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Beware

Near midnight on Sunday night 17th July I stopped at these services just before the tunnel expecting to pay £5 for a few hours sleep before getting the train.

I had only just pulled in when a guy in a Hi-viz jacket knocked on the door and informed me that the first two hours were free and after that I had to pay him the fee. I stated that I thought that you paid £5 via telephone, but he said that I changed on Friday 15th and now there was 24hr security for OUR saftey. I asked how much it was to saty over two hours and he stated £30.00!! I said that I would have to think about it.

About 20 minutes later he returned with another man, once again dressed in a Hi-Viz jacket and said that he had made a mistake and that it was only £20.00. I suspected that I was being conned and said that I would be ringing up to complain and asked for teh telephone number. He stated that he would go and get me his buisness card. I waited twenty minutes and then had to go looking for him. he gave me a buisness card entitled "Channel Ports" and stateing his name as Paul Wells "Director".

As I still suspected this was still a con as surely a Director would not be patrolling a parking area at midnight on a Sunday!! I decided that if I annoyed him too much my van might have been scraped while I was sleeping so I drove out of the area. This was definately an unpleasent start to my holiday.

Just a warning to others as for £20 or £30 I would expect a full 5 star campsite with all the bells on it. 

UPDATE

I emailed Channel Ports, detailing my concerns and have just received this reply:-

My name is Paul Wells and I am the Managing Director of ChannelPorts Ltd. The reason why the security officer handed you my card was so that if someone wish to make contact they would have someone in a responsible position not some unidentifiable man walking about. ChannelPorts are the operator of the 82 space lorry park at the rear of the site and we have been asked by Henry Boot, the owner of Stop Services, to operate the caravan overnight parking on their behalf. As it was the first weekend of the change the security officers on duty were asked to try and explain to customer about the changes, I am sorry you felt in any way threatened by their actions as this is clearly not our intention and I shall be talking to those officers who were on duty.

On the web site the price of £5 per day refers to cars and not caravans, the website should have been updated and checking today it has been  updated to reflect the correct charges and on behalf of the site operator Henry Boot I do apologise for  the lack of clarity on the website. Stop 24 originally had no specified parking spaces for caravans and motors homes at all. Earlier this year some of the parking area which is not protected by height restriction barriers was marked as caravan parking, this was intended for short term – 2 hour free not for long term.

Following requests from caravan and motor home owners it was decided to try an offer some overnight parking at a charge. The charge being £20 or £28 including a £10 meal voucher, both prices also include free use of showers within the main terminal building.

Henry Boot believe that the prices are comparable to other motorway services, in fact Road Chef at Junction 8 of the M20 charge £26 for a caravan.

I think the security officer made an honest  mistake when he said 30 as this is the Euro price not the GBP price and it was the first weekend. The receipts the security officers would have handed you clearly show all of the prices to ensure there is no possibility of you being charged more than the published tariff.

Again I can only apologise on behalf of Henry Boot for the lack of clarity and publicising the correct rates. If you would like to use our facility at some time in the future then please present this email to the officer on duty and we shall offer you a 50% discount on the standard parking fee (meal voucher offer excluded)

 Regards

Paul Wells

I would recommend that members of this site should boycote this service area.

The fact that firms can operate like this is barking, only today I was in a Sainsbury's free! car park, only to notice a small troop of folk in Hi-Viz jackets, they were busy sticking civil enforcement tickets on vehicles that were over the line on thier given parking slot, so no doubt £30 due etc, etc..

No doubt some of these clowns were responsible for parking thier own cars at the start of a row, over the line, which meant other motorists also had to park in this fashion. basicly a form of entrapment.

Of course we all know not to pay Civil Enforcement Notices, but a lot of folk don't.

I think we'll stick to overnight at Baie de la Somme or Aire des Deux Caps.

I wonder what Europeans, who are used to better than this, think about our service areas?  I don't just mean overnighting, but the parking charges if you 'outstay your welcome'!  Whatever happened to being able to stop and have a rest if you're tired!

People do have the option of staying on a proper campsite at around the cost of the services or lower. There are plenty of places near Dover where you can stay including Club site, commercial sites and CL's.

David

Totally agree with David.

I would never stop on a services overnight. Far to much noise and more risk.

harryb

When you consider that service areas in Europe are FREE, what message does this say to vans from Europe stopping at our services.

Last year it was £5 to stop and suddenly without any notice or signs in the parking area, (the webb site had not even been updated) they increase the charge to £20! That's a 400% INCREASE.

The security guys were not even able to produce any identification, deffiinately what I would class as extremely unhelpful.

We too had this experience at Stop 24. 

There had been issues previously with the Shearings rep at this location.  Having heard this we located the very limited caravan parking area we set up for a 6am departure.  Sure enough 2 hours later a guy came and told us that we were unable to park overnight unless we paid him £20.  I had asked in the services and was told there would be no problem staying overnight.  We are told that the Services want a quick turnover of parkers so they can gain maximum customers through their doors.

At this point OH and self decided that we would see if we could get an evening crossing via the train.  No issues there, no additional cost - Well done Euro tunnel. We stayed at the first service on the other side 'Deux Caps'.  They then got our custom for breakfast and food for the journey south.  They also gained the custom of the people we were holidaying with. No cost for parking there by the way.

Never again will we stop at Stop 24, not for even so much as a bottle of water.

I can however recommend Deux Caps, or should you wish a specific camping site, Les Epinettes at Peuplingues is good and only a short distance from the tunnel.  If you have a little more time to spare, 1 hour will get you to the Baie du Somme services with their specifically allocated caravan area.

Quote: Originally posted by Ina on 14/8/2011

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As David said, plenty of sites nearby, this time we're staying at Daleacres CC site, OK, that also costs £20, but at least it is in a lot more pleasant surroundings than on a service area.

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