H2O — Local services in Clearwater

We booked the 5pm tour on Saturday September 4th. When we arrived at 415pm we were immediately greeted with "you're late". I understood because of my age I needed to take a boaters test & had no problem doing so. Also when we were greeted we were immediately asked to provide gratuity for a service we hadn't even received because of various banking reasons, none of which we're valid as I work for a rather large bank in the business bank side of the house and knew these were not valid reasons.. I passed the test & we eventually boarded the jet skis. The gentleman explaining the rules was a little rough with making sure we knew how much everything would cost if we damaged the machines instead of focusing on the problems, no big deal. We are heavy travelers and very experienced riders riding in various countries etc., we get it people can be very careless. Instruction was good getting out of the causeway but when we got to the open water instruction for my bf was confusing first telling him to slow down and then too speed up. When we were out on the open water, there was a sudden slow down causing another rider to slam into the back of another guest. This is where things went south. We overheard some heavy screaming & extreme rudeness from the guides that we both found over the top and unnecessary. Not a professional way to handle any issue. We all sign waivers up front and understand accidents can happen. The last straw was when we were out in free play, one guide asked my bf to get close to us to take a picture and when my bf starting getting close to us, another guide yelled at him. Like the left hand didn't know what the right one was doing. It's now three days past and I also still have never received the photos I was promised by that evening. We jet ski a lot and this was by far the worst experience we've had. On a positive side the equipment was great, they were brand new machines.

*2nd response: we arrived at 415pm. I did not leave to the parking meter, my bf did because he was old enough not to take the test. I will also add I was the first one to be done with the test and had 20 minutes of waiting to spare. I would like to be refunded...

Worst rental experience of my life. We were running late (since you have to be there 1 hour before, but we were still well before the actual tour time) because of traffic on the area so we called to see if we could still make it. The person on the phone said yes if we could make it in 10 min. We parked quickly, literally ran there and made it in 8 minutes. We were attended by a very friendly young lady but when "Josh" came up it all went down hill. My husband was having trouble finding his boating license certificate and in the mean time Josh became verbally aggressive towards me and my husband. I sat down and shut up because I did not want the aggression to go a y further. As I sat and waited a different employee made conversation with me and Josh jumped in aggressively again. The young lady cooled down the situation, apologized and got us processed and ready to go. As we sat on our Waverunner getting safety instructions the other Male employee singled me out for supposedly not paying attention. I was not speaking and was looking straight at him. My husband jumped in because he was humiliating me in front of my son and all of the other customers. We decided not to stay AND were asked to leave as Josh provoked a physical confrontation with my husband. The female employee was very helpful in processing our refund so we could leave. Some of the other customer looked to be in shock when the guide accused me of not paying attention out of nowhere. They ended up leaving as well. I am glad we did not go because all of the neighboring rentals closed due to incoming bad weather that day. Josh led us to believe he was the manager or maybe even owner. I hope not because to be that aggressive he must have been high on something. I chose not to call at the risk of having to speak to him again but if the Owner does see this I would be happy to speak with you over the phone. I hope that no one else has a...

The workers were very nice, but we wanted to just cruise around and see the sights. Our "guide" had other plans. He wanted to guide us on a high speed course around the area, no chill. No time to just jet around and take it easy. We signed up for the hybrid...where freestyle was indicated in the package. There was only 5 mins where we were able to chill. We were all really disappointed that our preference to just cruise around was completely disregarded.

Edit: Actual website information regarding the 1.5hr tour we purchased;

"Ready to discover the waters of Clearwater by jet ski? We offer some of the most unique tours in the area that covers 20 to 25 miles roundtrip with great views of Clearwater Beach and the surrounding areas!

Your adventure tour starts out from the Clearwater Marina and then you head north through the intracoastal area, circling many small spoil islands. Eventually the tour reaches Hurricane Pass where you head out into the Gulf of Mexico between Honeymoon Island and Caladesi Island. In this area, you have up to 30 minutes of free ride time where you can tear it up, get wet, go for a swim or just relax… whatever you want! Then on your Clearwater jet ski tour you cruise south along the beach all the way to Clearwater Pass, even passing Pier 60, south of the marina (water and weather conditions permitting).

The highlight of most experiences include dolphin sightings along with many other species of marine life."

I must have missed the part that indicates that its "high speed". 30-40mph was fun enough for us. But then again..i'm just a paying customer. Gotta keep the...