Deposit no longer a deterrent
reducing the deposit to £5 seems to have removed the deterrent to not turn up particularly Friday and Saturday bookings. Finding it difficult even in advance now to book a full week due to Friday/Saturday being booked up, I appreciate the members who can only book weekends due to work commitments etc we have been in the same situation when we were working no problem whatsoever with that but having spoke to a few wardens recently not saying which sites but they have noticed an increase in weekend no shows, please cancel if you are not going so that others can go or should they reintroduce the 20% deposit?
Comments
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I've not found any difference in getting a booking now against when it was 20%. It was about 2 months before and it's the same now. Some sites are very popular no matter what
I think the club has looked/will look at the different booing patterns between 20% and £5 and take it from there. At least the club will keep the £5 which by itself doesn't sound much but will add up.
It's a balancing act though? With a 20% deposit perhaps more people went elsewhere while at £5 more people are booking and even with no shows the club is making more income?
@clarinetman Any booking is about on average around £40 per night depending upon season and site. At 20% that's £8 per night or £16 per weekend. I personally don't see that being any more of a deterrence than £5 if I wanted to cancel a weekend An extra £11 to cancel/no show wouldn't make that much difference for a weekend?
Also of course you're perhaps making the mistake that all the weekends are booked as weekends - that is Friday and Saturday, maybe and a lot will but also people arriving for longer stays may arrive on the Saturday?
I think the lower deposit is aimed at longer stayers to get them to book not weekenders?
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I’ve no idea if no shows are happening in any number, although certainly not at Knaresborough last Friday, the site was full. However, an easy way to stop it would be to make payment the night before compulsory and charge for the first night in the event of a no show. I doubt there are many who will not cancel in advance if they stand to loose £40 or so. Plus of course they would have to wait for the remainder of the automatic payment to be refunded. A suitable deterrent I am sure.
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We tend to use CLs more than sites but the no show has a greater impact on CL owners and I've seen a significant increase in owners now wanting either a significant non refundable deposit or full payment before arrival. Almost all of the leisure industry have more robust T&Cs than the club and I personally would have no qualms with the club implementing @SteveL suggestion.
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@clarinetman I find it interesting what has happened on the deposit front with the Club. They seemed so determined that deposits were the way to go but it seems to have back fired and they have essentially done a u turn. Lets face it a £5 deposit is just a token which most people will be happy to sacrifice so no real deterrent? Personally I had no issue with a 20% deposit and even with it the T&C's are still much more generous that the majority of commercial sites. Clearly the introduction of 20 % deposits must have seriously impacted on the Clubs future bookings otherwise they they would still be in place? Whilst I quite like the idea of @SteveL suggestion of automatic payment the day before I suspect its a case of the Club being once bitten twice shy?
David
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I agree with @DavidKlyne as to why the club went back on itself. I'm happy with either.
I'm not happy with payment taken the night before but will go with it if introduced, I like to pay on arrival just in case something happens on the day. I would of course let the site know but maybe getting the remainder of the money back might take some time, but certainly a no show should/could trigger a the payment of one's night payment but taken the next day.
Under the old rules, there was a three strikes approach, is this is use @Rowena?
The club will have its data on no shows and will take it from there and the club did say it is monitoring what is happening, and we don't know the true numbers involved.
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I do agree the £5 deposit looks a bit low and may be to low to put off the no shows and multiple bookers. I assume the club is monitoring the problem and if this is the case then they will change it. The idea of them taking the full price automatically was voluntary and you could pay on arrival so if these people do that then it will be a problem but not sure if this option has been removed.
I have not seen anything about the three strikes policy having changed though.
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I seem to recall some folks saying the introduction of 20% deposits and harsher across the whole Membership T&C’s would come back and bite the Club at some point. Only the Club will have the figures that truly give the impact, but I suspect that there will be a good few like us who never got caught up in the new 20% deposits, either by booking very late (night before arrival) or simply using alternative provision. I am sure there were a good number of folks who did book then not turn up, but would question if the whole Membership had to be beaten with the same stick? The Club has individual Member data, could have monitored this and rooted out the serial offenders, but chose not to do this. When the Club put in place similar terms and conditions as a lot of other holiday pitch providers do, it imposed this onto a fee paying Membership, not random customers, and it certainly didn’t sit well with some, us included.
It’s also possible that the Club just might have got slightly wrong the way MH ownership (as opposed to a caravan) might have changed just how some folks now take holidays? Rooting a caravan on a Club Site pitch for two weeks is way different to moving on after a few days with a MH, which might be more spontaneous, you can chase the good weather a bit easier, change areas, ideas, things to do, see? Not as easy to do with the big deposits.
As for stopping the weekends being full, I am sure there will have been an interlude where it did stop, possibly because of the 20%, but the price increases via dynamic pricing will also have had an effect. Some Sites , say YRP for example will always be busy at w/ends, purely because there is a very large % of working people with outfits, can only go away at weekends trying to make good use of their outfits. We were the same 40 years ago, this won’t change. Deposit amounts, increasing prices won’t bother the many who love Club Sites almost exclusively, as they are still getting VFM they like. The Membership has changed hugely in the last five years or so, oldies like us either giving up altogether or going to cheaper places, the COVID bonanza is stabilising in terms of new/retained Membership
No problem with harsher T&Cs from CLs. A no show has a much greater impact, and they are protecting their businesses best way they can. We seldom pay a deposit as we book very late, but never fail to show up.2 -
Just a comment on the three strikes and you are out policy. This was introduced to discourage no shows. However this didn't prevent the introduction (or reintroduction of deposits for those with longer memories) of deposits eventual. I have a theory about the new booking system and I think it can't operate without a deposit being taken, however high or low. If I am right, happy to be corrected, it would explain why the deposit is now just a token amount?
David
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Most Club sites are nowhere near fully booked. At the majority of Club sites a few “no shows” are not preventing members getting a pitch. At most sites availability remains until the day. If Club managers were troubled by “no shows” they would deal with it.
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I have a theory about the new booking system and I think it can't operate without a deposit being taken, however high or low. If I am right, happy to be corrected, it would explain why the deposit is now just a token amount?
It does seem to be hardly worth the administrative effort.
peedee
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If I am correct, it was a bolt on and make do booking system, not a purpose designed exercise, so you may well be right about having to make a deposit, at any cost. The dynamic pricing element is the most annoying aspect for me. It only works one way, not enough latitude for dynamic discounting😡
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Problem is that we're discussing this in a void. We don't really know what the CMCs decision making process was or what the No Show numbers were for different deposits.
I appreciate that the CMC operates in a commercial environment and needs to keep some things close to its chest - but even so the lack of comment from TPTB is disappointing.
FWIW I'd quite happily go with a 20% deposit, that's still much better than anywhere else I can think of.
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@Brian1 Over the years we have discussed lots of "voids" about Club policy, part of the fun as far as I am concerned but can understand that it can be frustrating not to get the full facts. I think the online questions asked at the AGM have tended to fill some of those voids?
David
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@Brian1 This is, in my view, a fairly good comprehensive comment from the club as given in the 2024 AGM:
Question
Having implemented the deposit scheme, which appeared to be working successfully, the club reduced the amount of the deposit and slowly bad habits are back...The number of sites booked up for a Saturday night has jumped alarmingly..Why change ???
Question by Stuart Proud
Response
The deposit system certainly works, reducing speculative bookings and late cancellations and ensuring members do have plenty of opportunity to book. The Club has done its best to reduce the financial barriers to booking, firstly reducing the deposit for booking from 20% to 10% and more recently to just £5. The evidence we now have seems to be that it's not just the financial cost, but also the longer process of giving card details, which deters speculative or inconsiderate multiple bookings. The reductions have helped and more members are booking, and booking further ahead so we hope that we can maintain our position as the first choice with members as we have the best terms available, without causing a return to the past behaviour. So far, with about three months’ experience, we are not seeing any concerning levels of cancellations or inconsiderate levels of speculative booking. But we are monitoring the situation with cancellations and no shows so will be able to react if necessary. But we do want to keep the deposit as low as we can, and is appropriate, in a members' Club
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