The CL Five Van Rule Explained: A Guide for Certificated Location Owners

If you run a Certificated Location, the five van rule is probably the single most important number in your whole business. Get it wrong and you are no longer exempt from full site licensing rules, which is a much bigger problem than one awkward phone call turning away a booking. Yet a surprising number of CL owners, especially newer ones, are fuzzy on exactly what counts, when it applies, and what wiggle room the exemption actually gives them. This guide sets it out plainly, so you can run your site with confidence instead of guessing.

We will cover what the five van rule actually says, what counts as a unit, how the "big meet" exemption works, and the practical habits that keep you on the right side of it without turning every booking into a stressful headcount.

What the five van rule actually says

A Certificated Location, sometimes shortened to CL, is land that a certifying club, usually the Caravan and Motorhome Club, has approved for use as a small campsite without the landowner needing full planning permission or a site licence from the council. That exemption comes from the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960, and it is conditional on the site never having more than five units on it at any one time.

This is not a soft guideline or a rule of thumb. It is the legal boundary between an exempt CL and an unlicensed site operating outside the rules. Five units, full stop, with only one narrow exception for club rallies, which we cover further down.

It is also worth knowing that Certificated Sites, or CS sites, run by the Camping and Caravanning Club, operate under a very similar cap. If you are weighing up which certifying club suits your land, our guide to CL versus CS sites covers the practical differences beyond just the unit limit.

What counts as a unit on your five

This is where owners most often trip up, because "van" is really shorthand for something broader. In practice, a unit is any of the following, and each one takes up a place in your five regardless of size or how long it stays:

• Touring caravans, of any length or age
• Motorhomes and campervans, whether a small panel van conversion or a large coach built model
• Trailer tents, since they are towed units even though they fold down small
• Some certifying bodies also count a tent pitched alongside a caravan as part of the same party's unit, while others treat a family with a caravan and a separate tent for the kids as two units. If you are unsure, check with your certifying club directly rather than assuming

What does not typically count is a car or a tow vehicle parked without an accompanying caravan, or a day visitor's vehicle that is not staying overnight. But the unit itself, the thing people are actually sleeping in, is what matters, not how many vehicles arrived with it.

Because the limit is on units present at any one time, not bookings taken per day, the risk is less about how many reservations you accept and more about what physically turns up and how long it stays. A guest who arrives a day early, or a departure that overruns into the next guest's arrival, can just as easily tip you over five as a genuine double booking.

The big meet exemption

There is one recognised exception to the five unit cap. Certifying clubs allow their CL and CS sites to exceed the normal limit for a small number of organised club rallies, sometimes called "big meets", each year. During an approved meet, a much larger number of units can gather on the land for a short period, provided it is genuinely organised through the club and not simply a busy weekend you decide to overbook.

The exact number of meets you are permitted each year, and how many nights each one can run for, depends on your certifying club and the specific terms of your certificate, so this is not something to estimate from memory. If you want to host a bigger event than your normal five allows, contact your club well in advance, get the exemption confirmed in writing, and keep that confirmation with your other site paperwork. Turning up on the day with more vans than your certificate allows, on the assumption that it counts as a meet, is not worth the risk to your certification.

Why this trips owners up more than they expect

On paper, staying under five feels simple. In practice, a few situations catch owners out again and again:

• Overlapping arrivals and departures. A guest who is slow to leave in the morning while the next guest arrives early can briefly put six units on site, even if only for an hour
• Walk-ins during peak season. A passing motorhome asking if there is space "just for one night" is an easy yes to give without checking your board first, especially with no one else around to double check
• Confusing bookings with units. Five bookings is not the same as five units if any booking includes more than one caravan or motorhome travelling together
• Long stayers who feel like part of the furniture. It is easy to forget that a caravan that has been on site for three weeks still occupies one of your five places, the same as a one night stay

None of these are dramatic failures. They are small, everyday moments where the headcount slips without anyone noticing, right up until an inspection or a complaint brings it to light.

How to keep track without it becoming a chore

The sites that never worry about the five van rule are the ones that treat it as a simple, visible number rather than something to work out from memory each time a booking comes in. A few habits make this automatic:

• Keep a single, always up to date view of exactly which units are on site right now, not just which bookings are in the diary for today
• Block your pitch layout at five, so a sixth booking simply cannot be confirmed against an available pitch by mistake
• Build in a buffer between a late departure and an early arrival on the same pitch, rather than scheduling them back to back
• Note walk-in enquiries against your live occupancy before saying yes, not after the van is already parked up
• Keep any meet exemption confirmation from your certifying club filed alongside your CL certificate, ready to show if ever asked

If you are still running your CL from a notebook or a whiteboard by the back door, this is exactly the sort of thing that quietly goes wrong during a busy bank holiday. Software built around real campsite bookings and pitch management shows you occupancy at a glance, so you always know how many of your five places are filled before you say yes to one more.

What happens if you breach it

Consistently exceeding five units, whether through poor tracking or deliberate overbooking, puts your exemption at risk. Your certifying club can withdraw a CL's certification, and without it your land reverts to needing full planning permission and a site licence to operate as a campsite at all, which is a far bigger and slower process to sort out than turning away one extra van. A single accidental overlap of an hour is unlikely to end your certificate, but a pattern of it, especially if reported by a neighbour or spotted at inspection, is a real risk worth taking seriously.

The key takeaway

The five van rule is not red tape for its own sake. It is the specific condition that lets a small field become a legal campsite without the cost and delay of full planning permission, and it is worth protecting. Know exactly what counts as a unit, understand that meet exemptions need genuine club approval rather than guesswork, and build simple habits around tracking who is actually on site right now rather than just who is booked in. Do that and the five van rule stops being a source of anxiety and just becomes part of how you run a well organised little site.

If you would like a clear, always accurate view of exactly how many pitches are occupied on your CL, right down to today's arrivals and departures, try CampSuite free today. It is free for CL and CS sites, takes about 15 minutes to set up, and no card is required to get started.