I think this happened with a friend of mine. The 'cheap' break with all the extra's wasn't so cheap.

JOY... I've just managed to stop my cheque with Barclays, cost me £10 but worth it, can't stop the other cheque thou.

You always have to pay extra for passes, bedding,and electricity.
If you read the terms and conditions it tells you there.

Tells you here

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/fun/competitions/promotions/article609985.ece

When these holidays first started all the entertainment passes were included in the £6.50 or whatever it was then. Electricity was sometimes chargeable depending on the park.

We went for 3 or 4 years, but the charges kept increasing until it was just as cheap to get a last minute deal direct with the holiday company.

luci

Yes it has changed over the years. It started out as a more or less genuine offer and as you say now Luci they have added more and more on. I work with someone who has also stopped using this deal as you can get a last minute booking for more or less the same price.

Doe

I think the sun only do this offer to Sell you the holiday Insurance

hi, We found this a few years back got my 4th choice with a priority booking form! Now you can book online if you have used the sun holidays before and you can do it all yourself and know what you are booking. The entertainment pass and linen charge are optional all you have to pay extra is the service charge.

I've been on quite a few of these hols, the first time I went ,I only put in one park, and one holiday date, (As friends of ours were booking a caravan, as well, so didn't want to end up at different parks, with different dates), We both got our chosen caravan park, (Primrose valley easter mon-fri), so it wasn't as though it was an unpopular caravan site, and it was in school hols too!. The price in the brochure was well over £400. We payed £87,- if I remember correctly, that included the passes, and service charge, (We brought our own linen), -Maybe we were just lucky, - But no way was I gonna settle for any other dates/park!, and I knew if they could not accomodate us, we'd just get our cheque back.

Since then we have booked every year, on-line, (You are classed as a priority booking, once you have had a holiday with them), and are sent out a priority form, with your reference number on, and only need to enter 3 dates/parks. If our chosen park does not come up, I just keep pressing amend, and deleting the other two chosen parks (and enter a more popular park, and date!), until I eventually get the park I want!

For anyone who has got their priority booking form, and want to book online (But not saved the vouchers from the sun). The codes to enter are: sand, keep, look, cash, meet, date

Regards, belly

Please note that I had to remove two posts that did not have any relevance to the topic at all.

Members seek advice in this section of the forum or perhaps want to share experiences. Sarcastic one liners with no relevance to the topic do not help.

Many thanks

MarkJ HT Mod

Maybe as a suggestion for anyone else making these reservations would be to put your 1st choice as your last choice - then there's probably a good chance of you getting the site you wanted in the first place

just a thought but can you put the same choice in all boxes would they accept that

If you only want one holiday site then only put that one down in the first box and leave the other two empty. If they cant offer you your choice then they would not i assume cash your cheque. Then you would see how mch they wanted to take yor money!

I think these days it only works out at a bargain for families going during school holidays, we are hoping for the school Easter holiday but havent heard back yet.

I have now had an email back from the people the sun put me in touch with, they say they will look into it. Butlins still say there is space on the allocations given to The Sun so we'll see what happens, i just find it so hard to understand why they wouldn't give people their 1st choice unless the bigger holiday camps charge The Sun more than the smaller camps.

This is just my opinion, - but I reckon they will try to get rid of the less popular parks first (knowing that the more popular parks are more sought after), - because if they allocate all the popular parks first, - they are going to be stuck with the less popular ones (That nobody wants!). If you notice, on the booking form, - It does say, that if you let them allocate you a park of their choice, (You have no say in the matter), then you won't be charged the service charge!

We have always booked on line - (Exept the first time we booked),and have always been succesfull, -but this time we could not get any of the parks we usually go to (So we put all the parks in, for the licolnshire/yorkshire area), and not one was available, we put 3 dates in too( easter fri-mon, then easter mon-fri, and may day mon-fri). - but then upon reading further down the booking form- I noticed a paragraph saying something on the lines of "Only a small percentage of our caravan parks are available to book on line". If this is this case - why do they send priority forms out to those who have booked before, - if there are only a certain number of parks available?

Would be interesting to see if anyone else has had this prob,

Regards, belly!

I have been on a Sun holiday for the last five years and have never had a problem. It tells you on the brochure what the other charges are for the parks you choose and some do offer free entertainment passes etc it just depends on where you want to go.

I always upgrade the accomodation etc and still always save at least £100 off the online price for exactly the same break. A cheaters way of getting around the fourth choice fall would be to only put the park and dates you actually want and are willing to pay the extras for. I booked online this year but usually only put two parks and one date and just repeat it on the form, it's never let me down yet.

Have to admit that when we used the forms we only put down the parks and dates we wanted expecting to get our money back if they were not available, which I think we did once. Now we tend to book online but we need more than one van and so I used to use 2 concurrent PCs and 2 different lots of codes, just in case they ever asked for them to be presented. This worked fine, but last year they stopped it and so I have booked direct since. We are larger parties and so allowing for the fact that we want some comfort - larger vans 3 beds etc, it actually worked out cheaper to take a cut price offer with the park. Completely different at peak times though when the park seems to surcharge in the region of £300 over the SUN cost for a 3 night break! The SUN lot wont give me a username even though I booked all the holidays bar one, when we had to use my daughters name as it was her cheque. She has a user I don't. If you want to save time on the systems, most of the small cornish parks are closed early and late in the year so use those parks and dates as the alternatives you have to put in, leaving you to peruse your first choice peacefully.

We've been caught out with this as well. Only, we didnt just get our fourth choice park, we got a park that we didn't even choose. We have used the Sun offer before and never had any problems. Always first choice date and parks.

The Haven holiday company were really helpful but basically, there is nothing they can do without us incurring a £20 admin fee as well as paying all the additional charges. We have also tried to ring the Sun hotline but that doesn't actually open until the end of February. To be honest, its not worth the hassle and we will probably not bother even going. Think I would rather save my money and book a last minute deal somewhere warmer later in the year.

Oh well, live and learn.

Sarah