KOA Campground Cancellation Policy

Some years back, I had to cancel a one week KOA reservation at the last minute due to death in the family. The manager apologized and explained that the rule required I pay for the first night, which I expected since I was aware of the policy. A few days after we got home from the funeral, etc., we received a nice sympathy card from the park along with a coupon for a nights stay in their park.

Bobchambe wrote:
Just wanted to mention that if you reserve a campsite at a KOA park, be very sure you can make it. They have a 48 hour cancellation policy!!
If you make a reservation today for a site tomorrow, and something happens and you can't make it, you pay for tomorrow night anyway.
48 hours is a ridiculous amount of time! 24 hours notice is bad enough when you never know what may happen with an RV! Most RV Parks we have dealt with have a 12 hour or less cancellation policy.

Personally, we will avoid KOA parks in the future, or at least not book them in advance.

Is this new? Or non-disclosed or something?

At ACOE campgrounds if you cancel within 24 hours of the check-in time, you give up the first nights cost plus $10.

At state parks in PA if you cancel less than 6 days prior you lose the first nights cost plus a fee.

I don't see where KOAs policy is ridiculous at all.

We stay at a GA State Park every July for a family gathering. They have a $10.00 cancellation policy. It is not unreasonable to me...I get it.

Westernrvparkowner's explanation from the business side makes perfect sense.

LOL! Just another "let's bash KOA" thread. You read the policy, you agreed to the policy and then you complain. If you didn't like it you should have moved along. What cracks me up is some of you think that KOA is the ONLY type of campground that has strict policies that they enforce. Many private campgrounds do so as well.

It is so easy to avoid this type of thing. If you don't like the policy, DON'T STAY THERE. None of us are "special"-we all should be expected to abide by the same rules. If you've had an emergency or unpredictable delay then ask for an exception. If they don't give it to you remember it's THEIR right to not do so. These are not charities, they are businesses.

Crowe wrote:
LOL! Just another "let's bash KOA" thread. You read the policy, you agreed to the policy and then you complain. If you didn't like it you should have moved along. What cracks me up is some of you think that KOA is the ONLY type of campground that has strict policies that they enforce. Many private campgrounds do so as well.

It is so easy to avoid this type of thing. If you don't like the policy, DON'T STAY THERE. None of us are "special"-we all should be expected to abide by the same rules. If you've had an emergency or unpredictable delay then ask for an exception. If they don't give it to you remember it's THEIR right to not do so. These are not charities, they are businesses.

Totally agree.

If you explain your situation, and they give you consideration, then great. Just don't expect it, and both you and the campground owner will get along just fine.

Mike

Pretty rare when I agree with anything that WesternRV has to say, but his two posts in this case are 100% right. He noted something that I'm stunned that some government parks are willing to tolerate. That being a reservation system that has a facility listed as "fully booked" and the situation on the ground is that 1/3rd of the park is empty. I would guess that a lot of this is due to reservation and cancellation policies that are way too lenient. We frequent a state park beach CG. It's common to find a spot, mid-week, for a few days, and have the reservation system indicate that the park is nearly full, then spend a few days camped there, and find that they barely have a 50% occupancy rate.

Crowe wrote:
LOL! Just another "let's bash KOA" thread. You read the policy, you agreed to the policy and then you complain. If you didn't like it you should have moved along. What cracks me up is some of you think that KOA is the ONLY type of campground that has strict policies that they enforce. Many private campgrounds do so as well.

It is so easy to avoid this type of thing. If you don't like the policy, DON'T STAY THERE. None of us are "special"-we all should be expected to abide by the same rules. If you've had an emergency or unpredictable delay then ask for an exception. If they don't give it to you remember it's THEIR right to not do so. These are not charities, they are businesses.

x2
we stay at koa's, state parks, and private campgrounds. we understand their cancellation policies. when making a koa reservation via phone call the koa rep specifically tells me the cancellation policy so there is no confusion.

last new years we were at koa mt pleasant south carolina. we had booked and paid for 3 nights checking out on monday morning. my wife got a phone call on sunday about mid day that one of her good friend's mom had died. we decided to pack up and head home about 4pm on sunday afternoon. on the way out i told the koa desk person that we were leaving early in case they could rent our site. (campground was full) and told them why. i did not ask for any type of refund.

when we got home 4 hours later i had received an email from koa mt pleasant had refunded us 1 night on my credit card.

koa gets bashed about as much as camping world. yes there rates are normally higher, yes camping world customer service can be bad at times, but the bottom line is everyone has the option to not do business with them. personally we have only had good experiences with koa and camping world

EVERY THING is up to the owner/manager. The park is not required to follow the national KOA policy. A policy is not a law. Depending on the reason, they can return whatever amount they want. Some do not charge to make the reservation. Some give refunds for checking out early. All depends on the campground.
Note that the OP did not have a bad experience with the KOA in question. He just didnt like the policy. Some cancellation policies for cabins can be a week or more.

Heck. We have reservations at Mama Gerties near Asheville for the end of July. We paid a $100.00 deposit. After reading all of this thread I decided to look at their cancellation policy. For reservations made outside of 90 days, which ours is, the cancellation policy is 30 days. And, that will incur a 20% fee before returning the rest of our deposit. Inside of 30 days, we lose our $100.00. To my mind, it is what it is. We were lucky to even get the reservation as they were booked for the entire summer and had just had a cancellation that morning.