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now this has me really pissed off,, according to kevin callan ,, 6 pm news in my area chex t.v. peterborough,
some people are booking campsites in large blocks with no intention of tripping/ camping for the entire reservations and then selling off the remaining dates at a profit,, this is WRONG!!! i just can not believe these bastards!!!
Last edited by swedish pimple (3/29/2021 8:53 pm)
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thanks for posting the evidence ,,,
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Unfortunately Ontario parks doesn’t care. I hope they do something about it but I highly doubt there is a change coming. As long as campsites are full they aren’t likely to change anything, even if people are getting fleeced in a murky secondary market.
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European trip organizers have been doing it for years- they'd get their employees to book several sites for them, then charge a premium to customers to use the sites. I remember years ago we ran into a German couple who were complaining about prices- they paid $100US per night for their site PLUS another $75 for food and gear...
I suspect they used the "I book, but you go" loophole meant for parents of kids without credit cards.
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scoutergriz wrote:
European trip organizers have been doing it for years- they'd get their employees to book several sites for them, then charge a premium to customers to use the sites. I remember years ago we ran into a German couple who were complaining about prices- they paid $100US per night for their site PLUS another $75 for food and gear...
I suspect they used the "I book, but you go" loophole meant for parents of kids without credit cards.
I recall reading about this occurring in BC a few years ago and I don’t doubt it’s happening here in Ontario. It’s a profitable way to force people into your guided trips if you happen to hold a bunch of permits for popular times of year.
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This is a similar 'grey area' scam that is common with concerts, sporting events etc. through Ticketmaster. If you've ever had 4 browsers open at 6:55am waiting to book a campsite at 7, only to not get it for some reason, then you have been beaten by a bot.
Tour/guiding companies will use bots to scoop up primo sites during vacation season and then bundle them off on their websites. ON parks knows it happens, but they also make their money so are most likely indifferent. In fact, it guarantees solid bookings and revenue. Far more common with front country camping, but I can imagine easy access lakes along the hwy 60 corridor is greatly affected as well.
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After watching Killarney bookings for a period of time and finally giving up I am not surprised at this. Have since moved on and managed to get bookings in a different park for the time around the Perseids. It is a good show most years and fantastic to watch from a canoe.
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This is my first year trying to go to Killarney. Being teachers, my tripping partner and I are both very flexible. We lost the battle every morning that we were trying to book... Might be time to try something else I guess
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There's a few posts circulating on Facebook showing someone on Kijiji stating that they use computer technology (bot) to basically book sites instantly (before the average person can). They've purchased dozens of sites for the summer and sold them all on Kijiji at an inflated price.
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There's a few posts circulating on Facebook showing someone on Kijiji stating that they use computer technology (bot) to basically book sites instantly (before the average person can). They've purchased dozens of sites for the summer and sold them all on Kijiji at an inflated price.
You can see the link in the post I did above to a CTV story.
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There's a few posts circulating on Facebook showing someone on Kijiji stating that they use computer technology (bot) to basically book sites instantly (before the average person can). They've purchased dozens of sites for the summer and sold them all on Kijiji at an inflated price.
You can see the link in the post I did above to a CTV story.
Ah sorry man I didn't actually read the link...my bad
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Yeah I was figuring somebody was using a bot to book a site. At the crack of 7am I selected a campsite on four different occasions. Got beat out the first 3 occasions. It's sad things are starting to move in this direction.
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All you have to do is look at Killarney dates out 5 months and a few days from now.
The entire Park is already booked.
Something untoward is going on.
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Try booking a loop on the Killarney backpacking trail. It’s a joke. You have to book a minimum of 10 days you will be cancelling for sure and holding onto the 5-6 days you actually want.
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Only solution I could think of would be for them to keep track of people who transfer or cancel dates and have an increasing penalty system based on the number of incidents and eventually ban them for future bookings.
Of course that would require the government to actually care.
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Why would they bother? Every site is booked and sometimes they get 2 or even 3 reservation and cancellation fees for the same campsite. Fixing the problem costs time and money and doesn’t create any new revenue, it just makes it more fair.
Clearly based on their new flat rate site proposal, fair isn’t exactly a priority.
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