Booking ahead is unfair at some sites

Or how about asking the site staff ?instead of just ,thinking what the real reasons were

 It's good to talk.

Strangely some folk like to talk through social media, don't get it myself

JK

mbee1 tells us that he called the site at 9 am on the morning of his arrival and was told there were no vacancies. That same night he saw some vacant pitches.

I am struggling to think of any reason other than no shows or cancellations between 9am and "after 8pm" (the only difference being that they at least made a notification) - assuming, that is, that mbee1 was given true information.

Abduction by aliens is unlikely, on the whole. Just possibly, a reason might be that they turned up but did not like what they found so departed immediately. Again, pretty much the same thing. It all comes back to no shows.  

Of course, and this might be the point you were trying to make, we do not know the reason for the no show or cancellation. It could have been any number of reasons, some of them entirely benign, some selfish and some possibly because of some unfortunate event befalling the people concerned. But that does not alter the fact these were people who booked a pitch, but who did not use it and, as a result, people willing and anxious to have a pitch on that site have lost out, as has the club who lose revenue.

Deposits are a must in my view and I agree that the cancellation period should be much longer than 72 hours. I think I posted earlier that my understanding is that the CCC have a month's cancellation period and that sounds about right to me. Oh and, yes, I would be perfectly happy to forfeit my deposit if I test positive for Covid. Life is full of risks and one cannot expect others to pick up the pieces. 

It will be the same people who enter their "problems"? with the site in the comments book (if they can now find it , but forget.? to enter their name or membership number

Earlier this year ,we were on a club site, when on the Friday a member was unable to reset the bollard trips to get power,,when the site staff also could not reset them ,it was found that the whole bollard had a fault ,and so the members were asked to move pitches  if they wanted EHU,as luck had it the two outer hard stands were within reach of bollards with extra hookups   so only one needed to move, which to arrivals on a full site would see an empty pitch

At what level of occupancy is a site deemed to be 'full'?
seems a simple enough question but I guess the answer isn't the obvious one...

As I pointed out to a very "important" site manager 1last month when there was a real proble with the site WiFi as I was told when the site is full  there is a problem with members streaming? 

It did not compute when I said but the site is not full? As all the grass pitches are not being used 

As other site staff had advised me to contact Air Angel which I had done

Ps 

The empty pitch was where we were.  as we were booked on another site on the Saturday, but the staff on the site we were on changed us to go that day  the site we went to was only an hour further

Evening

I put my site full sign out when the computer says I'm booked to zero that night, not before. That's zero on the available pitches for sale on that particular day. There's lots of variables on that in my experience.

JK

The reasons surely do not matter. I was told there were no free pitches only to see later on that there were. That’s lost revenue to the club at stops other members using those pitches. 

As I’ve already said on this I’d be willing to lose my deposit if the reason for my not turning up was genuine. However, members would be less willing just not turning up if the deposit was high enough.