Encore Winter Garden — Hotel in Winter Garden

Look, I wanted to like it here. I did. I showed up and had power issues with the power pedestal. They fixed it the next day. The maintenance staff was fast and responsive. All positive things right?

However, in comes the daunting part. My 9 year old son was playing at the park and pond 40 yards from our camper. He was escorted back by a campground office staff member and I was told he was not allowed outside the RV without adult supervision. I asked if he was doing something disrespectful, no. Was he disrespectful to you, no. I was friendly and respectful when the staff member came to our camper to discuss this. I asked questions as I had not seen the rule before in my three years of membership with thousand trails. I apologized that I was unfamiliar with the rule and then committed to observe it while at the park. What tweaked me, was that the staff member then proceeded to apologize that she would need to proceed with a verbal warning and that I would receive written notice of such warning for a rule violation... Yes, your Overlordship.

First off, this "rule" is in a guideline section. I had to ask, because it wasn't in the rules and policies stapled to my reservation slip. The guidelines section is among all the area advertisements. You know, the first place we go to look for info about our reservation. Secondly, guidelines, by definition, are flexible. If you are inflexible, put it in the rules section that your require people to sign or at least staple the section in with the reservation information.

I would understand if I had been initially belligerent or if my son had been disrespectful to her or the property. I would understand if I was not available to talk to when she followed him home. I would understand if it were a rule I signed and acknowledged. Since none of this is the case, I don't understand.

If you choose to stay here don't forget to read the guidelines... you will get written up... It sucks, because the maintenance staff was so responsive. I would have loved to give them a positive review. unfortunately, "I apologize", this experience is going to overshadow anything else.

[ adding due to response...] As mentioned, when informed, I agreed to abide. In your response you call it both a rule and a guideline. Again, a guideline and a rule are very separate ideologies. If you see items in your guidelines as rules, label them as such. I was not pushing against the rules and while I didn't know that the guideline existed. If I had known, I still would have applied my judgement toward the guideline (because that is what you do with guidelines) regarding my son. Who, again, was well behaved in all aspects of this situation and in a place where kids should be expected to be found (at a park/pond).

If you see it as a rule then label it as such and stick it in the policies and rules section. Better yet, just label your resort a 55 and older resort based on the way you patrol for kids at the park. Furthermore, having a rule that says kids (under 16) can't be outside the RV including on "their" site without an adult outside would not be inconvenient it would be ridiculous. Good thing it is only a guideline though; Or is it? I don't know.

All of that aside, this only needed to be a conversation. As it was clearly unintentional. Which was abundantly clear by our original conversation and the fact that I agreed to follow the rule. It could have ended there but then you needed to force a written notice of a "rule" violation and tape it to my RV for some unclear reason. As well as mentioning that it was going in my membership file while telling me that it was not grounds for suspension, but that if I had future rule violations it would be...

I've camped here 3 times, first time ok except that for the price you pay it's a swamp, no cement slabs to park your RV on. Also the office staff is off limits door is locked, when you check in your site/ camp info is in a mailbox outside the office door. The second time I was trying to book there I was having problems with their online reservations so I called the 800 reservation number and was told I wasn't allowed there that my RV is too old. I told her that I had already camped there before just a few weeks prior without a problem. She asked me to email her pics of my RV and she'd get back to me. She called back and said I was fine and she helped me with my reservation which was Friday to Sunday. Once there I decided to stay till Monday and reserved one more night. I get a call from the office telling me that I was only approved for the two nights and I'm not allowed to stay longer. I said I've already stayed here once before and extended my stay without a problem and I sent in pics of my RV and they were approved to stay here, she tells me to hold on and comes back telling me, "oh sorry I had you confused with someone else you're fine to stay". My third time staying there I booked without a problem Friday to Sunday and again extended to Monday. I'm then called again and told that I'm not allowed to extend that I was only approved for the days I had already booked. I then tell her that the weekend prior I was given a hard time about extending one day and then whomever it was in the office that called me said she made a mistake and I was fine. So now why is there a problem with my RV when last week it was fine. She tells me there's something wrong with my RV, I said exactly what is wrong now what's changed since last week?? She tells me that maybe I just need to wash it. Are you kidding me?? Ooohhhh and again I'm parked in a mud hole so bad that when I was trying to park it when I got there that Friday I got stuck and started throwing mud so I gave up and parked it. I was hoping it would dry up while I was there. Well the side of my RV that the power, water & sewer are on it completely under water the whole time. In fact it rained Sunday night so it got worse. There were also exposed & above ground wires perfect for someone to trip on. Ooohhhh Halloween night I get home from the gig I was on the only reason why I stayed there was the easy access to my usually crowded gig. They had karaoke outside and loud enough for the entire campground to hear. I love karaoke, but would of loved having some notice maybe with my check in paperwork that it was happening, what time, where and an invitation. It's not worth staying there for what they charge. The only really friendly & helpful staff there is the maintenance guys Anthony & I think it's Jordan. They helped me get out of the mud pit by getting & putting down limestone for me. This is the only Encore campground I've stayed at and if they are all run this way I don't...

We are full-timers who stayed here for nearly six months of a seven-month reservation. A family emergency necessitated that we move out of the park (and temporarily suspend our full-timing lifestyle) with a month and a few days remaining on our reservation. The ending of our stay left a horrible taste in our mouths, but I'm going to try to be fair with my review.

The good: Our spot was quiet and shaded. Amenities were nice. We loved being able to walk to ALDI for groceries. The overwhelming majority of campers who live or pass through here are great neighbors. I can count on one hand the ones we weren’t crazy about, and even then, the ones we didn’t like weren’t that bad — and thankfully were there for short stays.

The bad: The fire ants are busy outside in the summertime, but you’ll get a prompt response if you mention such concerns to the front office. One treatment took care of the hills around our site.

The ugly: Encore’s cancellation policy is awful. In addition to having to vacate our spot at Winter Garden RV Resort early, the emergency resulted in us having to cancel three other upcoming reservations. We received full refunds of our deposits from all three of the non-Encore parks. All three asked whether there was an issue that caused us to cancel, and when we explained our situation, they wished us well and welcomed us to visit when we are able to travel again. Winter Garden RV Resort, on the other hand, might as well have said, "Don't let the door hit you on the way out." They wouldn’t refund a penny of the $750 deposit paid for the final month of our stay. We were told we could use the deposit toward a future Encore stay within the next year, even though it’s highly unlikely we will be in a position to travel again within that time frame due to the family emergency mentioned earlier. The deposit policy is published on the website, but we were foolish to not have a contingency plan (which I suppose is "don't stay at an Encore park") for a completely unpredictable emergency and to think a corporate park might care. Encore is greedy to take advantage of patrons in situations like ours, even more so when they were able to rebook our spot less than 24 hours after we vacated. When we are able to hit the road again, we will steer clear of...