CROYWALL CLIMBING CENTRE

Hi Climbers!

We are incredibly excited to be reopening on the 25th July. We want to give you the confidence to return to climbing when you are ready by providing a covid secure climbing experience. This newsletter goes into in depth detail on this with the aim of covering all your questions and concerns. If you would like clarification on any points do get in touch by emailing membership@vauxwall.co.uk. Our booking system will go live on 20th July, details of this are included below. Thanks for reading and we look forward to welcoming you back.

Summary

• All our 5 centres (VauxWest, VauxEast, HarroWall, CroyWall & RavensWall will open on Saturday 25th July at their normal opening times
• CanaryWall will open start of August (keep an eye out for more information on our 6th Climbing Centre soon)
• New booking system in place at VauxWest, VauxEast and RavensWall. Pre book to confirm space. This will go live on each independent website on Monday 20th July by 5pm
• No booking required at HarroWall or CroyWall to go climbing
• ALL Climbers MUST check in and check out to assist with any PHE Track & Trace efforts.
• No instruction at any of our centres to begin with. We are hoping for an early August return for sessions
• New Covid Secure procedures in place to minimise risk to you (our customers) & our staff

WHAT HAVE WE DONE DURING LOCKDOWN?

• We maintained all 68 LCC staff and topped up furlough to 100% pay for March, April & May. – a huge thank you to those who continued billing with us and/or made donations of days and credit to help us continue to pay staff top ups to the furlough scheme
• In June we asked the team to take a 10% pay cut only if they were able, in addition to sacrificing some annual leave. In July we matched the 90% pay.
• We stayed in close contact with our members so they understood what was happening with their memberships
• We have carefully reduced all other costs working with our landlords, partner companies, contractors and suppliers to support each other through these tumultuous. Thank you all for your support.
• We continued with the Holds and Volumes orders placed in February staying optimistic and to support the companies who craft and supply our toys. This includes some fresh holds for all sites.
• CanaryWall full set
  • VauxWall West – holds and volumes purchased for the extension
  • VauxWall East – a top up sets to add fresh shapes
  • CroyWall – fresh black holds to mix up the circuit style
  • RavensWall – anew yellow set to become an ‘off piste’ circuit and new Kids circuit
  • HarroWall – a top of colours to add fresh shapes
  • All sites – We are adding an additional circuit ‘V8+’ will be set soon.
• We offered to pay freelance routes setters in full for cancelled work within March, April and May.
• We worked actively with the Association of British Climbing Wall and UK Active to develop Covid Secure reopening plans for climbing centres.
• We continued with the CanaryWall project & renovated the Cave Arch at VauxWall West and completed a plethora of maintenance tasks at all sites.

WHAT ARE WE DOING IN THE RUN UP TO OPENING?

• We are preparing our centres and team to operate in a Covid Secure method
• We are completing some route setting at all sites
• We are supporting our team in their return to work
• We have completed a Covid Risk Assessment and Updated Standard Operating Procedures and have presented this to the entire staff for a consultation period
• We are staying in close contact with all our members
• We are putting the finishing touches to our booking system that will be used at VauxWest, VauxEast & RavensWall
• We have decided not to offer instructed sessions until the earliest 3rd August, when we bring these in they will operate in a limited Covid secure style prioritising those that need their session rebooking from the closed period.

THE BOOKING SYSTEM & HOW CAPACITIES WILL BE AFFECTED:

One of the main methods of being a Covid Secure Indoor Gym is reducing capacity to ensure social distancing is possible. The government have mandated allowing 9m2 of customer accessible floor space per person to ensure social distancing is possible. What his means for LCC London Centres:

CENTRES WITH BOOKING

We will have booking for all opening times at VauxWall East, West and RavensWall for a trial period of 25th July – 2nd August. CanaryWall is drafted to open 1st August and we will make booking for here live when this is confirmed.

At centres with booking we highly recommend you book in advance, if you walk in and a slot is available we will book you into it. You will be able to see the live capacity of the centre via a widget on our website so this could help inform your decision. We STRONGLY advise that you book a slot before you turn up as we do envisage those centres with booking systems to be full at peak times.

PRICING

For the most part our booked independent climbing sessions will match our pre-lockdown pricing.

A £1 booking fee will be applied to each ‘Member/Punch card holder’ booked session, this fee is there to ensure an incentive to use your booked sessions. To smooth this extra cost for our members and punch card holders we are allowing one free hot drink per person at any time during their visit.

If you ‘walk-in’ rather than ‘pre-book’ and there is an available slot you will not be charged the £1 fee. We can’t risk lots of slots being booked then having lots of ‘no shows’, hence the fee. If you ‘walk-in’ we encourage you to stick to the usual one free hot drink for members before 10am only.

An optional perk for our valued LCC recurring members only : you can opt to have your £1 fee’s tallied up and added as credit to your account on a monthly basis – this will automatically off set your future dues. – Please email membership@vauxwall.co.uk to specifically request this option. You will still get the hot drink at anytime perk because we love you.