Easter freeze makes for unhappy campers
Power supply issue hit families at caravan site
Easter weekend was a miserable experience for some caravan park customers in Aberfeldy.
A war of words has broken out between the power supplier, the park management and disgruntled customers after power failed at the privately-operated Aberfeldy Caravan Park overnight on Good Friday – when temperatures were well below freezing.
With no power from 10.30pm to 10am, campers were so cold they could not sleep.
Some left the site at daybreak and those that stayed experienced two further fuse blow outs during Easter Saturday.
The park was at capacity for a weekend which heralds the start of the season, but tempers frayed when electricity repeatedly failed.
Local shops were inundated with complaining visitors who could not charge their batteries, heat their vehicles and got only cold showers.
Families mobbed the thrift shop looking for blankets.
A spokesperson for Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN), the networks side of the SSE Group, said: “Engineers responded to power cuts at Aberfeldy Caravan Park on Friday, April 14 and Saturday, April 15.
“Our priority is to provide a safe and secure supply of electricity and we responded to the faults quickly in an attempt to minimise disruption to customers of the caravan park.”
SSEN blamed the outage on an overloaded transformer which fused owing to too much demand on the caravan park’s separate circuit.
The engineers said the problem was confined to the holiday park.
The network engineers noted an underground cable had been damaged and worked overnight on Friday, April 14, to fix the problem, deciding temporary generators would cause too much noise.
John McKenzie, managing director of Moness Resort which owns and operates the park, disagreed with SSEN.
He said: “The park as well as nearby residents suffered a temporary loss of power on Saturday, due initially to a fuse fault in a substation, run by Scottish and Southern Energy which serves the local area.
“This had a knock-on effect on fuse boxes serving the park. SSE was called and we are grateful to it for quickly resolving the problem.
“The park was operating at near peak capacity over the Easter weekend but it has done so before without any black-out.”
The power was not back on until 10am on Saturday, prompting a queue of caravans to leave when the site barrier went up at 8am.
Campers reported angry scenes as families asked for refunds on the separate electricity charge taken by the site’s operator.
Responding to the PA passing on SSEN’s demand that Moness either reduces the draw on power or pays to upgrade the system capacity, Mr McKenzie replied: “We have received no recent notification from SSE, verbally or in writing, that further work needs to be done on our part to upgrade the site’s electrical systems.
“However, we would welcome further discussions to ensure this problem does not occur again.”
In a statement, a spokesperson for SSEN replied to Mr McKenzie’s comments saying: “We would like to apologise for any interruption to the power supply and we thank everyone for their patience as our engineers worked to safely restore power to Aberfeldy Caravan Park.
“We will continue to engage with the site owners to ensure there is a secure supply of electricity.”
Cameron MacFarlane (55) from Stirling said: “There were three generations of my family trying to enjoy a holiday. The people beside us had three small children. They were all up at 5.45am on Saturday morning too cold to sleep.
“We were all raging. There were no hot showers, no lights and folk couldn’t charge up to move on.”
Businesses in the town say they feel let down as the site customers contribute a significant spend and the Easter weekend’s disruption may mean many don’t return.
The caravan park was disposed of by the council in 2015 on a 50year lease.
Customer niggles over new charges of £5 extra per night for electricity hook up and limited toilet and shower facilities have led to bad reviews on Trip Advisor. A power failure over Easter weekend at Aberfeldy Caravan Park left guests unhappy
Moness Resort boss Mr McKenzie responded to negative comments: “Since acquiring the park, Moness has invested heavily in improving the site to provide good quality services for up to 167 pitches for caravans and tents.
“This included extensive renovations following serious flooding in the winter of 2015-16.
“Our investments have resulted in the park being awarded 4 star status by VisitScotland.
“Moness remains committed to providing a high quality, value for money service at the caravan park as it does at the Moness Resort, which continues to be the Aberfeldy area’s most successful tourism business.”
We were all raging There were no hot showers, no lights and folk couldn’t charge up.