**Here’s the story of how Uncle Kimos Scuba Adventures in Oahu used a claimed family tragedy to buy sympathy, kept my $250 after cancelling my dive, promised a refund, and then threatened me when I asked for my money.**
Here is the timeline of what happened:
On February 2, Jim (allegedly the owner) told me their boat had broken down and offered me two options: move the booking to Wednesday or get a refund.
I chose the rescheduled Wednesday dive because I still wanted to go and had no reason at that point to think there would be a problem. Even though they never picked up the phone and were very unresponsive when messaging them.
On February 4, before the rescheduled dive took place, a person named Taylor contacted the customer group on Jim’s behalf and said that there had been a tragedy in Jim's family so the dive had to be cancelled, and that refunds would be issued to everyone.
At that point, I treated that explanation as real, responded respectfully, and sent my best wishes to Jim.
The other customer and I were patient because, if a family tragedy had really happened, I did not want to pressure anyone immediately over money.
On February 9, we followed up with Taylor (so we would not bother poor Jim) about the refund, and Taylor replied that Jim would be back the next week and that he would make sure Jim was on top of it.
Even after that, more time passed and the refund still did not arrive.
On February 23, we had messaged Taylor a few times with no success. Refunds were not being sent. The other affected customer also told me he had not received his reimbursement at that point.
So this was not a case of me immediately assuming bad faith; for a long time I assumed the family-tragedy explanation might be true and that the refund was simply delayed.
After being ghosted by Taylor multiple times, I decided to file a dispute with the credit card I used (in this case Discover) to try to recover my funds, stating that this was a "paid service that was not delivered to me." Somehow, the merchant (Uncle Kimo's Scuba) responded to the dispute and said that they provided the services so they should keep the money, which is obviously a lie.
At this point I decided to contact Jim directly. He only picked up the phone once and hung up on me once he heard that I was one of the customers he had scammed.
When I messaged Jim and asked for proof of refund, he said I had already been refunded, but he did not provide any receipt, transaction reference, refund confirmation, or refund date.
Instead, he sent hostile and threatening messages. In those messages, he accused me of fraud, said he would report me to Homeland Security and the Department of State, said my visa could be revoked, said I would be prosecuted, and called me “a liar and a thief.”
He also said that the other people had received full refunds, even though I was in contact with another customer who had also been trying to recover his money.
What bothers me most is that we were patient for so long.