Swimtime UK Reviews 

WARNING! Shocking. The attendance from the teacher has been low, last minute cancellations, substitute teachers at best. The teacher didn't even turn up today and no communication! The classes are badly organised, the swimmer capabilities vary beyond ability which divides the class. Better off jumping in the river to learn how to swim. This is very poor standard of organisation. DO NOT SIGN UP FOR SWIMTIME!!! (Village, Bromborough, wirral)

Great experience, highly recommend!

Adult swimming lesson with Phil in Bromborough to teach front crawl. Have always wanted to know how to do it properly and Phil managed to teach me in less than half hour! Hoping to take up swimming again to help with health issues and aches and pains. Thoroughly enjoyed it, Phil super friendly and down to earth and makes you feel at ease. Thanks Phil!

Rachel B has taught all 3 of my children to swim in 121 lessons. They are all really confident in the water enjoy attending lessons couldn’t ask for any more really! If you are thinking of booking lessons for your children then don’t hesitate they are in brilliant hands!!

The most unreliable swimming lesson group we’ve ever used. A constant and consistent let down. Moving venues, loosing teachers and having no means of replacement should there be illnesses or issues.

No lesson for the third week running. Turned up to find the instructor wasn’t there. This is not an isolated experience, constant cancellation of lessons. We have now cancelled with Swimtime having being let down constantly since the beginning of this year.

Swimtime 1:1 and 2:1 instructor Rachel B has worked with my children from 2022. My daughter has special needs and Rachel got her to a level of accomplishment we never thought possible. She made the sessions fun and differentiated them for my two children. The children loved swimming every week with Rachel. There are issues with other aspects of swimtime (see my other review of group and managerial team) but I can’t recommend Rachel enough and am very grateful to her.

The website states that children from age 4 with no experience should start with the beginners class (makes perfect sense). My daughter does in fact have some experience; however, it still seemed the best and safest option for her to attend the beginners class when reading the requirements for the subsequent class.

Lesson 1: I asked the instructor at the end of class if she felt it was a suitable fit for my daughter. I was told it was.

Lesson 2: at the end of the lesson, the instructor suggested another class since my daughter wears aids (just like she wore them the first lesson). No alternative class was given, and I was told to organise this myself via the website. Upon request - after I pointed out I would struggle to do this and get a different outcome due to already following website recommendations - she said she would sort it for me. The instructor was surprised that the class was for children with no experience, which was obviously concerning given she was teaching that very class. However, I took it in good faith that the situation could be quickly rectified somehow.

Unfortunately, a week went by without hearing anything. Hence, the day before her usual lesson was scheduled, I was left making countless phone calls to no end (without an option to leave a voicemail). The only other option was to send an email enquiry relaying the conversation with instructor. I waited 4 days for a reply, where I was just asked what days would work best - no actual information about an alternative class was given. A further 5 days passed without a reply. Needless to say my daughter had already missed a week of class and was on track to miss another, still without any resolution in sight.

2 weeks after the initial suggestion from the instructor that my daughter changes class and 2 weeks without any information about said class, I informed Swimtime I would like to cancel her subscription. Following this email came a response in less than 24 hours where additional charges were debited from my account due to cancellation. Within this email was confirmation that my daughter did begin the correct class (beginners) and that children within this class will of course be at different stages of their swimming journey. This was highly frustrating as this is what I had anticipated the problem to be (again in accordance to their website guidance) in a previous email.

In summary, we have been charged £102.47 for 2 swimming lessons, a few headaches, and the task of finding another swim school. Swimtime phone lines still ring out without a voicemail option. Email requests for telephone communication regarding unfair charges have continued to be ignored.

If you feel safe in the knowledge that swim instructors don't know the requirements of the very classes they are teaching, or you enjoy dealing with upset 4 year olds when you can't give them even a child friendly indication of when they'll start swimming classes again then Swimtime is the school for you. Communication very much lacking, but payments and cancellation fees on point.

I can't fault the instructors at all, they have been fabulous and my son loves going to his lessons. The admin however, you can't get hold of anyone by phone or by email. I've sent several complaint emails with no response what so ever. It's a joke! We've not had our deposit back, when the agreement statez we will get it back after 90 days if you agree to sign up for lessons and don't cancel. I've been charged over summer when no lessons are being done (why I'm paying when they're closed I don't know). Absolutely shocking customer service. I don't know whether to keep paying them and suck it up so my son continues to learn in a luxury pool or cancel and stick him in a freezing cold pool with a new group 😑

Really fun and educational swimming lessons, where lots of progress is made. Really nice staff, who are all friendly.

After the third consecutive week of instructor no shows we are cancelling. We weren’t even informed tonight would be cancelled so another wasted trip to the pool. Can’t get hold of head office. Swimtime has become a total joke.

We paid monthly from September until July and remained in Eel 1 (entry level) with no progress. When I swim with my son casually, he does so without armbands and underwear confidently. He even learned to do forward rolls on holiday. The teachers kept changing in the 10 months we were there where he would just be put back into floats because they didn’t know his progress. I brought this up with the teacher who blamed his listening skills. I know my son could listen more attentively but he is 6 years old and attends after school! I refuse to believe all the swimmers not using arm bands are all “listeners”.

You pay a deposit of around £50 when you start. It’s a monthly fee of £40-£50 pro rata, so you’ll continue to pay over the summer holidays when you don’t attend. And you have to pay £30 (if I remember correctly) if you leave within 90 days of enrolling to pay for a tea towel, string bag and some goggles. We didn’t need or use any of these items. 5 of our lessons were cancelled while we were there.

Parents at other swim schools are pretty surprised when I tell them our experience. What kept me there for so long is I had a perfect view of the pool at The Village so I could watch him swim. I know there’s restricted views in all my local pools but I can’t possibly pay for this any further.

Both our children have attended swimtime since January 2023.
Our son progressed quickly, making it to eel3 by Easter 2023. Our daughter progressed to Eel 2 by July 2023.

However since then there has been very little in progress, We feel that having spent over £1000 in lessons that there has not been much in the way of progression. when we went away over Easter our son was swimming with just 1 arm. 15 months of lessons and swimming with 1 arm is not good enough.
Other swimming lesson providers also offer incentives and badges. Swimtime did used to hand out certificates pool side at Easter, August and Christmas but now you can download and print yourself. A child thrives on praise and recognition and me printing off a certificate does not give the same sense of achievement as a teacher presenting something to a child.

Also the amount of cancelled lessons is shocking! Yes they get credited back but simply not good enough.

It very much feels that swimtime is profit first.

My daughter had Chris at the village hotel for 3 years and shes now so confident swimmer . I couldn't fault Chris at all he was so supportive towards my daughter with sen needs and wish we could of carried on sadly she wanted to do something else . I highly recommend him

I am currently learning to swim with Dianne and she is amazing! A lot is fit in to one lesson and she is constantly checking to see if I’m okay when something new is introduced to the lesson. I’m really happy with my swimming journey and have learnt a lot! 😊

Highly recommended! My instructor - Zoe, was a very patient teacher and was always close by, ready with constructive feedback on how to improve my swimming skills. She was always early to the slot and was well prepared with equipment. The 1:1 lessons ran for 30 minutes and she was always there to support and encourage. Zoe, thank you for being so awesome and I hope to see you again in September :)

We have lessons with Molly in Cheshire and she’s in amazing, so far no cancellations, something we were worried about when reading other reviews! But Molly is a credit to the organisation and a fabulous teacher

In the last three months my daughters swimming lesson has been cancelled 6 times out of 12 lessons. While we have received a credit for each occasion the point of booking swimming lessons is to be able to attend and learn to swim. Poor service and will be reviewing her membership.

My daughter has been attending these swimming lessons for about 18 months and is still at the first level of the first stage. The class is mixed ability which in my opinion slows down progression. Her older sibling attended Swimstars and the children there seemed to progress much faster and were not in mixed ability classes, so the short amount of time spent in the pool was not wasted and the session challenged them more.

Lovely instructor and my daughter really enjoys her lessons. But recently the venue have banished the class to the shallow end due to “guest complaints”. Every time I ask swimtime for an update they tell me a meeting is being/has been arranged, but this never seems to happen. The level my daughter is now at cannot possibly be taught in the shallow end, but quite frankly swimtime don’t seem to care!