John and Casey reported, “KOA charged us $50 to empty our tanks yesterday. Is that the going rate now?”
“Hold on,” Cliff interrupted. “You mean all you did was dump your holding tanks? $50 is outrageous!”
In agreement about dump station fees
Almost everyone around the campfire agreed that KOA’s fee was far too expensive. Newbies Jeff and Marla wondered, “Why not just empty tanks at the campground where you spend the night?” Cliff explained that often small-town parks, for example, may not offer sewer hookups or a dump station.
A campground’s cost
My husband and I have emptied our tanks at our local KOA campground a few times. It’s only a couple of miles from our house, and the management is always happy to help us out. I talked to Jenny, who works at our local KOA, and asked why any campground might charge such an exorbitant rate—as high as $50! Here’s what she had to say.
“In times past, we never charged anyone to empty their RV tanks at our camp dump station. We figured that our goodwill effort more than paid for the amount of water used by the RVer. Now things are much different. Or maybe I should say that some RVers are different. You wouldn’t believe the problems some irresponsible RVers have caused when emptying their tanks. We’ve had folks drive away, leaving the water spigot on and big puddles forming. Our sewer caps have been broken and taken. Worst of all, we’ve had to clean up some really awful messes, and so now we charge everyone a fee.”
More reasons
Another reason for assigning dump station fees is due to an increase in environmental regulations. Compliance with these regulations often means costly upgrades to a campground’s sewer system. Dumping fees help to offset these improvements.
In addition, RV parks are under extreme pressure to offer more and more amenities to campers. These amenities (e.g., bounce pad, climbing wall, programs, and activities) are costly to put in place and maintain. Dumping fees, along with other charges, help pay for these amenities.
How about you?
Have you ever paid to use a campground’s dump station? What did the campground charge you for this service? Please leave a comment with your answers below. Thank you!
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I have paid to use a dump station a couple times. Once I was moochdocking at a relative’s house and used an RV & marine storage lot’s dump station – $25. The other was using the dump station just outside a small town’s campground – $5 requested on the honor system.
We’ve used dump stations at commercial camping ‘resorts’, state campgrounds, Pilot and Love fuel depots, and even Camping World. Some charged a fee… most did not. The key to success in terms of dumping is planning, and the key to planning is knowledge. Know what you will need and when you will need it. Plan accordingly. If you don’t want to pay, plan your trips to avoid fee-based dumping. We all have choices. Or, you can simply continue to accept life as it comes and then whine about how unfair it is. If you want to control results start by controlling your own actions.
Over 20+ years of RVing we have paid for sanitary dumping from time to time. I do not remember ever paying more than $10. Near our former home there is a town sewage treatment plant that asks for a donation to the volunteer ambulance service. KOA has always be a go to and seldom have paid more than $10 (actually never, I just drive on). One KOA had a $20 charge for paying campers!!! I “assumed” the sign was wrong and just dumped on the way out and kept going
I’ve only paid a few times and it was $10. Well worth it when there’s no other choice, and in fact the dumps were planned in advance, didn’t want to get caught with my pants down so to speak!!! Also where we store our RV there’s a dump station and we have a sewer access with standard flush screw cover in our driveway 3′ from street which I consider the best luxury having my own private clean dump!!!
Since we have a septic system at our sticks and bricks, if I can’t or don’t dump on the road I do it once I arrive at home. I installed a dump port in the systems that makes it easy to do. Everything is there to do it right! Unless forced to, I would not pay to dump on the road.
In Washington some rest stops have dump stations. No charge last time I was at one.
We have paid to dump our tanks twice. The first was on our way home from our first trip in our first RV. It was the second time that I ever dumped the tanks. We paid $10 and it was October 2016. The second time we were limping our RV home with a DEF problem. We paid $25 to dump and add fresh water. As an aside. Some campgrounds are on septic systems and refuse to allow dumping by anyone not staying at their campground. We have encountered this. I could also see this as a situation where a very high fee is charged, depending on the expected charge to pump out the septic tank.