Consequences of obsession with rules
The Met Office issued a Yellow Warning for unseasonally high winds for the past two days on the South Coast. My pitch is very exposed to the wind but my booking is for 9 days and the awning is fully set up for dining, cooking and bike storage.
Without casing any inconvenience to other members, and fully maintaining the 6m fire gap, I attempted to protect our 1075cm awning from storm damage, until the storm passed, by parking inches from the front of the awning. I explained this to a warden who initially queried the fire gap but I assured him I personally measured and was confident in adhering to fire regs.
Some time later, the same warden returned with another and told me I needed to move my car because it was “breaching fire regs” I reminded them I measured the gap and in response, the other warden stated I could not have any wheels on grass, apparently oblivious to the pitch opposite parking their car with one set of wheels on grass and of course, there are grass pitches with cars parked anyway so this is a ludicrous explanation.
I asked them to be reasonable, to acknowledge the potential and very real risk of a wrecked awning and assured them I would move the car as soon as the storm passed.
To my utter astonishment, the other warden suddenly said she would ask me to leave unless I moved the car!
Highlighting the storm warning from the Met Office, I asked them if they were fully aware of the risk of damage to my awning but this fell on deaf ears. With the alternative of packing up in high winds and risking driving unnecessarily, I moved my car.
As a direct consequence to this now familiar obsession with Club rules and total inflexibility, my awning was badly damaged, torn and I now face a 4hr round trip in the morning to have emergency repairs done by Isabella. Isabella were excellent with true customer focus and said they will turn the repairs around in one week.
What would you have done and what would you now do regarding the damaged awning? I phoned East Grinstead for advice before the damage was done. They were sympathetic but unable to help.
Comments
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By the time I returned to the site, it was already blowing a gale and on assessment, it appeared more dangerous to dismantle the awning than to protect it in situ. The car has 360 degree cameras and can be parked within centimetres of the awning, giving very effective protection from the direct blast of the wind.
Having towed my van and used my awning in France, Spain, Morocco and the Sahara, where we experienced severe winds, my awning sustained zero damage because common sense prevailed and people rightly shield their awnings with their cars - without the threat of having to leave the site!
Would the safety of someone’s awning not be a higher priority in the moment, than adherence pegs and rules? It strikes me the purpose of the warden is to enforce rules, not to ensure customers have an enjoyable and pleasant stay.
Customer focus was zero…
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I think the higher priority would be fire risk, tbh, rather than the damage to one person’s awning. It’s not really about pegs and rules but about safety and the customer focus was on all the campers.
You know from previous experience that the warden’s word is final and I’m sorry you suffered awning damage but it’s life.
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The warden disagreed that the OP was maintaining the fire gap and that, to me, is the most relevant factor.
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The risk of a fire in the storms predicted seemed unlikely.....🌧️🌧️🌧️🌧️🌧️🌧️
Rod, put it down to experience and focus on the service you've been given by Isabella.
hope it works out.
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Reminds me of our tenting days, sitting up all night in a storm on Guernsey holding on to the tent poles to stop it blowing away!
We rarely used a full awning with the van but even with our little porch awning, we'd have taken it down in advance - better safe than sorry! I appreciate it's not so convenient if you have a full awning set up in the way the OP had.
Don't want to get into the rights or wrongs of what the wardens decided and, although clearly an inconvenience, I assume the cost of damage to the awning, transporting it etc. would be covered by insurance at least.
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“The risk of a fire in the storms predicted seemed unlikely.....”
Or maybe more likely with the wind fanning any flames 🤷🏻♂️
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I'd have photographed the car, awning and pitch and had the measurement witnessed. Photos also of other cars parked on grass. Add in a simple four line written statement of the conversation signed by both parties.
Colin
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Common sense, added to numerous weather warnings would have had us taking down awning early. That way there is no awning damage, no unnecessary stressful conversation with staff, no having to go and get repairs done, no sounding off on a public forum, no trying to shift any blame and consequent litigation with others, no need to worry much at all.
Life is a lot simpler with a bit of fore thought and common sense applied.
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Agreed - we cannot know. The element of doubt is huge but sympathy for the OP has been shown.
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You said Without casing any inconvenience to other members, and fully maintaining the 6m fire gap, I attempted to protect our 1075cm awning from storm damage, until the storm passed, by parking inches from the front of the awning. I explained this to a warden who initially queried the fire gap
As far as I'm aware the 6m fire gap is between the facing walls of the neighbours caravan/mh and 3m between anything else, placing your car in front of the awning would not affect the 6m gap so what was the gap between your car and neighbours car/awning.
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I would have put my Isabella *storm guys” on, designed for strong winds.
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That’s what I thought as well Arch.
I’m sorry the OP has had his outfit damaged, but it’s a lesson learned. Apply common sense and heed warnings. If weather doesn’t worsen, good, no harm done. If it does, good, your equipment is safe. Compounding the problem and trying to shift blame onto staff? Not nice, and costs all of us one way or another in the long run through wasted staff time.
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Irrespective of the use of ones awning, to me anyone with an ounce of common sense in light of the forecast would have taken the awning down. I'm not going to comment on the staff's alleged actions in the opening post because as usual it's one sided but, I can give a two prime examples that occurred here in the last week. A request to park car next to awning to protect from the wind, go for it I say, it won't work (from experience) but if it gives you peace of mind. Next morning a request for help to dismantle wrecked Isabella awning, damaged car and caravan from awning pole. I did knock on everyone's door to advise awning take downs. Yesterday there was a slight lull in the weather so two families out with windbreak joining up two outfits having bbq time, weather starts again, bbq goes over into windbreaks lots of flames going both ways along windbreak. Disaster prevented by a neighbour tearing down one end of windbreak. In this wind and rain.
JK
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I and others I've observed have placed their cars to deflect the wind off the awning in very high wind conditions usually when the wind is blowing and there's a risk of damage this has happened very infrequently, if there has been plenty of warning I would take the awning down, I've also had to turn the van to face the wind and put the car in front as I've seen motorhomes do, in extreme conditions everyone needs to be flexible it rarely lasts long.
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I would (and have) taken the awning down.
Once again club site rules are being discussed which is fine.
Of course also fine is that the rules are clear and people staying in club sites have to abide by them.
The OP took the risk of leaving it up. His choice. It's a great shame but there it is. We once early on made the same mistake, never again. I am more worried about pole damage to the caravan.
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You rarely get the chance to alter your caravan position on a Club Site, particularly now hardstandings are prevalent. So you have to take what action you reasonably can, to mitigate any chance of damage. Some would go home early, some would trust in storm straps, some would pack their awning away. Some would put their expensive vehicle in harm’s way as well, it’s all a guessing game. Sometimes you win, sometimes, you don’t.
We should have been away last couple of days, but once we had seen forecast for home and our chosen destination, we decided against going. Nothing booked, so nothing spoiling. As it turned out, weather wasn’t as bad thankfully as predicted, but we had no stress, no damage to think about, no one to litigate against.0 -
Oh goody, Judge Rinder time! 🤣
Case for the prosecution….. “Yes, M’Lud, I knew all about the severe weather warnings, but didn’t think they applied to me, and I could merely move my car to ensure that everyone was safe and no damage would get done”
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Firstly my original reply posted this morning seems to have gone astray.
If the weather had already picked up I think you made the correct call.
With the unhelpful approach of the warden I'd have photographed everything and written a short statement of facts up, getting it signed by the warden and a witness.
I would now write an "appropriate" review and name the site in question.
Colin
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There’s a similar post of yours on pg2, EM.
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Is all this writing up of decisions, photography, chasing witnesses for signatures, trying to find the busy Wardens happening during the storm EM, or after?
I think an early application of some sound decision making would be a far better idea frankly.
Why do you think it’s ok to blame staff, the Club for something that could have been prevented? The OP acknowledged in his first post that he/she knew they were in a vulnerable position regarding wind, had heard the weather warnings given out. 🤷♀️
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Btw, EM, such a review would be Deleted User because it would not be a review of the site but a moan about wardens. Check the review section in the Community Guidelines for more info.
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I would hate to go to a site which had rules.
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"The OP acknowledged in his first post that he/she knew they were in a vulnerable position regarding wind, had heard the weather warnings given out. "
Good point - and further, in his second post went on to say
"By the time I returned to the site, it was already blowing a gale and on assessment, it appeared more dangerous to dismantle the awning than to protect it in situ."
From which it appears that he was quite content to leave the site with the awning unprotected even when aware of the weather warnings. So whilst I have some sympathy with him about the resulting damage, it does seem to have been a (avoidable) problem of his own making.
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