Peter Shokeir | [email protected]
Parks Canada has been working to address the high volume of users attempting to book a campsite online.
Opening April 1 for the 2021 visitor season, the campground reservation service has been heavily utilized as the COVID-19 pandemic limits other travel options and many Canadians choose to spend their recreational and vacation time at national parks.
In anticipation of higher volumes, Parks Canada had adjusted the service prior to April 1 to improve client service, such as adding a virtual waiting room to help manage the volume of transactions and maintain higher processing speeds.
As of last week, over 129,000 reservations have been completed since the service opened.
However, Parks Canada apologized in a statement for the slow service and technical difficulties experienced by users on April 16 due to high traffic and reservation volumes.
Technical adjustments were made throughout the day, which ended with over 13,000 reservations being completed.
Parks Canada now says the reservation service is functioning effectively, while processing speeds and wait times from April 17-20 have been within normal ranges for the volume of clients.
Visitors are encouraged to be flexible in their selection of dates and destinations while checking the Parks Canada website for up-to-date information.
