MiurasFan
Blackballed
Nothing I disagree with in the above! HandicapMaster works fine if that's all that's required - it seems the sort of minimalist or 'backyard' application that 1 guy wrote for his society in the early PC days to learn how to develop PC applications, as opposed to creating a business. That's how much of the 'new technology', that the PCs allowed, happened. Some, Microsoft being an obvious example. It could also have been the result of converting an equivalent app originally developed by a guy using his employer's, or university's mainframe (even out of necessity), as they have been the source of quite an amount of software - and standards - too. Club Systems, and BRS, took the 'create a business' route.IG is not exactly new....its been around for at least 13 years and was one of the options my club looked at when we had to change ISV back in 2010...in fact...as handicap secretary at the time, it was my preferred option, but the costs put it well beyond the reach of the Competitions Committees finances and would have required financing by the club owner...who wasn't willing to stump up the cash.
Truth be told, IG would have been far more product than we really needed but I saw the value in having a complete solution that encompassed the club website, tee booking, remote competition admin by the committee along with other features that were pushed at the time. but others within the club were less convinced and less keen to adopt a wholesale change to how we did things. I think we were quoted a four figure sum for initial design and set-up, and then a smaller four figure sum for ongoing support, hosting etc.
Club Systems 2000 (the father of Club V1) would have seen us spend maybe £300-450 a year (and our old ISV was really pushing us towards Club Systems...i think they'd fashioned some sort of deal that got us a discount) but had such a shocking reputation for reliability, accuracy, results uploading to HDID that there was no way we were ever going to entertain it.
In the end we went for HandicapMaster which cost us around £150 a year....a really simple Handicapping and Competition Management System which offered none of the functionality around tee booking, bar management, shop management etc that either Club Systems or IG did. To be fair...it has suited us perfectly for the last 13 years.
Your experience with Club systems and HDID pretty much matches mine, especially as the club had no internet at the time! FWIW, it wasn't all that bad. But it did need some knowledge of PCs and IT, which was rare in those days, and a sizeable amount of (at least my) time!
But, apart from providing an opportunity to reminisce, it doesn't answer to OP's question of whether Club V1 or BRS is better! Basically, that can only be answered by the club, using their specific criteria! Things such as how integrated the system is - and how much of that is wanted - can only be answered by the club If doing a proper job, they'd survey other clubs to get their opinion and or experience. The one essential is to have a reliable, user-friendly, front-end! There's nothing more frustrating than standing waiting or trying to get the system to co-operate, when all that's wanted is to get the golfer onto the course, the result posted or the order supplied!
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