Southport site - power problems

[Guest Mel B]

Hi Just got back home from Southport CC site. It's a lovely site and placed very nicely for getting into town, the beach etc but unfortunately around a third of the site keeps getting electrical overloads, consequently, while we were there for the last 2 nights, on both nights we had a power-out. On Tuesday it was from around 8.00 pm to approximately 10.20 pm and on Wednesday from 7.00 pm for at least an hour and a half I think. The wardens said they were going to ask people not to use too much electricity, ie NOT electric heating! If you are going there make sure you have plenty of gas and that your batteries are well charged just in case you're in the affeted area.

[Guest Bill]

Personally I think it's a helluva cheek to ask us to pay £2 a night for electricity (or the euivalent loaded into the base price) and then ask us not to use electricity

[Guest Mel B]

I must admit that I agree - if they were still using the policy of only having to pay if you really wanted I think some wouldn't have used it - we wouldn't I know - so the demand would've been less. As we knew it was included we took our mini oven with us to warm up pies etc so had no choice but to use it as we don't have a gas oven. The wardens were only going to request people to keep down the electricity consumption to try to avoid any further problems over the 'popular' holiday period. They were trying their best in the circumstances so we can't blame them for the problem, they were just the poor s*ds who got lumbered with it. However, one thing that really did annoy us is the reason we were given for the overloading in the first place - the site was due to get the electricity gubbins upgraded by the CC before Christmas as they knew the site was badly needing this, but it didn't happen! What they really should've done was restrict the number of pitches available to ensure there weren't any problems for those who went there, but whether this was feasible I don't know, at the very least they should've warned those who had booked of potential problems as it seems that they knew this was likely to happen. No doubt there'll be some correspondence in future issues of the Caravan Club magazine (if they're honest enough to print it) so it'll be interesting to see what the CC's comments are.

[Guest julie blackburn]

hi we stayed on this site during the 2003 chritmas/new year period and they were having trouble with the supply then. we were asked to keep our usage down put it still went off.we were told that the caravan club had known about the problems for a while so it should have been dealt with by now. and no we didn't get a refund . no problems in edinburgh last year the site was full and the weather was freezing. julie

[Guest Bill]

Following my earlier post, I wonder if it is legal to take money for electricity and then restrict the supply? The logic behind the flat-rate charge for electricity is that it would be uneconomic to meter every pitch, so they charge "for the service" and then give the electricity "free". But, does that hold up if the supply is restricted? It is quite deplorable that Julie did not get a refund.

[Guest Mel B]

Just for the record, we didn't get a refund even though we suffered the problem on 2 consecutive nights. We were only there for these 2 nightb but I don't know if it continued on subsequent nights after we'd left. I will be writing to the CC to see what their comments are on the situation, I don't suppose for one minute that I'll get a refund, particial or otherwise, but hopefully I'll get a response. I'll let you all know what they say if and when I do.