Time for a moan....

[MadAdey]

Do you have the problem of not being able to get your name down for comps? At my place it is set up with 6 minute tee slots in 3 balls and the tee is open for 8 hours. So most people will quickly pick up that equals 240 available tee slots.

Now my club has 673 male members so enough tee slots for 35% of the members to play. Not everyone wants to play in them, but most of us do.

The board goes up in the pro shop on a Monday morning and all the tee slots soon go with the seniors being there when the board goes out. Then the old boy that works in the pro shop puts him and all his mates down and nicks an hour of morning slots. Then the young lad that works in the shop sticks him and all his first team mates down so it is full pretty quickly. No problem with people getting the slots as it is a first come first served basis and I have to go to work. The shop shuts at 6 so I struggle to get there before it shuts.

I have only played 2 comps this year despite being available to play in pretty much all of them.

What does your club do, or is this a common problem across the country? Does your club play the medal over the weekend rather than just on the Saturday?

 

[fundy]

wow, tbh if it was like that I dont think Id be a member there! not being enter would really annoy me, and at 6 minute intervals pace of play can't be the fastest either!

am fortunate that at our club the demand for comps is nowhere near as high as yours, have never not been able to enter a competition I have wanted to in 3 years!

sheets go up on the board in the locker room, and you can sign in hourly slots, the early slots fill up after about a week and every now and again they tag another hour on the back if demand is high but rare the tee times get to midday, my name usually sits in the latest tee time option with very few other names and I end up with one of the last tee times each comp

 

[Aztecs27]

Yes. But this is mostly down to me not being able to get down to the club enough to put my name down in time!

Also, I like to play early in the morning for comps, but no one ever wants to fill the early (7:30am ish) tee times.

But the comps fill up really quickly at my place regardless, so unless you get your name down within the first 4 or 5 days of the sheet going up, you don't get a look in.

Fortunately, I've not been available for many comps this year so far (or unfortunately, whichever way you want to look at it), so I don't know if I would have been affected or not.

Probably for the best too, since I've not hit a ball in over 2 months!

 

[ScienceBoy]

Call the pro shop and ask them to put your name down, cite the reason...

Some might not let you but its worth a shot!

 

[Doon frae Troon]

Six minute tee times is crazy, you need to go out to at least 8 and preferably 10.
The club need to manage demand by increasing fees to allow reasonable wear on the course.
You also need to introduce an online/in person booking system.

I used to manage a club with 1,200 members, nearly twice the size of your club. We coped.

 

[MadAdey]

wow, tbh if it was like that I dont think Id be a member there! not being enter would really annoy me, and at 6 minute intervals pace of play can't be the fastest either!

am fortunate that at our club the demand for comps is nowhere near as high as yours, have never not been able to enter a competition I have wanted to in 3 years!

sheets go up on the board in the locker room, and you can sign in hourly slots, the early slots fill up after about a week and every now and again they tag another hour on the back if demand is high but rare the tee times get to midday, my name usually sits in the latest tee time option with very few other names and I end up with one of the last tee times each comp

TBH it is probably the best club in the area and is on 10 mins from my front door, so not really wanting to look elsewhere. If I was going to look elsewhere then it would mean a 30 min drive. If I was going to do that then I might aswell just drive 45 mins and join Woodhall Spa.

I do not want to leave my club, but I am playing some good golf at the minute despite my putting problems, that the V-easy (cheers Bob:thup have now sorted. I am under my handicap constantly and the Tues/Thurs roll up that I get to sometimes are giving me funny looks, as my last 3 appearances have been 41,39 and 40 points. I want to get in some comps and put that form to good use win a couple of things and get my handicap down. Trust me I would prefer to get 34 points off a 4 handicap rather than 41 points off 11.

So what do you do apart from come on here for a good old moan.........................:sbox:

 

[MadAdey]

Call the pro shop and ask them to put your name down, cite the reason...

Some might not let you but its worth a shot!

Not allowed mate. You have to pay your entry fee when you put your name down, hence why it is in the Pro shop. It is to stop people putting there name down not knowing if they can play or not. No turn up then you loose your entry fee.

 

[Doon frae Troon]

PS MadAdey.

I bet I could walk straight onto the first tee of your course at 5 pm on any Sat or Sun evening.

 

[BoadieBroadus]

our club instituted a rule that one person could only put names down in one single time slot, so while the old boys would still get in ahead of you, the guys in the pro shop would only be able to book one time slot each.

as far as our club and organising comps go, this is the one single good idea that the whole club has come up with in the last 6 years i've been a member. you can't be the only person suffering from missing slots because of this, maybe try and make it an issue and get some back up...

 

[MadAdey]

PS MadAdey.

I bet I could walk straight onto the first tee of your course at 5 pm on any Sat or Sun evening.

That would be very easy to do. But I have a life away from golf that normally involves socialising on a Saturday evening with friends. I am not moaning that I can't get a nice little prime tee slot it is the fact I can't get one full stop, unless I want to be out there on a Saturday evening......

 

[arnieboy]

We could do with a couple of hundred more members! Our club has introduced an on-line booking system and it works very well as long as you are sitting at your pc at 6.59am ready to get your slot!!

 

[GB72]

At my club there are booked tee times for comps in 3 balls as with most who have commented. The tees are closed for various times for the comps but once they are open again, they will allow people to enter the comps then without a booked time. Seems to suit most so if you do miss out (and I tend to book mine a week or 2 in advance, they you can still enter). Never had to miss a comp yet.

 

[bobmac]

I do not want to leave my club, but I am playing some good golf at the minute despite my putting problems, that the V-easy (cheers Bob:thup have now sorted.

Told you it would
I'm glad it's helped

 

[MadAdey]

Told you it would
I'm glad it's helped

You need to be careful bob you'll not get that head through the front door..........

It is working a treat. Not quite as good as I want yet but it is improving a lot, very quickly. :cheers:

 

[BelliedWedge]

Similar problems occurred in our club about 7-8 years ago after a necessitated influx of new members. So here is the solution that was put in place and remains to this day.

At 7.30pm on a Monday a draw is made from a tombola. All you need to ensure is that you get there before 7.30 and get your name down. Gives everyone a fair crack of the whip and stops the practice of the old boys you mentioned blocking times. When your name is called you can enter yours and one other name on to the start sheet.

I don't believe it is ideal, but it is reasonably fair. As the club's web site guru I've made the case for trying to have a system where certain blocks maybe reserved for those who are too behind the times to use an online system and the rest of the times are acquired by those willing to use the internet and slowly move the culture to entirely web based. That said, the bar does do a turn every Monday night when it would otherwise be dead.

 

[duncan mackie]

The board goes up in the pro shop on a Monday morning

here is the problem

if you are going to run such a system you need to revolve the time and day the board goes up otherwise it's inherently unfair.

second is obviously that if you can't ring up to put your name down then no-one should be on the sheet that hasn't visited in person - again it's inherently unfair otherwise

only one thing worse than silly rules - that's silly rules that aren't applied to everyone equally!

I would add the other obvious - this is exactly why 'course access and competition entry' should be so high on peoples list when looking at clubs. shame that you have the best club but can't get into the competitions.....

 

[Bratty]

For comps, a sheet goes up on the board with three sets of slots, early, mid and late (can't remember times exactly, but it's something like 06.45 - 07.45, 08.45 - 09.45, 09.45 onwards).

You put your name down on the sheet in the timeslot you want. Two weeks before the comp, the club then do the draw and post the teesheet on the board. YOU have to check which time you've been given (I think it's online too, but rarely check that myself). Pay on the day of the comp.

If you then don't turn up, you get a letter from the club putting you "on notice". Failt to turn up again (in the same year), and you're banned from comps for a month. Works pretty well for us, but then we've only got about 400 members.

 

[CMAC]

speak or write to the committee, there should be no more than 1 additional name being put down per person, ideally online booking with a password. You pay full fees and you cant get a tee time for a medal! Ridiculous!!!

 

[Doon frae Troon]

He can get a tee time for a medal.
It's 5pm on any weekend.
Trouble is he and 200 others want 9 am.

 

[hackerjack99]

get your club to open an on-line booking system. in my club all competitions are done online. alternatively you can call the caddy master and reserve a time. you can also reserve a whole line of tee times online.