AquaBeba Swim School — Local services in New York

Up until today, I would have given Aquabeba five stars. Beware of using them during COVID-19 times because of their management. My daughter has been going to them for years and the instructors really care and helped her learn how to swim and were truly wonderful. Today however, very sadly, they treated me in a very disagreeable way.

I have given this company thousands of dollars for years and they didn’t want to refund me the session that was lost due to the global pandemic. I patiently asked and waited for 7 months to hear from them and now after those 7 months they told me that they could only offer me credits for the future.

It was only after posting about the predicament on Twitter that they refunded me the money and told me I can no longer sign up for classes with them. Beware. They are glad to take your money, but when it comes to customer service at the management level they have no idea what they are doing and lack any level of flexibility.

Instead of being happy that I helped fund them for 7 months very patiently, they instead prefer to try to keep the money for themselves.

Be wary, especially during the pandemic, to sign up for their classes. Easier to get a refund from the airline companies than this company. They will not give you a refund, or if they do, they will ban you. Terrible customer service practices.

COMMENT TO AQUABEBA RESPONSE: It is a shame that such a great team of instructors has this managerial team that lacks any level of customer service.

Just to be clear the two options available (there were not “many” options, as you claim) were: 1) one week as the pandemic erupted to decide to ask for a refund (this was 7 months ago) and I opted to not request it because my daughter and I cherish your services and I thought things would get fixed quicker. Also they said in an email to us at that specific time and I quote: “We anticipate remaining closed through the first week of April – but will continue to evaluate the situation as it develops... For those enrolled in the March/May 2020 session we will be pushing back the start day until it is safe to reopen.” The session ended up being cancelled entirely and no refund offered. 2) And as I explained in our email chain, while trying to reason with you, your credit option to Nov 2022 did not work for me because of my child’s age and your scheduling.

As for the comment that I was bullying them, it is simply not true. I have not and will never bully anyone. I have had my child enrolled in classes with you since the Nov/Dec 2018 session. We enrolled in almost every single session thereafter and you never called me mean or aggressive or a bully. It’s only after I asked for a refund during a global pandemic and you didn’t want to give it to me, that you started calling me names.

I am persistent if owed money for 7 months, not being responded to and being told I can only have a credit that I cannot use. In regards to the alleged threat, after being told that I will not be refunded under any circumstance, I said that I would be forced to go to the Better Business Bureau if they continue to refuse to refund me my money for a service credit I will not be able to use. Which is absolutely within my rights.

Furthermore, if me sending emails with no response (and before that asking you to call me at your convenience so we could discuss - and you saying that you only email so you can get to every client) while you have my money for 7 months is bullying, extreme or threatening then we have different definitions of these words... Just finally admit that you should be more flexible given the current circumstance of the global pandemic and all the stress and worry that comes with it.

And I repeat, it was easier for me to get my refunds from the airlines than from this company. We are all in a very peculiar circumstance of life over these last months, where you should be more flexible with your clients and I am shocked that you prefer to lose a loyal client instead of giving a refund during a global pandemic. Have a nice life and best of...

My daughter has ADHD the instructors are so kind and patient with her. We have tried other programs and though many were in no way bad, Aquabeba was the only one to take the time and really connect with her. She is 5 and it is a tricky time for her, we are very worried she will be at a higher risk of drowning. Within two sessions she is already swimming and gaining confidence. I do appreciate that they are very careful to say that even though she can swim that she is not yet swim safe and we always need to monitor her closely. At one program we previously attended they were too confident that they could teach her to swim and she would be able to be ready to be out on her own. We appreciated the honest careful approach Aquabeba offers. We started bringing out 7 month old this session as well and he is already sailing under water! We started later with our older daughter, we are excited to see how our younger son progresses!

• EDIT We have been going to Aquabeba for some time as you can see above and we have always been happy. It is detailed and progressive. It took some time to build the skills but they are so concrete now that my son is very comfortable and this something we are so grateful for.

I write this review because this past weekend at a friend's house our son was knocked into the pool by another child playing. As we ran to jump in he shot to the top of the water and started to the wall. We were in and got him very quickly but seeing him not panic and know what to do was something we will never...

Teachers are great, and your kid will get better, but BEWARE: Just when they are getting the hang of the class and comfortable you could get bumped from the class. Once you sign up, every 2 months you need to reply to a 9AM Monday email in less than 5 minutes in order to be guaranteed a spot. (Even if you are already in the class) This, apparently is by design, so that more people can get to take the class... But educationally it is plain dumb. Getting a young kid comfortable with teachers, and a swimming environment is not easy. To design an enrollment system that is designed to bump current students for no apparent reason is undermining the hard work of the swim teachers in the pool. Of course it would take more time and resources to give current students a 24 hour head start on enrollment. The poorly justified omission of a priority for current students betrays either a lack of respect for swim education, or a simple desire to make more money, (Or both). It would be like saying College should be for everyone, so lets save money and scrap the whole administration, admissions, and registrar, and let people attend for some random assortment of months, first come, first served,...