than the required notice period then a rescheduling fee will be applied.
3. Rescheduling a course or experience after the start time of that session is classed as a ‘No Show’ (point 1.)
4. If you are unable to attend a course, or part of a course and provide more than the required notice period for that course, we will endeavor to reschedule your course to another date that is suitable to you without any rescheduling fee. Any part payments made for courses will remain in credit on said account for up to 1 year from booking date.
5. Failure to complete the full course requirements for any reason caused by the student will result in additional charges to complete the course at a later stage. This includes not being able to demonstrate competence to meet the performance requirements as laid down by the Agency Course Standards. If you are not willing to pay the additional fees to complete your course, a referral document will be issued to you, which will hold last for a period of 6 months from the date of last portion of the course completed.
6. In the event that a situation arises and Ritual Dive is unable to deliver your course on pre-arranged dates, we will endeavor to give you as much notice as possible and will re-schedule your course. We reserve the right to cancel courses if diving conditions render student diving unsafe. Risk assessment controls will determine conditions to dive.

 

OW courses:

Here are our terms for the Open Water course:

• Failed swim test: no refund on course material & cert fee
• Failed dive medical: we’ll give you a full refund
• Drop out after 1 & 2 – NO REFUND W/O medical reason
• Drop out before dives 1 & 2: please chat to management for refund rates as these depend on what has been completed
• Charges for extra half/full day: €60/€100

Pro courses:

• Our pro course deposits are non-refundable as this covers the course material
• No refund if cancelled within 30 days

 

Itinerary changes

We would love to adhere to the advertised itinerary but we do reserve the right to alter, cut short or cancel the trips either due to weather conditions, medical emergencies or any other reason that may compromise your safety. In the event that this happens, please speak to management if you have any doubts or queries and we will be happy to chat about your concerns. Please always consider our choice of dive sites to be provisional.

 

Discounts and Offers

We are committed to offering our divers great deals through our various dive packages. If you arrive and do not complete all the dives purchased through your dive package, we cannot refund you at the discounted rate. Depending on how much of the package you have actually done, you can either chose to pay the normal price for your dive course/package and get the refund for whatever is left that you have not done, or you can pay the full package price and not continue on with the remainder of your dives. The reason we do this is to be fair to our instructors who we have booked in to take you out on your dives and to those divers that we were not able to take as there were supposedly no more available spots.

 

Equipment

We take pride in having top quality dive equipment for our training and leisure dives. Our instructors will show you how to use your dive equipment appropriately and if you are unsure or a piece of equipment looks new to you please ask them how to use it. You will be liable to look after the equipment as if it were your own. If any equipment is lost or seriously damaged, you will be liable to cover the costs. From past experience, this seems to be the only way to ensure our equipment is properly looked after. We cannot be held responsible for any damage to equipment or injury that is caused by your negligence.

 

Refresher dives

If you have not dived in a while, we may ask you to complete a refresher dive. This is our policy for refresher dives:

• <20 dives and inactive for 6 months or more
• <50 dives and inactive for 1 year
• <100 dives and inactive for 2 years or more

 

Check dive

Any divers who haven’t dived in Maltese waters at least 6 months prior to arriving will be asked to do a check dive in an easily accessible site no deeper than 18m  to make sure you are comfortable with your equipment and that your weighting is appropriate.

 

Marine life

Fish Feeding is strictly prohibited, collecting shells, corals, or any living or dead organisms from the sea is also strictly prohibited. Please do not collect or touch anything (other than rubbish) and respect the sea and the environment. The use of any form of artificial lighting is also strictly prohibited when photographing seahorses.