Good News From Yacht Haven MD.

[hlb]

I have today spoken to Mr Dylan Kalis of Yacht Haven. A very resonable man. Problem all sorted.

No one can force me to come here-----------
----- I'm a Volunteer!!!

Haydn

 

[ccscott49]

Wonderful news! Now we can keep you in Plymouth!!!!!

 

[Col]

So what's he done then H ?

 

[tcm]

Re: h duffed up by MD

I think that praps the MD has explained

1 He is 6'6" and ex-boxer
2 He also has his boat
3 There's a waiting list of six years

 

[ccscott49]

Re: h duffed up by MD

Yeh! but does he know about SWMBO (Tuts), If Haydn lets her lose, whirling dervish doesn't come into it!

 

[Trevethan]

From MBY last year. Nice work if you can get it

When UK marinas get this full, the boat industry braces itself for the inevitable price hikes as marina operators, like city traders, take their profits and seek a return on their investments.

Rumours abound as to MDL's plans, but they're playing it cool - or not returning my calls, at any rate. Given MDL's record, these rumours have a certain apocalyptic quality, but if they have learned one thing since the late 1980s it is the importance of public relations. Connoisseurs await a formal announcement of MDL's new berthing rates with bated breath.
Yacht Havens Group (YHG) like to present themselves as minnows in a market whose rates are set by their voracious competitor, but their new idea for Lymington Yacht Haven will elicit a low whistle of admiration from MDL: a '300 non-refundable deposit to remain on the waiting list.

At 1,083 names this was admittedly getting out of hand. Now, if your name comes to the top and you take up a berth, you get the deposit back, plus interest, against your first year's fees. But if you get a berth elsewhere, get posted overseas, change your mind, sell the boat, die, or have any other valid reason for wanting to remove your name from the list, you don't.
Given the sheer front of this proposition, readers who have written in show admirable restraint. "I fail to understand why a non-refundable deposit is required, since a fully refundable renewal deposit would do just as well," says one. Quite. Peter Waring, the RYA's marinas specialist, is equally at a loss.

YHG present the scheme as a "drastic" but fair method of reducing their waiting list.
And anyway, "people who can afford to berth in Lymington can probably manage '300", as a director of the company put it to me. No doubt they can, but that's hardly the point. When I spoke to YHG in mid-August they'd had 150 cheques, with two weeks to run until the deadline: rather less than the 50% take-up they were predicting in mid-July, but still '45,000: not a bad return on 1,083 photocopied letters. YHG insist that all this money will, of course, be given back when boats move off the waiting list and into
the marina. But not immediately. And not all at once. Meanwhile, it's a substantial amount to have sloshing about in the accounts: enough to buy some public relations advice, perhaps?

 

[Trevethan]

But what did they do for you?

 

[ToMo]

O-Oh!....when Haydn goes all coy, he's either drinking a beer and doesn't want to spill it or something is being cooked up - and I don't mean in the food sense!....watch this space!!!
TôMö

 

[jfm]

Re: From MBY last year. Nice work if you can get it

Agree all that Trevethan, but that's capitalism and it's the same thing that allows us to have boats. I cannot promise that if I owned a very popular marina I wouldn't do the same - can you? Thing is, you can get straight into Berthon if you make the right noises, and it's much nicer (imho) because so much nearer to town and the Kings Head. So I can't understand why if someone is prepared to pay to be on a waitlist (which means they seriously do want a berth) they do not move 1/4 mile along the road??

 

[claymore]

Did the lovely Bobby get the bullet then?

Sans Signature

 

[longjohnsilver]

Imposter!

Can't have been Haydn posting this, far too short and all spellings ok, suspect it's the marina manager impersonating H.

 

[ToMo]

Re: Imposter!

Tuts might have taken pity on him...suspect he goes all of a tremble when he's excited, bit like you really in it? <G>
TôMö

 

[longjohnsilver]

In what, exactly? NM

.

 

[hlb]

Lets just say. We had a grown up. Bloke to bloke conversation and although at times a bit heated. We came to an agreament. Now shut up.

No one can force me to come here-----------
----- I'm a Volunteer!!!

Haydn

 

[Guest]

Re: From MBY last year. Nice work if you can get it

...and I should point out that we (MDL) did away with deposits altogether this year!
I don't expect a round of applause but as least we did listen and act accordingly.

 

[tcm]

Re: slight clapping from the back (nm)

.

 

[ccscott49]

Oh! Big mates are we now, how the worm has turned eh! He'll be running off with the nmanager(ess) next, telling everybody what wonderful people they are! Well done Haydn, a result!

 

[oldgit]

Just a quite comment that had you taken the advice of the"sue em" brigade the only happy people would be the lawyers who will now have to look elsewhere for the kids skool fees HP on the porche and the payments for the cottage in tuscony......

Hard work never did anyone any good.You die from it.