Celebes Beach Resort Travel And Tours — Hotel in Pom Pom Island

I booked this resort approximately 13 months in advance for a group of 23 of us. Initially things were looking good with a very communicative and informative booking agent. About 1 month before we travelled the booking agent changed to a lady based in Tawau and the communication went from excellent to appalling. I had to send previously required and sent information over and over again. I asked for some information in return on a couple of occasions. The agent took forever to reply and it was clear that she was struggling to deal with the English language. I had sent a deposit to secure the trip and agreed to pay the balance by credit card on arrival. It took weeks for the agent to sort out the balance amount with numerous errors in their accounting.||||On arrival we had to walk across hard coral as the jetty had been damaged. They do not even have a jetty - the one they had been using belongs to the conservation group on the island.||||There were problems every day with showers, lack of replenishment of necessities and dangerous electrical services. Several guests received electric shocks from their equipment. I am not unused to living in remote areas and putting up with most problems. I have worked in remote locations as a diving instructor throughout Africa and Asia. I have stayed at mid-range resorts in Borneo such as Borneo Divers and at Backpackers like Billabong Scuba and Uncle Changs without any issues or gripes. I understand that things will never be perfect in locations like Pom Pom. However, if the manager makes an effort to help you it can make all the difference. Sadly, the manager at this resort has no concept of customer service and is as approachable as a nest of vipers. The man did not even introduce himself to me as the group leader of 23 people which made up 90% occupancy of his resort, stunningly ignorant!||||Before leaving Semporna I spoke to CBR's resort staff there who assured me they had stocked a variety of soft drinks and beer sufficient for our stay. By day 2 it was obvious that they had not. Rather than order more for us the manager just let the drinks run out. He showed no initiative to solve the issue at all. As it was we visited the resort next door who offered to sell us a limited amount of drinks. Why could he have not done this? Ali organised an acquaintance to sort us out with drinks which he did and saved the day. For his initiative and good customer service he was rewarded with a dressing down from the manager! The manager has his own separate fridge next to the guest's fridge. One of my guests asked for a diet coke and was told by the manager he could not have one as the diet drinks were his! Common courtesy would be to offer the guest the drink and ask him if he wanted him to order some more for his stay. Honestly the man was a completely ignorant buffoon. The totality of his proactive engagement with us was to leave his protected office to smoke a cigarette often next to our dining table whilst we were eating. He closed the fridges, padlocking them at about 9.30pm each night. Our night dives were scheduled for 8.30pm so, guests coming to the resort bar struggled for a drink. It was only after I managed to get a message to the resort director that the fridges stayed open longer. Again the manager showed no initiative. Why not get us to prepay for the drinks in one fridge and leave it open? The two junior members of staff tasked with serving drinks were completely disinterested. One of them constantly had his feet up on the bar listening to his ipod. Think of the character from Little Britain whose catchphrase is "computer says no" and you have hit the nail on the head. ||||The diving staff particularly Ali were absolutely top notch and we had great fun diving with them out on the boats. This helped to take our minds off how bad the resort was. However, the boats were also an issue and suffered from numerous breakdowns and took on water on our trips. As for the diving equipment every piece of hire equipment leaked, regulator mouthpieces were torn and we had one complete 1st stage failure at 15 metres. Clearly the lack of maintenance and safety considerations is not just confined to the resort. The diving itself was pretty good with a variety of macro life, heaps of turtles and clear visibility. Unfortunately, some of the nearer sites have suffered quite badly from dynamite fishing and we saw evidence of this on a few dives.||||I cannot complain about the food it was varied, tasty and plentiful especially when you consider the remote location. We were told the wifi was not working. However, the manager had wifi and having spoken to other staff at the resort they confirmed this saying that the manager would not give out the wifi passwords to guests or even to other staff members. ||||I was unable to pay the balance because the Semporna office's credit card machine was off-line. It remained off-line for the whole of our stay. I was asked if I could pay in cash. As you can imagine it is the simplest task to arrange to take delivery of nearly $20,000 at short notice in Borneo! In the end they agreed to accept paypal which did not come without difficulties. I had a Malaysian sim card which I could just get a weak signal from if I walked into the water at the end of the resort. I had to make several payments over several days and even then they disputed paypal's agreed exchange rate and insisted on charging me nearly $1000 extra for fees which were never declared up front. With 14 minutes to go before our boat departed back to Semporna they finally agreed that I had settled the bill. ||||Throughout the trip I relayed to the booking agent that we were dissatisfied but to no avail. She dismissed my concerns as being down to a language barrier. This was absolute nonsense as we had a native Malaysian amongst our guests! The manager was extremely rude to her. When she asked to speak to him he bellowed back to her that he could not hear her and demanded that she walk to him if she wanted to tell him something. On the last day she tried to discuss the issues we had experienced. His response was to argue publicly with her and wave her away.||||In summary this is a lovely picturesque island, the dive staff are brilliant, there is a complete lack of buy in to maintenance or the needs of the guests. The resort manager needs to be immediately replaced with someone up to the task as does their booking agent. When issues were raised everybody blamed each other. The booking agent in Tawau, the staff in Semporna and the resort staff need to share a collective responsibility for all that went wrong, that is how a team functions as a team rather than individuals operating in isolation.||||I would recommend you steer away from this resort and spend a little extra to go to somewhere where you will enjoy your hard earned break.||||These guys took a lot of money from me, provided all of my customers with an appalling level of service and this costs me as a business....

I returned to CBR Pom Pom after 3 years away. Since then there has been a change in management, and for the worse.||||1) No proper pick up, no sign, nobody from resort met me, and they wanted to dump me at some random jetty in Semporna. Yes given that Air Asia had decided to make my day by cancelling my early morning flight and shifting me to a 1030 flight from KL – meaning I arrived at 1330 in Tawau airport but there was nobody from the resort to meet me. I had to wander around and ask people if they knew where the pick up for CBR was. Then I was put on a general pick up van to Semporna, and the van driver tried to drop me off at some random jetty. ||2) Lack of dive guide allocation – there is only 1 guide. I am the only diver in the resort. How can they mess this up? Aparently they could. I walked to the dive centre on day 2 of my stay only to find no dive guide waiting for me and my equipment all still not set up. Resort manager not in sight. I had to ask at the counter and they woke up a freelancer to bring me out. ||3) Sand in the dive centre/ untidy dive centre – sand is a bane to divers. It gets into everything, is scratchy and more importantly breaches o-rings and seals. The previous management was stringent about sand in the dive centre. We couldn’t wear our slippers into the area, and there were 2 tubs set up for us to wash our feet before entering the area. This is not the case now, and even though the tub was put out to wash feet, it was never enforced. And the water was never changed during the whole 4 days I was there. A tank I had put up on the bench (because I thought I had to set up my own equipment) was left there on the bench for 4 days too. It is probably still there on the bench today.||4) Poor room maintenance – the first thing I checked when I got in was my room toilet. It didnt flush. I had to come out and ask for someone to repair it. It took a while. Immediately after they left, I turned on the lights because it was getting dark. There are only 2 lights for the room, and 1 wasn’t working. I had to complain again. It wasn’t just a change of bulb but needed rewiring. I was shooed out of the room. All in, I didnt get to use my room for the first 2 hours – till after dinner infact, since I arrived in so late that day. ||5) Workmen entered my room unauthorised and unasked for, whilst I was out – on day 4 after I came back from my 2 morning dives, and I went to my room, I noticed that the bed has been moved to 1 side, the room aircon was on full blast whereas Im always sure to turn it off before leaving, there were dirty footprints tracking into and out of the room, paint chips and dust on the floor, and bolts and black soot in the toilet area. Nobody has told me why, and I had nothing that needed repairing. ||6) Waited 15 minutes for the dive boat to pick me up whilst clinging to a buoy. It could have been worse, I could have surfaced in the middle of the ocean with no buoy line to hang on to. On day 4 we were allocated a different boat and boat driver than normal – I understand these guys normally handle the snorkellers. There was me, my guide, 2 discovery scuba (first time try out divers), and an instructor. The discovery scuba & instructor came out 10 minutes before me bringing their total waiting time to 25 mins. What an introduction to scuba diving. All in it took the boat guys 1 hour and 25 minutes to realise that we werent surfacing where we dropped off and that they should start looking for us. This is an accident waiting to happen. || Despite our late return the manager made no remark, no comment and no apology for the incident.||7) They no longer have spotters – in critter heaven – Pom Pom is renown for its small stuff, exotic and incredibly diverse sea life. This is the reason divers visit the place. The guide is basically doing his job – guiding divers from point a to point b. Dont get me wrong. He is a nice guy, he is just not trained. Many times he would have to wait for me while I stopped and looked for stuff. ||8) Lastly – the manager is inaccessible, aloof, and never available. Not just all the issues over the days – the confusion over the dive guide, the snorkeller boat allocation to divers, but on day 5, I wanted to settle my bill – it was just for a few cans of beer which I had consumed there. But I needed small change. The girl at the counter couldnt change my cash for me because she need access to the petty cash box which only the manager has to key to. And he wasnt awake yet. It was 10 am. Actually I realised that the manager was never around in the mornings. I only might catch a glimpse of him in the afternoon. 11 am I went to check – he was awake and had his breakfast but in no mood to open any petty cash box for me. This is terrible attitude and knocks off on the whole staff there.||||Dont get me wrong, I want to love this place. I used to love this place. I brought 15 divers here to celebrate my 500th dive 3 years ago. The previous manager Nurul, would make us all welcome, greet us warmly every morning, and make sure we were well tended to. She would go the extra mile for us. No house reef dive was ever a “self dive”. We would always have somebody bring us around from the dive crew, sometime Nurul herself would go with us. This year when I went back, the 2 people who greeted me warmly were ex staffers no longer working at CBR, and all part of Nurul’s dive crew. ||||Come on, get your act together. Since Nurul left, this place has had quite a few alarming reviews on trip advisor. Nothing spreads faster than bad reputation. You have all the best resources, beautiful surroundings, and even though there are other new resorts on the strip, there is enough room for everybody. For Malaysians, this is our own backyard. If we love it we will keep coming. But if we don’t, we vote...

I returned to CBR Pom Pom after 3 years away. Since then there has been a change in management, and for the worse.||||1) No proper pick up, no sign, nobody from resort met me, and they wanted to dump me at some random jetty in Semporna. Yes given that Air Asia had decided to make my day by cancelling my early morning flight and shifting me to a 1030 flight from KL – meaning I arrived at 1330 in Tawau airport but there was nobody from the resort to meet me. I had to wander around and ask people if they knew where the pick up for CBR was. Then I was put on a general pick up van to Semporna, and the van driver tried to drop me off at some random jetty. ||2) Lack of dive guide allocation – there is only 1 guide. I am the only diver in the resort. How can they mess this up? Aparently they could. I walked to the dive centre on day 2 of my stay only to find no dive guide waiting for me and my equipment all still not set up. Resort manager not in sight. I had to ask at the counter and they woke up a freelancer to bring me out. ||3) Sand in the dive centre/ untidy dive centre – sand is a bane to divers. It gets into everything, is scratchy and more importantly breaches o-rings and seals. The previous management was stringent about sand in the dive centre. We couldn’t wear our slippers into the area, and there were 2 tubs set up for us to wash our feet before entering the area. This is not the case now, and even though the tub was put out to wash feet, it was never enforced. And the water was never changed during the whole 4 days I was there. A tank I had put up on the bench (because I thought I had to set up my own equipment) was left there on the bench for 4 days too. It is probably still there on the bench today.||4) Poor room maintenance – the first thing I checked when I got in was my room toilet. It didnt flush. I had to come out and ask for someone to repair it. It took a while. Immediately after they left, I turned on the lights because it was getting dark. There are only 2 lights for the room, and 1 wasn’t working. I had to complain again. It wasn’t just a change of bulb but needed rewiring. I was shooed out of the room. All in, I didnt get to use my room for the first 2 hours – till after dinner infact, since I arrived in so late that day. ||5) Workmen entered my room unauthorised and unasked for, whilst I was out – on day 4 after I came back from my 2 morning dives, and I went to my room, I noticed that the bed has been moved to 1 side, the room aircon was on full blast whereas Im always sure to turn it off before leaving, there were dirty footprints tracking into and out of the room, paint chips and dust on the floor, and bolts and black soot in the toilet area. Nobody has told me why, and I had nothing that needed repairing. ||6) Waited 15 minutes for the dive boat to pick me up whilst clinging to a buoy. It could have been worse, I could have surfaced in the middle of the ocean with no buoy line to hang on to. On day 4 we were allocated a different boat and boat driver than normal – I understand these guys normally handle the snorkellers. There was me, my guide, 2 discovery scuba (first time try out divers), and an instructor. The discovery scuba & instructor came out 10 minutes before me bringing their total waiting time to 25 mins. What an introduction to scuba diving. All in it took the boat guys 1 hour and 25 minutes to realise that we werent surfacing where we dropped off and that they should start looking for us. This is an accident waiting to happen. || Despite our late return the manager made no remark, no comment and no apology for the incident.||7) They no longer have spotters – in critter heaven – Pom Pom is renown for its small stuff, exotic and incredibly diverse sea life. This is the reason divers visit the place. The guide is basically doing his job – guiding divers from point a to point b. Dont get me wrong. He is a nice guy, he is just not trained. Many times he would have to wait for me while I stopped and looked for stuff. ||8) Lastly – the manager is inaccessible, aloof, and never available. Not just all the issues over the days – the confusion over the dive guide, the snorkeller boat allocation to divers, but on day 5, I wanted to settle my bill – it was just for a few cans of beer which I had consumed there. But I needed small change. The girl at the counter couldnt change my cash for me because she need access to the petty cash box which only the manager has to key to. And he wasnt awake yet. It was 10 am. Actually I realised that the manager was never around in the mornings. I only might catch a glimpse of him in the afternoon. 11 am I went to check – he was awake and had his breakfast but in no mood to open any petty cash box for me. This is terrible attitude and knocks off on the whole staff there.||||Dont get me wrong, I want to love this place. I used to love this place. I brought 15 divers here to celebrate my 500th dive 3 years ago. The previous manager Nurul, would make us all welcome, greet us warmly every morning, and make sure we were well tended to. She would go the extra mile for us. No house reef dive was ever a “self dive”. We would always have somebody bring us around from the dive crew, sometime Nurul herself would go with us. This year when I went back, the 2 people who greeted me warmly were ex staffers no longer working at CBR, and all part of Nurul’s dive crew. ||||Come on, get your act together. Since Nurul left, this place has had quite a few alarming reviews on trip advisor. Nothing spreads faster than bad reputation. You have all the best resources, beautiful surroundings, and even though there are other new resorts on the strip, there is enough room for everybody. For Malaysians, this is our own backyard. If we love it we will keep coming. But if we don’t, we vote...