How to Improve Sunbed Availability Without Paid Reservations or Conflict

The short answer

Improving sunbed availability without paid reservations or conflict starts with a diagnosis: is the shortage physical (too few loungers for the crowd) or behavioral (guests claim seats that stay empty for hours)? Research shows written bans alone rarely work. A clearly announced use-it-or-lose-it window, honest staff rounds, a safe place to hold removed belongings, and measured occupancy usually outperform fines, apps, and assigned beds at protecting guest satisfaction.

Key takeaways

Papathanassis and Boecker's 'Sunbed Wars' study finds towel-based reserving 'frequently results in frustration, verbal conflicts and even physical violence,' and that purely regulatory hotel fixes are often ignored.
Game theorist Philipp Weinschenk frames the problem as a coordination game: guests copy each other, so early-morning reserving becomes a self-reinforcing 'inefficient equilibrium' even when enough loungers exist.
Diagnose before you act: at ratios around one lounger per three guests, peak-hour scarcity may be a genuine capacity limit, not a service failure a policy can fix.
A fair use-it-or-lose-it window (30–45 minutes) with a designated place to hold removed belongings is the most widely adopted no-cost lever, used by resorts such as Anantara in Phuket.
Assigned loungers at check-in remove the incentive for the 'dawn dash' at capacity-constrained sites, but at the cost of flexibility and more front-line effort.
Because a large majority of guests dislike towel 'reservation,' a well-communicated fair rule protects the majority rather than punishing them.
Russian operators typically pair staff rounds and announcements with realistic capacity ratios; court compensation there tends to be small and case law inconsistent, so prevention beats litigation.

Why written bans fail on their own

The classic research by tourism scholars Papathanassis and Boecker ('Sunbed Wars: A Holiday Nuisance and Its Impact on Holiday Satisfaction', 2019) treats pre-dawn towel 'reservations' as a form of guest misconduct. Early in the morning, tourists stake out the most favorable spots with towels for the whole day, which the authors note 'frequently results in frustration, verbal conflicts and even physical violence' against holidaymakers who were not proactive enough. Their key finding for operators is blunt: hotel attempts to regulate sunbed allocation 'are often ignored,' and fixes that are purely regulatory or systemic frequently fail to deliver expected results.

Game theory explains the failure. German researcher Philipp Weinschenk describes the pool deck as a 'co-ordination game of multiple equilibria.' New guests quickly adapt to what others are doing: if the norm is getting up at dawn, everyone feels forced to join in, because the cost of not reserving is losing a seat. The result is what he calls an inefficient equilibrium — an artificial scarcity much like panic stockpiling, where there is enough for everyone until hoarding begins.

The practical consequence is that a rule is only half the solution. The other half is reshaping guests' collective expectations and making compliance visible and consistent. Without that, even the most sensible ban stays on paper and quietly erodes trust in the whole pool experience.

Bans remove the symptom but not the incentive to be first.
People mirror their neighbors, so manage the visible example, not just the wording.
Unenforced rules quickly convince guests that the hotel does not mean what it says.

Diagnose first: capacity limit or behavior?

Before choosing any measure, answer whether you have an objective capacity deficit or a fairness deficit. Many operators size their deck at roughly one lounger per three guests on the assumption that not everyone is at the water at the same time. At that ratio, peak demand can genuinely exceed supply for a stretch of the day, and no policy will change that.

So an experiment should start with a week of measurement. Record how many guests are actually at the pool and beach in the peak hour, how many loungers are occupied by people versus merely 'claimed' by towels, and whether the same seats sit empty with belongings for long stretches. If dozens of seats are held but unused, you have a behavioral problem. If more people than seats arrive in the peak window, you have a capacity problem that needs more loungers, zoning, or realistic expectations — not another ban.

Sector guidance is consistent on the radical fix for physical scarcity: provide at least as many loungers as rooms and ideally as many as guests. The discipline of measuring first prevents you from spending energy on enforcement when the real constraint is infrastructure.

Peak concurrent use of the deck against the number of loungers.
Share of seats held by belongings alone for longer than your chosen window.
Complaint themes: 'no free seats' versus 'seats sit empty since morning'.
Lounger-to-room and lounger-to-guest ratios in high season.

Levers that need no paid bookings

Paid reservation is not the only tool, and often not the best. Three families of free measures work in practice: a use-it-or-lose-it time window, lounger allocation for the stay, and social norms backed by real, visible enforcement.

The time window is the most widely adopted lever. As Kommersant describes, the Anantara property in Phuket posts a multilingual notice, including Russian: a lounger cannot be claimed with belongings, and if no one has appeared on it within 30 minutes while only towels or bags lie there, staff may move the items to the pool area for later collection. Many Russian hotels use the same pattern — periodic staff rounds that clear towels from unoccupied loungers.

Allocation goes a step further: where the deck is tight and tension high, some Cyprus and Spanish resorts assign each guest a lounger at check-in for the whole stay, which eliminates the dawn rush entirely. Finally, etiquette work — notices, personal conversations, announcements at breakfast — sets the norm, but only works when paired with actual, consistent monitoring.

Time window: clear belongings after 30–45 minutes without a person present.
Allocation at check-in for families and guests with limited mobility.
Announcements and personal contact as the soft step before escalation.
Positioning 'no paid reservations' as a fairness promise in marketing.

Designing a fair use-it-or-lose-it policy

If you choose the time window, write it so it is clear, measurable, and applied identically to everyone. Pick the window: 30 minutes, as at Anantara, is a familiar benchmark; some sites use 45–60 minutes to give guests more breathing room. Announce the rule at check-in, in the guest folder, and on a sign at the deck in the main guest languages, so nobody can claim ignorance.

Create a safe holding point. When staff clear a seat, the belongings go to a designated spot by the pool or front desk where owners can collect them without drama. That removes the fear that 'my things disappeared' and makes the action safe for both sides. For the rule to feel fair, clearing must be systematic and predictable — for example, a round every 30 minutes — rather than dependent on one employee's mood.

Anticipate legitimate absences. A guest who steps away for lunch or a spa visit is not hoarding. Agree in advance how such breaks are flagged — for instance, the guest tells staff and the clock pauses. Otherwise a fair rule turns into a new source of conflict with the very people it was meant to protect.

Publish the window and clearing procedure in guests' main languages.
Designate a holding point and the staff accountable for rounds.
Define how lunch and spa absences are handled before disputes arise.
Apply the rule consistently across all guest segments.

Run it as an experiment and measure

Rather than announcing 'we are introducing a ban,' reframe the work as an experiment: measure a two-week baseline, introduce the measure, then compare the same indicators. This gives you data instead of opinions and lets you tell guests and owners honestly what worked.

Key metrics include the share of free loungers in the peak hour, the average time guests wait for a seat, the number of complaints and conflicts, and the share of seats held by belongings beyond your window. Track staff execution separately: a policy nobody enforces is dead on arrival, and infrequent rounds will show up immediately in the data.

After the test, compare results against the original diagnosis. If free seats in peak hours rose and complaints fell, scale the practice. If scarcity persists, your constraint was capacity all along, and the next step is a decision about more loungers or zoning — not stricter rules.

One week of baseline measurement before any change.
Before/after comparison of free seats and complaints in the peak window.
Audit of whether staff actually complete their clearing rounds.
A data-driven decision to scale, adjust the window, or add capacity.

Communication, de-escalation, and limits

Your most valuable resource is the perception of fairness. Surveys cited in the press suggest around 60% of guests rank towel 'reservation' among the most annoying tourist habits. In practice, that means the majority of guests are on your side — you only need to show that the rule protects them rather than the administration.

When a conflict arises, move the conversation from the person to the rule: 'the seat is released when no one is there for more than 30 minutes, and your things are safe at the front desk.' A polite but uniform staff position matters more than fines. Russian experience suggests disputes usually flare not over scarcity itself but over perceived inconsistency and unfairness in how the rules are applied.

Be honest about limits. An experiment cannot repeal physics: narrow beaches and small pool decks are simply not sized for every guest at once. And no policy replaces enough loungers when the constraint is capacity. State clearly the boundary where a management fix ends and a capital decision begins.

Frame the rule as protection for the majority of guests.
Keep staff responses consistent — person aside, rule in the center.
Name the limit: if capacity is the issue, bans will not solve it.
Collect feedback and tune the window using real season data.

Put it into practice

A 4-week 'open lounger' experiment: action plan and metrics

Use this plan to test in one season whether you can raise sunbed availability without paid reservations or conflict, using only staff, a clear rule, and honest measurement. Adjust the windows to your site.

Week 1: record peak-hour occupancy, the share of seats held only by belongings, and complaint themes as your baseline.
Identify the true constraint: behavior (empty seats with belongings) or capacity (more people than seats at peak).
Write a clear use-it-or-lose-it policy with a 30–45 minute window and a designated holding point for cleared belongings.
Translate the rule into the main guest languages and post it at check-in, in the guest folder, and by the pool.
Assign staff owners for rounds every 30 minutes and train a single, consistent explanation phrase.
Define the procedure for legitimate breaks (lunch, spa) so guests who inform staff are not penalized.
Keep a daily log: seats freed, belongings returned without complaint, and incidents handled calmly.
After two intervention weeks, compare results with the baseline and decide whether to scale, adjust the window, or add capacity.

Questions people ask

What use-it-or-lose-it window should I choose, 30 or 45 minutes?

Thirty minutes is the most common benchmark, used by resorts such as Anantara in Phuket: if no one has appeared on a lounger for 30 minutes and only towels or bags remain, staff move the items to a holding point. A 45–60 minute window is more relaxed for guests but frees seats more slowly. Pick 30 minutes when availability complaints are high, and 45–60 when tension is mild and your priority is building trust. Announce the window in advance and apply it uniformly.

How do I tell apart genuine lounger shortage from 'sunbed wars'?

Run a week of peak-hour measurements: count how many people are actually at the water and how many seats are held only by towels and bags. If a large share of seats sits empty with belongings past your window, the problem is behavioral and a use-it-or-lose-it rule is the right fix. If more people than seats physically arrive at peak — for example at a one-lounger-per-three-guests ratio — the constraint is capacity, and you need more loungers, zoning, or realistic expectations rather than stricter rules.

What should I do when a guest is upset that their belongings were removed from a lounger?

Stay on the rule, not the person: explain that the seat is released after the announced absence period and that the belongings are safe in a designated holding area (by the pool or at the front desk). A polite but consistent staff line matters more than fines. If the guest flagged a break for lunch or the spa beforehand, their seat should not be touched. Because most guests dislike towel 'reservation,' the rule is genuinely protecting the majority's interest.

Is paid sunbed reservation necessary to fix availability?

Not necessarily. First test the free levers: a published 30–45 minute use-it-or-lose-it window, lounger allocation at check-in, and honest staff rounds. Paid reservation improves availability but creates perceived inequality and can clash with an all-inclusive brand promise. Consider it only where genuine capacity limits cannot be solved otherwise, and only after an experiment shows that the free tools did not deliver the needed result.

Why is assigning loungers at check-in sometimes better than a general rule?

Allocation removes the root cause of the dawn rush: a guest does not need to wake up early to claim a spot because their lounger is reserved for the whole stay. It works especially well at capacity-constrained resorts and for segments like families or guests with limited mobility. The trade-offs are less flexibility (the guest is tied to one seat) and more front-line work at check-in. If conflict is moderate, a well-communicated general window is often sufficient and simpler to run.

Sources and further reading

Sources were checked when this page was generated. Confirm changing dates, rules and prices with the original publisher.