Cancelling a CL booking at short notice.

Hello again and thank you for your replies….I didn’t expect quite so many!

Firstly to those of you who have taken the time to comment specifically on our CL with so many compliments…it’s very much appreciated .

By posting I was trying to gauge member views on last minute (by that I mean within a few days to a week) cancellations, what you feel is appropriate to do in such circumstances and whether this view is widely held.  The vast majority on here seem to be of the opinion that if you cancel it would be appropriate to at least offer some kind of recompense to the CL owner which is encouraging to hear.

I’m not necessarily thinking of changing my policy at the moment but that may alter the busier we get and therefore the more members I turn away who could have visited if someone cancelled last minute.  I have had this situation on several occasions and when I received the 25 night cancellation I had turned a 9 night booking away a couple of days before.  Unfortunately, when I contacted them to see if they would still like to book they’d (understandably) booked elsewhere.

At present I only charge a deposit for Bank Holidays and special events and then it is a 50% deposit.  I don’t suffer greatly from cancellations but I know of other owners within our group who suffer many throughout the season and I understand that people’s plans change/illness etc.  It does bother me however when members cancel a long stay last minute especially when they say they’d ‘forgotten’ about the booking.  I also kindly ask for pitch fees on arrival day which has never elicited a negative comment from anyone. 

We run two other businesses as well as our CL and we have never confused bookings with turnover!  We are experienced in running our own businesses and that is what the CL is, a business.  Unfortunately we do not have the luxury of calling it a hobby…it has to pay its way and we take the running of it very seriously and are continually thinking about ways to improve the site.  We want all our visitors to enjoy their stay here.  As they say….there’s no better form of advertising than personal recommendation.

I can see this topic from both sides as we are also active caravanners ourselves (though not very often due to work commitments…sigh) and generally stay on CLs.  As we are running our CL our get-aways tend to be last minute bookings for which I’ve had to pay deposits, full amount up front or simply book and turn up….I don’t mind any of those choices as long as I can get away!  If I were to cancel last minute and hadn’t paid anything I would always at least offer to pay.  Whether that is accepted or declined is up to the CL owner….often the very act of ‘offering’ is all that’s needed…it acknowledges that you, the customer, have thought about it from the business owners point of view.

In my opinion I do think if a deposit/full upfront fee is charged then there should be a cancellation policy in place.  I do not think it is right to accept a deposit for a booking in say 6 months’ time which is cancelled a month later and the CL owner to keep that deposit.  If there was a cancellation policy in place owners and members would know what to expect and deposits should, in my opinion, only be lost if the booking is cancelled within a certain time frame…that may be a week, a month or 6 weeks….it’s up to the CL owner to set his/her own policy and make it clear.  This then obviously means more admin on behalf of the owner which is one reason why I don’t currently charge deposits but I am considering doing so for bookings of say 5 nights or a week or more.

And before someone points it out  no, I don’t currently have an advertised cancellation policy within my T&Cs because I only take limited deposits but it would change if I were to charge deposits for general bookings as opposed to just BHs and special events. 

A CL owner may choose to return/carry over pitch fees paid for cancelled bookings if the pitch is re-let (I did this last weekend and the member has booked again for later this month).  Yes, this is a trust issue and for those of you who categorically won’t pay deposits because you ‘once’ lost one, please don’t assume all CL owners are the same!

Yes, we are affiliated to the CAMC but CLs are nothing like club sites so I think the comparison is unfair and suggesting we operate like a club site is unworkable.  A no show on a club site is perhaps barely noticeable (in financial terms) but a no show on a CL is a loss of 20% of that night’s income.  The issue of cancellations/no shows  on CLs being ‘supported’ by the club is non-existent, they will offer us no support regarding this (and other things) and, as Cholsey Grange has stated, the club has no plans to offer CLs any support in the near future but they do still expect us to only accept their members and pay our membership fees.

For those of you who have commented on how fees/deposits are paid to CLs I believe things are and will continue to slowly change as younger generations who are more IT savvy take over or open new CL sites.  More and more will gradually have websites, offer online availability and booking along with more up to date ways of paying. 

Here at Skybarn we accept cash, cheques, paym (pay via mobile phone) and bank transfer.  The fees for card payments are currently too great in comparison to our nightly fees to offer this facility. 

We have a website with an online availability calendar as well as online booking.  When someone books with us they receive an email confirmation of the booking including arrival and departure dates and the full cost.  If and when a deposit is paid customers always receive an email receipt showing what has been paid and the balance still owing.  If there is an error it is my fault (doh) and I won’t ask for more money than is confirmed in the emails.  It happened recently with two bookings….one gentleman kindly pointed the error out and paid the difference (you know who you are  ) and the other… I lost out on one night’s fee.

We try to be here to answer calls, we really don't want to miss any bookings and if we're away we divert calls to a mobile which is with us all the time but not necessarily within mobile signal range .  If you leave a message (which we can understand) we WILL call you back .  I appreciate not every CL takes the running of it quite as seriously but that is the wonderful diversity of the CL network.

Nicola
www.skybarnfarm.co.uk
Telephone: 01522 681218
Email: enquiries@skybarnfarm.co.uk
Site 365, page 402 of the 2017/2018 Sites Directory
Read our many wonderful reviews!

For those averse to deposits, how would they feel if CL owners began overbooking like airlines as a hedge against late cancellations and found upon arrival someone had taken their pitch? It would create more animosity than any deposit scheme.

Thanks for that post, Nicola. It's good to hear a CL owners point of view. Sharing understanding of the various issues encountered when running a CL can only be a good thing. 

Hear Hear. Well said TW.

Excellent post Nicola. Says everything you need to know about CLs, and outlines everything we understand about booking a CL, and how we try and see things from the CL owners point of view. 

Even if the Club aren't able to give you much support, perhaps some better guidance for those members new to CLs might help any misunderstanding, and make folks realise that CLs operate very differently to Club Sites. Online and in handbook would be good. It all helps.

I will start by saying that we have only ever cancelled CL bookings twice.

Once at an award winning site in Shropshire, for which I sent a cheque for the full fee (never did notice if they cashed it or not) when our car broke a few days before supposed arrival.

The other was, I believe, for a couple of nights at the OP's site for which we offered to pay, this was declined.

We have stayed at Skybarn once or twice and I have said to Nicola more than once "it is your site, your rules", be it deposits, cancellation policies or even how you pitch your unit. It is entirely the CL owners prerogative how they run their site. We, as visitors have the choice whether to use that site or not.

Nicola, you are not the only caravan site locally to suffer late cancellations. A nearby CS have now started insisting on deposits because of it. They also had someone cancel at the last minute for a lengthy stay. Said they couldn't remember which sites they had booked.

They clearly must have remembered which site they booked as they knew where to cancel.

My GP got so fed up with people not turning up for appointments booked in advance that he told people to phone in at 8.00am on the day instead. He says people make that phone call and some still don't turn up. 

Apparently the telephone conversation started "Hello, this is Mr ****, are we booked in with you for next week?"

When he was told he was, he then went on to cancel a 3 week stay. Said he had been phoning round as he couldn't remember which sites he had booked (notice the plural sites, so how many other sites has he cancelled)

I owe Nicola an apology, as I attributed a post re lost money / confusing turnover with bookings, to her, when it was actually from another poster, sorry.

Nellies quote above re representative of CC membership is, in my opinion, the most accurate post made on this thread.

A CL owner talked about a survey on this thread, which involved CL owners asking for money from non showers, and said that the response to the request was nil !! and yet overwhelmingly the posters on here have supported paying in full, after a no show / cancellation.

It seems something doesn't add up !!