Showing up late

Crowe wrote:
ddndoug wrote:

If we have reservations and arrive late (especially after quite hours), we plug in the electric and that's about it so we don't wake the neighbors. We can survive for a night without leveling and water connections.

People understand late arrivals and typically don't mind as long as you try to be courteous.

Sometimes late arrivals are totally unavoidable and we do the same as above-as little as possible until morning. We have even slept with the slides in. What has always amazed me is the number of people who come out of nowhere to offer help and sometimes beer!

Your neighbors may be sympathetic to your face, but the park office often hears a different song. For the past several years, we have not allowed late check ins. We get much less pushback from that policy than we got from other guests when a late arrival woke them in the middle of the night. We have a redundant system to inform all potential guests of that policy. Furthermore, we contact each incoming guest on the date of their arrival to check on their travel progress. If it is apparent they cannot make the arrival deadline, we cancel that night without charge to the customer and direct them to alternative accommodations. Very rarely does the customer object, but when they do we remind ourselves our business is to please the 99 guests already on site who were able to arrive on time and not to try and please the outlier at the expense of those 99. I believe you will find this is a small, but growing trend in the industry.

It doesn't come at the expense of the 99-it only comes at the expense of those who it bothers, who are probably bothered by everything. I would definitely not use your campground because of this. If you won't let me come in you dam well better not charge me. Even though I might start out early even the best laid plans go awry and I don't want to lose a day of vacation by setting up elsewhere and then having to move again. I suspect your "less pushback" perception is because people are not staying there and just not saying anything for that reason. As another stated we here complaints about late-comers but what do you do to discourage Ethel and Fred yelling at each other because they are deaf, Diesel Pusher Dave who idles his rig for 30 minutes at 5 a.m. and Screaming Sally who thinks that the entire campground needs to hear her discipline her kids? I guess I just think a part of customer service is accepting the fact life doesn't always follow the rules we want. I started camping 40 years ago with my youth group, have camped with scouts, in a tent and MH and not once have I found a campground with a "no late arrivals" rule. A "you must be married" rule but late comers have always been welcome.

Never claimed I please 100% of all potential customers. Our policy works for us and judging by the lack of complaints, works for our customers as well. If it doesn't work for you, you won't be a customer, so I don't have to worry about pleasing you. And as I previously stated, our policy won't be a surprise so that won't fly as an excuse.