Choose Your Guide Wisely!

Occasionally, I get a call from a fishing party that was left stranded at the boat dock by a guide they booked online. Many times, it happens just minutes before the scheduled departure time when the captain calls and abruptly cancels.

Here’s a tip: Online charter bookies take up to 30 percent of the captain’s fee for simply being listed on their website. If the fishing guide you booked gets another inquiry for the same date directly, meaning he doesn’t have to share his fee, he books that charter and cancels the online booking you may have made weeks, if not months in advance. It happens all the time. I’ve taken countless people fishing who have been canceled on at the last minute.

Heck, one day a jilted charter that I rescued from identical circumstances was shocked when the same unscrupulous guide who canceled on them that morning shows up with another charter in their original time slot. You just can’t make this stuff up!

Bottom line: Spend a little time browsing your potential guide’s website and do some research before booking a charter. You will be glad you did.

To learn more, please visit about Osborne/Afishionado.