Handicap manipulation - how to address

[nickjdavis]

So nothing that isn't done now, only it relied on the memory & intuition of the committee?

I think we are getting away from the crux of the discussion. I've never said that the committee did anything different back then, to what they might do today.

All I have said is that the MyEG App allows for a significantly higher volume of scores to be submitted than the old supplementary score system did under UHS, and that such scores will hit, and affect, a players handicap record, before anyone on the committee ever sees such scores. What committees did or didnt do previously, or the efficacy of what they did, is irrelevant. The simple fact is that the higher volume of scores makes it harder for a committee to spot potential manipulation.

As such, with the collusion of a marker, or even with no marker at all, it is fair to say that the my EG app makes it easier for those who are inclined to do so, to submit dodgy scores to their record, that will affect their handicap.

Other than that, folks can happily pidgeon hole me as a WHS supporter....but I'm not so blind that I don't recognize that there are issues that could be improved upon.

 

[nickjdavis]

True. But I was in the centre of UHS management.

Are you my wife catfishing me? Having to have the last word?

 

[rulefan]

We did use a PSI for comp entry scores

And even then those scores needed checking before they went to Congo did they not

They did not.

But why would your club not use PSI for Supplementary Scores. CONGU did not require further checking of any scores by anyone. Unless your committee didn't trust your members. Which I'm sure was not the case.

 

[D-S]

I don't think apps were around at the time. But UHS never came up as a problem at committee meetings or elsewhere.

Not from Apps but did you have many instances of Supplementary Score cards getting rejected due to for example format issues. (Submissions from matchplay, betterball and team events), non preregistration, attester not present or using Supplementary Scores being suspected handicap manipulation?

 

[rulefan]

Not from Apps but did you have many instances of Supplementary Score cards getting rejected due to for example format issues. (Submissions from matchplay, betterball and team events), non preregistration, attester not present or using Supplementary Scores being suspected handicap manipulation?

Not that I remember but if there were not many they would have been resolved by EG staff. Only if there had been a large number would it have been raised.

 

[D-S]

Not that I remember but if there were not many they would have been resolved by EG staff. Only if there had been a large number would it have been raised.

So it appears, unless your experience is abnormal, that Supplementary Scores were not a source of handicap manipulation or entry of unacceptable scores onto the system.
I have experience of abuse (attempted entry of unacceptable scores) on a very regular basis and some manipulation of handicaps that has been thwarted and no doubt there has been abuse and manipulation that also has not been spotted or caught, so have many other committees who I have dealt with.
Good committees are correcting, educating and sanctioning people who are breaking the system rules either ignorantly or deliberately. Bad committees are not.
The conclusion is that the push for more GP scores and easing their entry has therefore enabled more abuse/manipulation than pre WHS.
The encouragement and ease of entry of GP scores is a good thing and necessary for the system to work correctly however this comes at a price.

 

[wjemather]

It could also be argued that the increase in scores provides more evidence and makes detecting manipulation much easier; and that manipulation largely went unnoticed before WHS, a time when 18⋅NRs were an acceptable score but provided no evidence of ability (and some players would routinely NR and gain a +0.1 if unable to win a comp despite being within buffer).

 

[doublebogey7]

So when someone entered a supplementary card before WHS no one checked it ?

How did it get onto the HC record

I was for a short time tesponsible for inputting supplimentary scores at my club. The only check we performed was to ensure the member had registered their intent in the log book. Even that was a little pointless given there was no way to check when the log had been completed. I'm not sure what other checks you feel could have been done.

 

[Dunesman]

Good committees are correcting, educating and sanctioning people who are breaking the system rules either ignorantly or deliberately. Bad committees are not.

In a self regulated system run by amateurs, a system that relies on having good committees rather than bad ones, is not as good as a system that is more vulnerable the effects of bad or ineffectual committees.
Part of the defence of WHS would appear to be that it is fine, if committees do what they should be doing. Which does not deal with the reality than many committees are not doing what WHS would like them to. Saying that is the committees problem is too simplistic. It is the system that is at fault if committees are not actual working to the needs of the system.

 

[D-S]

I was for a short time tesponsible for inputting supplimentary scores at my club. The only check we performed was to ensure the member had registered their intent in the log book. Even that was a little pointless given there was no way to check when the log had been completed. I'm not sure what other checks you feel could have been done.

Did you believe or suspect any of the members were using them for handicap manipulation? Did you think that they all came from acceptable formats and that the markers were actually present?

 

[Dunesman]

My golf was never governed by UHS, nor did I play under that system, so I have no information to answer that question. My play has been based on the USGA system. The point is that cheaters will cheat any system, and the people administering that system are responsible for outing the cheats - that is what administrators do.

Then maybe it becomes clearer why you are missing the various points that have been made here on how in several very significant aspects, especially in the context of UK golf, UHS was superior to WHS. Without offence, could I suggest that you are not really armed to defend or advocate for WHS as being equal or an improvement on UHS ? (and apologies again if I am mixing up some points made that might have been by rulefan and not yourself). Even not having been familiar with UHS gives you an interesting outsider view - from the discussion would you see that at least on some fronts, there were merits to UHS in which WHS has been retrograde ?

 

[rulefan]

Then maybe it becomes clearer why you are missing the various points that have been made here on how in several very significant aspects, especially in the context of UK golf, UHS was superior to WHS. Without offence, could I suggest that you are not really armed to defend or advocate for WHS as being equal or an improvement on UHS ? (and apologies again if I am mixing up some points made that might have been by rulefan and not yourself). Even not having been familiar with UHS gives you an interesting outsider view - from the discussion would you see that at least on some fronts, there were merits to UHS in which WHS has been retrograde ?

I am not familiar with the apps that have been added to the front end of the WHS system. As I have indicated with my questions about just what they do, to specifically allow cheaters to do what is causing all the fuss. My impression was that originally there were a lot of 'holes' which may or may not have been fixed. I don't use an app so can't say.

But I can understand that the volume of GPs as opposed to SSs could be overwhelming h'cap committees, that were/are not well manned and/or not well organised or even incompetent.

However, I still feel that in general WHS has the edge over UHS; in particular, 8/20 and Slope.
And poor apps have a lot to answer for..

 

[D-S]

I am not familiar with the apps that have been added to the front end of the WHS system. As I have indicated with my questions about just what they do, to specifically allow cheaters to do what is causing all the fuss. My impression was that originally there were a lot of 'holes' which may or may not have been fixed. I don't use an app so can't say.

But I can understand that the volume of GPs as opposed to SSs could be overwhelming h'cap committees, that were/are not well manned and/or not well organised or even incompetent.

However, I still feel that in general WHS has the edge over UHS; in particular, 8/20 and Slope.
And poor apps have a lot to answer for..

Couldn’t agree more.

 

[Steve Wilkes]

Clicking a button to "authorise" scores for upload didn't require any "checking".

What! , didn't the checker ask how you played each shot, what club you used and how many putts you had on each hole, tut tut tut

 

[AussieKB]

Like a politician, you avoid the question. The percentages have nothing to do with the handicapping system. They apply only to a particular competition and are for the sole purpose of determining winners. They have no effect on the scores put in for handicap index recalculation whether the competition is in Scotland or Australia

Do let me know if you don’t understand. I’m sure I could help you further.

United States
Course Handicap = Handicap Index® x (Slope Rating™ / 113) + (Course Rating™ – par)
that's 100%

Australia


England 95%

New Zealand
100% previously 96%

Not going to look up other Countries and don't even look at 4 ball calculation......

In other words the 'SYSTEM' is not the 'SAME'

But you look at it differently then me......so keep saying 95 96 100 equals the 'SAME'

 

[rulie]

Then maybe it becomes clearer why you are missing the various points that have been made here on how in several very significant aspects, especially in the context of UK golf, UHS was superior to WHS. Without offence, could I suggest that you are not really armed to defend or advocate for WHS as being equal or an improvement on UHS ? (and apologies again if I am mixing up some points made that might have been by rulefan and not yourself). Even not having been familiar with UHS gives you an interesting outsider view - from the discussion would you see that at least on some fronts, there were merits to UHS in which WHS has been retrograde ?

I only said that my golf was played under a system based on the USGA system, not that I was unfamiliar with the UHS. Actually, I was close friends with a couple of the R&A people who were working on the concept of WHS several years ago - talked a lot with them about "attesting", as that was one of the stumbling blocks early on. Our computerized version actually had a spot where, when entering a score, we could provide the name of a person we played with (it was optional to do so).
And I know (knew) enough about the UHS to form opinions on it. Things that I didn't like were the seemingly automatic penalty (a significant handicap reduction) for winning an event; another was that the system did not automatically adjust handicaps for declining ability - particularly those increasing in age. Because of the limit of 0.1 increase, and the maximum handicap, these players were totally disadvantaged and consequently discouraged.
The WHS in my jurisdiction (Canada) also removed the advantage the previous system gave to lower handicap players (the bonus for excellence), but I don't hear of anyone carping about it here compared to what I read on this thread.

 

[KenL]

United States
Course Handicap = Handicap Index® x (Slope Rating™ / 113) + (Course Rating™ – par)
that's 100%

Australia
View attachment 56817

England 95%

New Zealand
100% previously 96%

Not going to look up other Countries and don't even look at 4 ball calculation......

In other words the 'SYSTEM' is not the 'SAME'

But you look at it differently then me......so keep saying 95 96 100 equals the 'SAME'

Are you confusing course hcp (for hcp purposes) and playing hcp (for medals and open comps)?

 

[Slab]

United States
Course Handicap = Handicap Index® x (Slope Rating™ / 113) + (Course Rating™ – par)
that's 100%

Australia
View attachment 56817

England 95%

New Zealand
100% previously 96%

Not going to look up other Countries and don't even look at 4 ball calculation......

In other words the 'SYSTEM' is not the 'SAME'

But you look at it differently then me......so keep saying 95 96 100 equals the 'SAME'

Every app & program you use on your smartphone and other devices can be personalised in the settings menu to best suit the user (you) Even though it might behave a bit differently or look a bit different to someone else, it’s still the same system

Even on a basic website like Wikipedia I can have on night mode with large text and narrow margins, you might have small text, white background & wide margins. They’ll look vastly different (even behave differently) but they remain the same system
Your motorway speed limit is 68mph , the UK is 70mph. You use KPH not mph, the sign looks different, the font and size are different but it’s still the same system for applying a speed limit

Just because its been personalised for various territories it doesn’t make WHS a different system

 

[Dunesman]

Every app & program you use on your smartphone and other devices can be personalised in the settings menu to best suit the user (you) Even though it might behave a bit differently or look a bit different to someone else, it’s still the same system

Even on a basic website like Wikipedia I can have on night mode with large text and narrow margins, you might have small text, white background & wide margins. They’ll look vastly different (even behave differently) but they remain the same system
Your motorway speed limit is 68mph , the UK is 70mph. You use KPH not mph, the sign looks different, the font and size are different but it’s still the same system for applying a speed limit

Just because its been personalised for various territories it doesn’t make WHS a different system

I think that is trying to bend logic too far to say that because the system permits tweaking, then even with tweaks implemented, there is still a single system. Thats just word play, and putting a simple name over a bunch of different systems, deciding they are all permitted, therefore there is a single system.
Thats nonsense.
That would have been like changing nothing here, keeping UHS, but writing UHS as a valid localised option under the WHS umbrella, and then saying, yes, now everyone is WHS.

 

[Dunesman]

Things that I didn't like were the seemingly automatic penalty (a significant handicap reduction) for winning an event; another was that the system did not automatically adjust handicaps for declining ability - particularly those increasing in age. Because of the limit of 0.1 increase, and the maximum handicap, these players were totally disadvantaged and consequently discouraged.
The WHS in my jurisdiction (Canada) also removed the advantage the previous system gave to lower handicap players (the bonus for excellence), but I don't hear of anyone carping about it here compared to what I read on this thread.

There wasnt an automatic penalty for winning an even, even not a seemingly automatic penalty.

One can make the same argument about committee input for declining UHS handicaps as for committee diligence for the correct functioning of WHS. Committee were obliged and had the scope to adjust handicaps where there was evidence it was incorrect, to carry out annual reviews, and had pc analysis tools to aid them.

And just a small point, its not the removal of the advantage low hcs had here that has prompted the carping, it is the bias now being against them, rather than flattened. An imoroved system should yave been designed to be equally fair to all.