Donna Genie explains when to allow early check-in and late checkout at campgrounds. Set check-in around 1pm, use noon as a boundary for early arrivals, and keep early-check-in fees modest since they rarely cover costs and can hurt repeat business. Deny late checkout only if you need the site for the next guest.
Hey, I'm seeing lots of talk about early check in fees, late checkout fees, fees, fees, fees. So let's talk about it. Let's get down to the nitty gritty. I understand as campground owners you want to make sure you have a set of rules and guidelines and everybody knows what they are and can stick to them. But let's really dive into the nuts and bolts of early check in and late checkout. So let's take the easy one first. Late checkout can cause problems because you've got to get that site ready for somebody else who's arriving. And you need to get the traffic out of the park so that your cleanup crew can make sure that everything is ready for the oncoming arrivals before your check in time. So I completely get late checkout. But let's talk about some alternatives. If someone asks for a late checkout. First let's look at your occupancy of the park. Do you have someone else coming in for that site? If you do, it's a no brainer. They've got to go. You gotta tell them that someone else is coming in, but you can't accommodate that request for a late checkup. But let's see, do you have any other sites available that they could move to if they wanted to spend another day with you? Or. Or are they just trying to push the bounds and see how far they can go and sleep in a little? If that's possible, you can offer a late checkout limited, maybe they've got to be out by one o' clock or by noon if you can accommodate the request. And yes, you should charge a fee for that if you'd like. Now if there is no one coming into that site, I definitely think you ought to have a late checkout option and you can charge for that if you'd like. It depends. If you have somebody who's a loyal guest, maybe you don't want to charge for it. And I think that's up to you. Your cost really is simply the electric they're consuming, which honestly that is not going to be that much in regards to how much it will cost you if they have a great experience at your park and tell others about. But I do understand setting a precedence for that can be harmful if you really do need to get that person out. So just like a hotel would, if they can accommodate your request, they're going to let you stay in that room. If they can't, they will tell you that. So I think you ought to take that same approach. Now let's Talk early check in. So early check in has become a bigger and bigger issue. Many people are trying to arrive early in the morning. They get out of bed and maybe they're local to your park, so they may arrive there 10 o', clock, 11 o' clock in the morning. I understand completely. This can be a logistical problem. Campers coming out and campers coming in at the same time. You may not be able to accommodate that in your spacing of driving in and out. The roads may be a little too narrow for that and you may not be ready for them and have the appropriate site all cleaned up for them like you want it to be. So I do understand. However, let's talk about noon. I think noon is a magical time. Yes. Your check in time may be set for 1 o', clock, 2 o', clock, 3 o' clock obviously is pretty late. I would suggest that you set your checkout time between 1 and 2. A general rule in the RVing world, especially with people who travel a lot, is to be off the road by 3:30 or 330 miles in a day. We obviously try to get there where we can enjoy the park rather than just get there to spend the night and leave again in the morning. If it's just an overnight stop. So accommodate and look at your early check in time first. Look at your regular check in time. If it's around one or two o', clock, I think you're in the good range there, and that's pretty normal in the industry. Usually one o' clock is what I see most often. But let's say somebody arrives at noon. All right, let's do this just like a hotel would. If that site is ready and available. How about we get you in there and get you settled in so that you can enjoy the park to the fullest extent possible. You may also have other things that people might be buying. If you're renting kayaks or paddle boats or bicycles, things like that. If you have add on attractions, by all means bring those people in earlier. The earlier you can get them in, the more money they can have time to spend with you. And if they're just getting there at noon, I think that's kind of the edge of where I'd say they probably just didn't have their time appropriate. It is very difficult to manage time, especially when you're traveling between four and six hours in a day. Sometimes traffic backs up and you don't want to be getting in at 8 o' clock at night. You wouldn't like that as the owner either and other times, maybe traffic flows smoothly and everything goes great and you've allowed a little extra budget time for any contingencies. If those contingencies don't happen, people may arrive a little bit on the earlier side rather than the later side. So just like you don't charge people to arrive at 4 o' clock instead of 2 o' clock or 1 o', clock, I would suggest you let them in, give them the best experience. Remember that experience is what's going to generate a return visits to your park and great reviews. So accommodate what you can on that. And let's not let rules be the guiding line 100% here. Let's use a human touch to determine when it's too early versus when it's too late. Keep that in mind when you're thinking about the customer experience with your early check ins. One other thing I'll mention, I am starting to see exorbitant fees for early check in. I know you're trying to deter it, but again, allow people to spend the money in your park and come back. That is worth far more than any early check in fee that you may collect. You're always, and I will say 100% of the time going to create a rift by charging an early check in fee. I know you may have that on your website, you may have it on their confirmation. You may have told them on the phone. I get it. It's still a sticking point. So let's try to alleviate that. We want good vibes rather than bad vibes, especially upon arrival. So I've seen people charging anywhere from $10 on up to my latest and greatest was 35 doll early check in. I've seen the comments on the board. People are saying that is because they're using all of our stuff and we have to charge for our stuff. They're putting using our electric. Electric is the most commonly cited thing. Our water, our pool, our laundry, our bath facilities, all of our amenities. All right, let's break some numbers down for a moment. So let's say you are really worried about your electricity costs. Somebody pulls in and they have three air conditioners and they're there an hour early and they're just gonna plug in everything, leave all the doors open on the RV and crank that thing down to 65 degrees. All right? At $10 for an early check in fee. If somebody is two hours early and you charge them $10, that means that's equivalent. If we take a 24 hour rate scale that your nightly rate was $120. Okay? If you're just trying to recoup your costs like people were saying they are, that fee is more. More like five bucks in a lot of cases, or seven dollars. You're really doing more than trying to recoup cost. And I'd suggest that you recoup costs in a different way, like I said, by looking at what you can sell them. What other opportunities are there in your park for them to spend money, and the biggest opportunity is to capture that person for a return visit to your park. Okay, so rethink your early check in fees. I'm not saying don't have any, but rethink how you work and how militant you want to be, because you could lose a really good guest over 10 bucks. And how much did you pay to market to get them to your park? Way more than $10.
