POOR television reception on the new digital service is driving caravanners crazy, according to travellers and a Queensland caravan park operator.

According to one park in Bundaberg travellers are packing up and leaving after finding they cannot watch their favourite programmes in the riverside city.

"It happens all the time ... after one night of no reception they just go," Finemore Holiday Park manager Ross Harrison complained.

The desperate Mr Harrison has now penned a letter to Senator John Hogg pleading for help, but Communication Minister Stephen Conroy wrote back claiming large trees on the banks of the adjoining Burnett River were to blame.

But caravanners told Caravanning News they often had difficulty getting decent reception in other parts of south-east Queensland.

"The new digital signal is so unreliable that it's sometimes touch and go whether you can settle down to a decent night in front of the tele," grey nomad Bill Knight said.

"One day you'll get a perfect picture, but the next it'll frequently drop out or pixelate. It's so infuriating ... we never had this trouble with the analogue system."

And it was the same story when we spoke to travellers in the Gin Gin rest area, about 50km from Bundaberg.

"Thank goodness for the new VAST satellite service, it's the only way to get reliable digital television," NSW caravanner Brian Gleeson said.

VAST (Viewer Access Satellite Television) is the new government service which provides digital television to travellers, but it comes at a price.

A decoder box and satellite dish with LNB can cost up to $700.

"Our old satellite equipment is now redundant and grey nomads have had to dig deep into their pockets to update their systems," Mr Gleeson said.

"It seems ridiculous that we still have to use the satellite system when we are in the middle of some towns and cities because the digital signal there is so unreliable."

The Federal Government's Digital Switchover Taskforce said it was working to iron out problems with the new service.