kaypsmith Report post Posted June 3, 2018 What a shame, I have been staying at St George Island Florida State Park for 13 years in a row. Reserve America is the only to reserve at that park now, you can only book 11 months in advance, and I started 11 months to the day in advance last year, no sites out of 58 available at 12:02 AM. I tried several times during the year, hoping for a possible cancellation. None occurred during the entire 6 months afterwards. So I finally booked at a very nice campground on the mainland looking across the bay at the campground of choice, and had a very good stay there. While at the campground that I stayed at, a TT pulled in two sites away, it was one of the campground hosts from St George, in talking with him I learned that the campground is currently half filled most of the time. Here is the reason, many people are using bot programs to reserve prime times at the campground, and do so within seconds of booking times, many of these bookings are for the same person using ficticious names, but with the same credit cards. Now if you book and cancel within 48 hours of booked date, the park will refund all but one day stay for that booking. My suggestion to him was to change the policy of refunds to only happen in the occurrence of storm occurrence at the CG during the booked dates or a life threatening happening for the camper, and only with a doctors statement. Probably won't happen, but here is my start for a campaign to end such practices, with many letters and e-mails to Reserve America, any and all from fellow members will be appreciated. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
richard5933 Report post Posted June 3, 2018 Another way people get around this, at least with the similar system in use in Wisconsin, is to book a longer stay starting before they actually want to arrive. They then later cancel the first half of the trip and keep only the part they want. This allows them to book earlier than should be allowed, Would be nice if there was a way to fix this, but I'm starting to realize that no matter what they do people will find ways around the rules to mess up those of us that try to follow them when booking. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
manholt Report post Posted June 4, 2018 Sounds to me...we have finally arrived at the junction of, campground space available, for the amount of RV's that are made and bought each year! It was bound to happen! With high tech, it doubles the problem. Unless you want to spend Summer in Texas! or Winter in Main! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
wayne77590 Report post Posted June 4, 2018 There have been been several campgrounds around here built in the last year or so. As Carl implied, not good for summer time. Temps here have been in the 90's this past couple weeks. It is going to be interesting this coming Winter to see how filled they are. My guess is that they will be quite full. We are traveling again this summer to escape the heat. Could not leave earlier because of commitments. We have reservations all the way through the middle of August. This is something we do not usually do but the past couple years, even though we found places, they were booking up quickly. Now we just have to plan from August through October. Guess I better get started. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jleamont Report post Posted June 4, 2018 Similar thing happens in Disney, rooms and campsites people book them all up then bid them off on line and make a profit. It appears to be sold out, at the last minute if no one claims them they will cancel the reservation and they go back into the pool. Very frustrating, it seems like with technology the greed has become overwhelming. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
