Cancellation Deposit Warning
When the new improved booking system (which we all asked for) was opened I made multiple site bookings on one U prefix booking reference. Due to an unexpected hospital appointment the first booking had to be cancelled yesterday 25 days prior to arrival. When the email conference arrived is said it was an ammendment confirmation and when I opened the pdf it showed the multiple site bookings I had made minus the one I had cancelled. At no time during the cancellation process was there any mention of the "fully refundable deposit " and looking on previous bookings the one I had cancelled was no where to be seen?? After a long phone call to a very pleasant call centre operator who had to refer to " managers" for clarification my suspicion was confirmed - my "fully refundable deposit" of approx £65 had been migrated and added to the original booking deposit total. This process is not mentioned anywhere in the encyclopedia of T's and C's. I explained I was not happy and I requested the deposit be refunded to my registered card account which I am promised will be actioned. The reason given for this was due to there being multiple sites on one U prefix booking ? I will never make a multiple site booking again and I have asked for the system to prompt if you are happy to move the deposit or as in my case prefer a refund. I wonder how many deposits have been " withheld " in this way ? a nice little earner for the club coffers.
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I agree that the new booking system ( we all asked for )is not fit for purpose i have yet to meet anyone who did ask for it !! it`s a shambles. It used to be so easy to book on line but now it takes twice as long to book a site with the most stupid of requests for information not necessary ( it`s much easier we are told ) my first booking on the new system had to be amended due to a canceled and rearranged hospital appointment for my wife,after 30 minutes on line trying to amend it and being told i needed to pay more money ??? i rang the site direct and spoke to a warden who informed me i was the 5th person that day to have a problem.
NOTE TO CLUB
Stop telling us what WE need and if it isn`t broke DON`T fix it
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It certainly does not inspire me with any confidence at all to book online, unless it is just for a one or two site stay within a few days of travel, which means that I would be unlikley to be able to take advantage of any mid week, discounts. All in all, the new booking experience (which I certainly neither asked for nor wanted) is proving to be a disappointment. Perhaps it will improve over time, but I am not holding my breath!
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Sorry to hear about your difficulties Wedgy, and hope they are quickly resolved, both medically and financially. I can assure you that not everyone asked for these changes, and we certainly have no intention of booking anything up front and certainly not parting with a deposit to the Club. Months into the new system, they have yet to prove that the financial side is operating as it should be, and there are still folks getting caught up in a degree of misunderstanding around any amendments, cancellations, etc… and numerous instances of folks posting about not receiving prompt refunds where they are entitled. It’s a case of caveat emptor with us.
Hope things go well for you, and you can get to enjoy the rest of your bookings👍
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I booked a site last Thursday and now it's fairly straightforward, I made sure I unticked the box to say I did not want to pay before arrival and the email came through with that on.
Yesterday I added a day all went through well, again I unticked the box, and asked Mrs C to witness that I had yet on the email DPF it says they will take the money out the night before. But it says pay on arrival on the mybooking page.
No real problem but obviously the system still isn't working as it should
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I did the same as you last month (added a day to the booking ) and made sure I unticked the box , email confirmation with it on , but when we got to the site the warden said we had paid the night before , I showed him the email , but no real problem as you have to pay anyway , he also said that if there is a queue those that have already paid can jump the queue and find a pitch
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That bit is ok except for the conflicting emails (which should have been sorted by now.) Wedgy has had his deposit refund added back on to the account which means the multiple advance bookings are not being separately accounted for. If you make multiple bookings and you pay a deposit based on the total there should be a traceable way to account for each deposit and the refund should be allocated not amalgamated....I would hope?! Wedgy is correct in asking for a prompt if you are happy for an individual refund to be retained on a total deposit. He hasn't booked one big holiday, just a group of separate ones.
PS I haven't looked at the T&Cs so I'm just assuming the procedure should be straight forward.
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And I had a totally different response when I had to cancel a couple of bookings because of Ros's recent illness. One - a commercial site - South Lychett Manor near Poole were entitled to retain my deposit plus 70% of the full amount which I had already paid. I accepted that since it's in their terms and conditions. However, in view of the circumstances the lady I spoke to said she's have a word with her manager and ring me back. I didn't ask her to do that. Within 5 minutes, she rang back to say that since part of my booking was over the Bank Holiday at the end of this month, they were pretty confident they could re-let my pitch and therefore refunded the full amount for that weekend. At nearly £50 per night, that was a generous gesture.
The second site - a C&CC affiliated one gave me my deposit back for both nights booked without me even asking for it - having accepted that, again, within their T&Cs, it was non-refundable.
I wonder which sites I would be looking to book again in the future?????
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"the new improved booking system (which we all asked for)" as several of you have noted is not strictly accurate.
I think what most of us wanted was a way to stop some members blocking out many dates, particularly weekends, up to a year in advance and then cancelling many of them neare the time. Dare I say some people might be booking more dates than needed on the off-chance they might want/use them. The fact that free cancellation up to three days before the booikg was available allowed this to happen.
Whilst I don't like paying deposits and the 21 day limit I feel it may provide the answer and I will watch with interest to see if this is so.
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AA, I recommend you read the New Booking System thread where many points like yours have been made.
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I have just been looking into cancellation outside 21 days for ‘basket of bookings’. As a member has pointed out, if you have other bookings within the ‘basket’, your deposit is retained by the club and becomes part of your deposit against the other booking(s).
Now, one of the supposed benefits of the new system was being able to do several bookings at the same time.
However, if you were unfortunate enough to have to cancel the other booking(s) within 21 days, you will lose more money than if you had made the bookings separately, because you will also lose the money from the first booking (which was cancelled outside 21 days).
Better then, to make individual bookings, as we did with the old system.
I trust that someone from EG House might quickly correct me, if I am wrong.
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You definitely will not forfeit any deposit paid IF canceled before the 21day cut off date however don't expect anything like a swift payment back into your card account. It is now 8 days since my refund was promised and still nothing in my account - am I surprised ? Not one bit.
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Having fallen foul of making a multiple booking with the other club, I would never do that again with any organisation.
I now always make each site booking an individual one with it's own reference and deposit. That way only 1 booking can get messed up if anything goes wrong and usually a small deposit.
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I have to say this thread has been quite instructive and probably something I would not have realised.
David
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I have had 2 refunds recently from online retailers, both of which were credited back into my credit card account by return and there the following day.
There is absolutely no excuse whatsoever for the club not to do the same. Teething problems doesn't cut it anymore.
I too have found this and other posts on delayed refunds most informative.
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It seems 7 to 10 days is the clubs standard for all.
Every day our money is in their account its earning them interest - no doubt it will be said this can be used to improve site facilities etc . This is no way to run a "club" if that's what it still purports to be ??
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This is NOT the club i joined over twenty years ago,having shopped around there are many private sites now priced the same or cheeper than the club which raisers the question why bother to pay the subscription.
The prices will however benefit the CL owners,we have booked for next month a CL in Hampshire with a fully serviced pitch with showers and toilets for £326 for 14 nights the nearest Club Site wanted to charge £520 for same dates go figure.
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If the club you joined 20 years ago stayed as it was and not kept itself aligned to the constant changes required by the touring community to attract new members would that club have come through those 20 years and still be around today. I think not.
It's been said many times on CT that you can't compare a individually operated CL against a club with the size of network CAMC has.
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Thinking about it, the club I joined 20 years ago took deposits on bookings 🤷🏻♂️
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I recall them being in force when I joined, David, but were dropped soon after. They may even have been dropped before I made my first booking 🤷🏻♂️
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The deposit in 1999 was £5 (this is from the 1999 sits collection book) and it was non refundable but it was per site booking and not per night. So a two week stay on one site would be the same as a one night stay - £5.
EHU was also extra.
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Thanks C, you have a knack of coming up with indisputable facts👍🏻👏🏻👏🏻
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And the membership fee was £27.50 plus £5 joining fee if payable.
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I remember those booking forms 😀
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I remember the £5 deposit but I also seem to recall it increasing to £10 shortly before they went to the online system and stopped taking deposits. Interestingly the reason for increasing the amount of the deposit was because they were concerned at how many members were foregoing the deposit and just not turning up and not informing the site. Took them the best part of 20 years to sort that out!
David
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Do you have any corroborative pics like MrC does?🤔
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