Weekenders spoil it yet again
Comments
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Whatever you think about it one thing is for sure, allowing a site to book every pitch just for weekends almost certainly is not maximising revenue. The club obviously know this but rightly or wrongly don’t do anything about it. My suggestion to OP would be to stay on CL, much better value.
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allowing a site to book every pitch just for weekends almost certainly is not maximising revenue.
Without knowing the full details it is not easy to say for sure. No idea how many of those there at the weekend are staying longer and how many just for the weekend.
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One thing's for sure; Banff has succeeded again!
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Yes it's probably them pesky weekenders , flying them pesky flags again that's started all this .......😜
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Banff, isn't that in Aberdeenshire? Do the Scots have weekends and bank holidays? Isn't it the same up there what with working families and school days/weekends? What's the problem up there? With respect isn't it first come first served re days and number of nights required! I personally would not want it any differently, it served us well with young family in toe and now as 'OAPs'.
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They certainly do know it because I can remember discussing it with a member of the Club council long before the current booking rules came in and it was acknowledged as a problem then. Obviously it was/is not a big enough one for management to be concerned about or is it the Club just wants to ensure it is different to others? If the Club isn't maximising revenue, they have to recover cost somehow and there is only one way to do that!
The booking system is under review, any changes to it will effect all members not just a particular group.
peedee
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Booking a weekend up to three weeks in advance can hardly be regarded as exceptional, surely?
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If the Club isn't maximising revenue, they have to recover cost somehow and there is only one way to do that!
Very good point. Personally I am not clamouring for change however.
I don't think that I have booked more than a week ahead for a short break at a single site but have not done so for the last 8 years and so have little experience of late.
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When working I used to book weekends and longer holidays were Saturday till a week the following Sunday. Now our preferred manner is Wednesday to the following midweeek. There are a few like us I've noticed and then the people arriving at weekends add to the current number and hence this site is full.
Is the Op saying that the site is empty throughout the week? All the booking system shows is that there are spaces (at least 5 or more) There isn't a problem just different types of people staying on sites.
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Is there any other leisure/hotel chain that would put a quota of who can stay at weekends? Sorry Sir but you have already been here on numerous weekends so its someone else's turn at our (insert hotel, cinema , theme park, railway...
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We live in a twenty-four, seven, twelve society. There may be some who can only make weekends in pursuit of our pastime, others weekdays. There will be a demographic issue too with families whose children attend school, weekdays of course. There will be many retired for who it matters little what day they take. Requirements change as life changes. Some will only ever want what suits them right now of course but leave as is for me and for our future generations.
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There are sites with minimum booking periods. I suppose that they believe that such a system increases their profitability and reduces the problem of two night bookings sterilising pitches for those wishing a longer stay.
I am happy that CC do not follow this pattern
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I cant recal not getting a ptch in an Area I wanted to visit ever. I also never thinkof looking much more than 4/5 days ahead. Yes I may have had to miss the CC site I was looking at, but with internet its easy finding Cls Cmmercials etc, and bookable. Get used to it.
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"What I now do Is decide when we’re likely to want a break and book it. We then decide afterwards if we’re likely to go or not and, if not, we cancel it beforehand."
so, what we dont know is whether lots of the 'booked weekend pitches' are suddenly going to come back on the market 72 hrs prior to this particular weekend.
all we know, is that 'at this moment in time' they are booked...which prevents someone else booking a week.....yet, in fact there may well be plenty of space to accommodate such a break..
here, in my view, lies one of the biggest issues with the system...the blasė way in which 'commitments' can be undone, based on weather or whim...without penalty...
the penalty is that others who would have been delighted to use this time, missed put at booking time to someone who 'might' make use of it or not...
no doubt if it was forecast to pi** down on that weekend, there would, miraculously, be loads of late availability......
i dont do frenzy day as i 'dont think its right' to book a camping break months ahead and not have a cast iron commitment to taking up the booking.....whatever the T/C say.....i wouldn't do it for a cruise or a foreign holiday of for any other form of break.....not to mention the fact that most other camping and holidayncompanies require you to back up you commitment with hard cash.....
i realise that many dont like deposits and 'love' the flexibility of the CC booking system, but, as WTG mentioned upthread, we do get recurring themes on CT, and difficulty in weekend bookings is one...
perhaps our flexible system is, in part, the cause of other problems?
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Its a nice view to have WTG but in reality now its only a club in name. The fact is, its a hard nosed business in the leisure industry and being a member is no different from joining a Gym and paying a membership for instance.
If it were a club run by its members for the sole benefit of its members why do we have such a wide and varied pricing structure for pitch's. Surely if we all pay the same membership fee then "A club" would have a blanket price for a pitch regardless of where the site is and what time of year you want to book it.
First come first serve is fair IMO it's just like anything we do, like buying tickets for and going to the theater, taking advantage of a limited special offer and so on.
Ian
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A full site at weekend's could mean, especially on the honeypots that only one or two are actually there for the Friday and Saturday as there is no way of us members knowing without actually being on site how many were there before the Weekend
We were at Baltic Wharf a couple of years ago and they had 3 arrivals on Friday as the site was already busy
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It is true there are lots of sites out there not connected with either Club. However my experience thus far is that whilst there are sites as good as CMC sites they are rarely cheaper. Since we had the motorhome we have been using more "commercial" sites but I can't say any of them have been better. Obviously using the term better is a bit subjective as we all require different things. Quite a few have been of equal standards and prices. I would be interested to know where these mythical sites are so I can try them, or at least add them to my list. Unfortunately people seem very reluctant to name such sites!
David
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Weekenders are proving that as far as the CMC is concerned, demand exceeds supply.
This is an ideal opportunity for the CMC to increase the income from their sites during the weekend and bank holiday periods. Pitching the increase to the maximum that people will pay.
For the sensible caravanner, the solution is to open their eyes to the fact that there are other companies and organisations offering equivalent or better campsite experiences and taking advantage of those opportunities. Having a closed mind where the continual use of only one supplier seems totally against the ethos of caravanning. But there again there are people who are scared of the unknown.
K
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We are going to a commercial site on Friday
for the weekend leaving monday we cannot gain access until 1300 and must be away by 1100 on Monday and it is no cheaper than the cc site we are on now,we are only going because we need to be in the area,it is our second visit for the same reason,t is a big "holiday camp" style site and the "facilities/showers are questionable
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For the sensible caravanner, the solution is to open their eyes to the fact that there are other companies and organisations offering equivalent or better campsite experiences and taking advantage of those opportunities.
'The sensible caravanner' books a CC site in his chosen location if he knows that they generally offer what he wants. Why would he not? If there is no availability then he looks for alternatives.
If this imaginary caravanner want's something other than what CC sites generally offer then he looks elsewhere. I personally make no claim to being 'the sensible caravanner'. However I do no what suits me and in general that requirement is amply catered for on most CC sites.
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I have used 25 sites this year, a couple more than once, 22 of them were commercial in that they were not part of any club and I liked them all better than the club site and Cl I used for one reason another.
Where these sites in UK though David?
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