Start sheet or no start sheet?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Deleted Member 1156
  • Start date Start date

Do you want a start sheet or not?

  • Yes, I like to plan in advance

    Votes: 30 49.2%
  • No, I like to turn up and happy to wait a while

    Votes: 22 36.1%
  • Don't care either way

    Votes: 9 14.8%

  • Total voters
    61
We have the same as at Homer's place, a section online and a notice board outside the pro shop that lets everyone know about matches, comps, societies etc. Plus we have 2 courses so if there is something happening on one, you can always get out on the other. Booking systems just complicate matters imho and just make it virtually impossible for a quick 9 after work or an impromptu round. As I said before I have experienced both and much prefer not having to book.
 
Booking systems just complicate matters imho and just make it virtually impossible for a quick 9 after work or an impromptu round.

I don't get this, it might just be me. In both places I have been a member, we have had some form of booking system. The first place, almost everynight I would go down for 9 holes, having never booked in. I would just slot in. Are people saying that with some booking systems if you haven't booked X number of days in advance, you won't be allowed to play?

Surely for those worried about booking systems, if you wake up and want an impromptu round, and go down, even if you don't have a booking system the same people will want to play, but it may result in all 50 people turning up at once, rather than spread out over the morning...
 
We have a booking system for competitions but you can pitch up and play at any other time (In fact you can anyway as there are 27 holes and there are always 9 not closed for the completion and, generally, another 9 will open up by the time you have finished the first 9).

I prefer not booking because, in general, I want to play at a set time at the weekend and would rather queue for a little bit to play at that time. To be honest I rarely queue more than 10 minutes as we have 3 start points. I can appreciate the benefits of knowing exactly when you are teeing off and roughly when you will finish but that is no real advantage to me if I cannot start until an hour or 2 after the time I want to play. Ideally I want to be off the course by 1.00 on a Saturday so as I have the afternoon to spend with my wife.

At my old club is was slightly worse in that there was no booking for anything and only one start point. That meant 40 minute plus queues at times. This was made even worse when the club decided to start reserving tee times for ladies comps on Saturday mornings (despite all mens comps being pitch up and play) so you could be queuing for 40 minutes then, as you are about to get on the tee, you had to wait for the ladies comp to tee off. That had members leaving in quite large numbers.
 
We have the BRS system which you need to use if you want your preferred time for the weekend in the Summer. However, other than on competitions, you can usually just turn up in the afternoons and walk on, and have never had a problem with doing that after work.

Works much better this way, especially when you've got club knockouts and stuff to play. You know you can turn up at whatever time and your tee is reserved; if you wanna do an hours practice before hand (not me) or turn up 10 mins before and walk to the tee with a bacon butty (more like me) you can do, and play your match without having to worry about waiting around or not getting on.

Would annoy me no-end getting being ready to go out at 8 and having to wait around till 9 because loads of people turned up at 7.45.
 
I don't get this, it might just be me. In both places I have been a member, we have had some form of booking system. The first place, almost everynight I would go down for 9 holes, having never booked in. I would just slot in. Are people saying that with some booking systems if you haven't booked X number of days in advance, you won't be allowed to play?

Surely for those worried about booking systems, if you wake up and want an impromptu round, and go down, even if you don't have a booking system the same people will want to play, but it may result in all 50 people turning up at once, rather than spread out over the morning...

You rarely have to wait more than 10 or 15 mins, just time to sort your gear out and have a practice putt. I just don't want to have to book my golf a week in advance, I know I can turn up at my club any time, any day of the week un-announced and be on the course in a few minutes. I couldn't do that at my old club, unless you had rung up and booked for the following Saturday by 8-30 the week before you were lucky to get out before 4pm. Give me rolling up anytime, but each to their own.
 
We have the BRS system which you need to use if you want your preferred time for the weekend in the Summer. However, other than on competitions, you can usually just turn up in the afternoons and walk on, and have never had a problem with doing that after work.

Works much better this way, especially when you've got club knockouts and stuff to play. You know you can turn up at whatever time and your tee is reserved; if you wanna do an hours practice before hand (not me) or turn up 10 mins before and walk to the tee with a bacon butty (more like me) you can do, and play your match without having to worry about waiting around or not getting on.

Would annoy me no-end getting being ready to go out at 8 and having to wait around till 9 because loads of people turned up at 7.45.

Waiting around is generally not a problem for us. I guess because we have never had bookings people kind of evolve into a natural timeslot and avoid times they know things are busy. There is a list of the swindles on the website that shows when the regular ones go out and how many people on average are in them. In 3 years I have never turned up and found an unexpected queue at the first tee. If our swindle is on the tee and a 2\3-ball turn up we will usually let them through (or invite them to join us) to avoid them having to wait around too long. It just needs a bit of common sense.

I guess if you have always had one system or the other, the membership evolves to accommodate it. I wouldn't want to be anywhere where they changed the system, that would be chaos!!
 
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