Poorly run golf courses...I witnessed one last Friday.

I had the day off last Friday, so I decided to get out to one of my favorite local courses I recently started playing, before I move to CA.  Even better, they have a special of $20 for 18 holes/cart on Fridays.  It's a really nice layout and well-kept course, used to be one that the LPGA played years ago.

I was originally shooting for about 1:15p or 1:30p, but was told that my choices are either 12:46p or 1:50p.  So, I book my tee time for 12:46p with a friend.  We arrive at about 12:30 and are in the box at 12:46p exactly.  As expected, the fairway is ours.  We play through the first hole, and move onto the second.  As I'm standing in the box, a cart is coming toward us.  We have to wait because of the cart coming toward us, which eventually pulls up to us and asks if we're playing Hole 2.  Since I'm standing in the box, I reply "yes we are."  The pair of women tell us that they skipped Hole 2, because they tried to go around a large HS golf club group.  The group is now on Hole 3 through Hole 7, 5 golfers to each hole and they are all walking.  The women ask if they can play ahead of us (on Hole 2), since they were technically first but tried to skip over the HS group without success.  I'm thinking in my mind, we'll I'd imagine we would be quicker than two older ladies, but we let them tee up.

At that time, I make an executive decision to reverse course and play the Back 9 first, and then swing around for Hole 2 through Hole 9.

Semi-disgusted, we head for Hole 10.  We are behind one group, but they go quickly and we get to the box, tee up, and are now on the green.  As we are walking toward the green, putters in hand, we get approached by another women.  She is an employee of the course and she is pitching a fit because we are not supposed to be on the Back 9.  I explained to her that the Front 9 is jammed up because of a HS golf club and we figured since the Back appeared open, we'd play it.  Plus, we are only a group of 2 and should not hold anyone up.  She explains back that there's a league of gentlemen behind us and they will be very upset they are held up at all .

At that point, my friend (who is somewhat passive) suggests that we just go get a refund, since we've only completed 1 of 18 holes.  As we arrive at the clubhouse, the guy explains that "it's a mess out there" and is happy to give us credit for 9 holes .  I explain that we've only completed 1 hole out of the 18.  He pauses, but then agrees to give us credit for 18 holes, but later changes that offer realizing that 18 holes for "anytime" is more expensive than 18 holes on Friday.  So, now we get a credit for $20.  Since I'm moving, I explain that I came here for $20/18 holes, drove 25 minutes to the course, took off work to play, and cannot play on Fridays anymore because I'm soon moving.  He refuses to give me any refund, and sticks to the $20 credit.  I remind him that we were NEVER told about any HS golf outing when booking the tee time, OR when paying our money.

Needless to say, aside from my $20 credit which I'll apply toward a full-round of golf, I will never be back at that course again.  I find it downright rude that they would never mention an HS golf club (like others in the area mention) either at tee time or at payment.  The worst part is, they just kept loading up the Front 9...and we started seeing groups that were behind us coming to the clubhouse to also demand a refund.

How common is this episode for others?  How did you solve it?

It all depends on the starter, and how well the pro staff gets briefed on the day's events.

My friend was in his first season of golf last year, and we phoned in for a 7:45 AM tee time at an area course. We show up Friday morning, hit a few range balls and then tee off. On the second tee, we see four carts approach - two stop off, the other two head up to No. 3.

We talk to the guys at our tee, and learn that we're in the middle of a 12-team shotgun scramble. And the scramble tee-off time has just been moved up 30 minutes. We return to the clubhouse, and the assistant starter says he didn't know about the scramble and figured we would have no trouble playing. The starter said he figured we could get ahead of the scramble, because most were starting on the back 9 with 1, 2, and 3 as overflow. But, the early start messed things up.

We get a refund and head out to another course.

At my regular course, the scheduling is well run. Your group has to fill up most of the course to get a shotgun start, or else you get sequential tee-off on one of the nines.

Unless there's a tournament, the course will usually tell you to show up and they'll get you on. The assistant pro said that even on crowded days, they average two individual no-shows an hours - they plug in the singles to the no-show slots.

My regular course has a decent public address speaker system - the other course did not. It had a guy in a cart with a clipboard running back and forth between 1 and 10 tees to coordinate things.

The point of a refund is to keep a customer happy. Since you told him you were moving, he had no reason to keep you happy, as you wouldn't be back anyway. The only way to make money off you, which is the point of a business, was to only give you $20 credit so you would return to use it. Just good business.

This is what I get out of it. He was too impatient to wait to play, and is upset that the world does not cater to him. You jumped to a hole you should not have been playing. Your position on the course is directly behind the people in front f you. I dont see whyt they nmeed to inform yu a team is practicing. You did not even wait to see if they were keeping pace, you just made an 'executive' decision and jumped to a hole you shuld not have been on, and got angry because it was pointed out to yu. To me, I dont see how the course was poorly run, or why you think you deserved more than your full refund.

You should have paired up with the two women and played as a foursome.

Ya - the 2 ladies who tried to jump ahead but failed should not have asked to play ahead of you.  They shouldn't have tried to skip at all - but they did and so they lose thier place in line.  The course shouldn't have let 4 5-somes go off in a row, that's ridiculous.  You shouldn't have made the decision to play the back nine without asking.  The starter shouldn't have given you that crap about the group of gentlemen ahead being very upset if they were to be held up when it sounds like the whole course was a backed up mess.

The only thing right that happened was you got your money back.  I would definitely find a new course.

my golf course was/is basically closed for at least a day every week (even though they have 2 18 hole and 1 9 hole courses) because they run corporate events. they make money and pack the course, but it's frustrating when you get a day off work and head over only to hear that you can't play or even use the range because all the range balls are for the tournament. needless to say i call ahead now.

oh and my only truly bad "management" thing was when a guy in the club house joined the group ahead of me (a single) to make it an 8-some who all played simultaneously.

+1

I did that one day with a group of 3 ladies and I even moved up to the ladies tee's and played with them. I had a blast!

My course always lets us know when high school players are on and especially when they are doing a tournament.I really feel sorry for some of these kids playing this hilly course and some times from the tips they walk and the course is rated 142 slope from there. There are seriously some 150 scores coming in on the tournaments.

My home course provides monthly calender's that lists every event each day and what times tees times are restricted and such.

Many courses post their monthly events, and I wouldn't be surprised if the course in the OP had a similar system in place.

I hope those are some JV scores for high school teams that just pieced together a team.  We played some pretty hard courses when I was in high school and it was rare to ever see a score over 100 for JV.

+2.

This would have been the most intellegient thing to do, would have slowed you down enough where you still could have had a nice flow to your round and wouldn't have to wait to long for the high school golfers.  If they are on a golf team they are all decent golfers, they should play ready golf.

I'm curious what city this is..............and course in Ohio.

i had some B.S. happen Saturday at a local muni in s Texas, showed up for a fun Saturday afternoon to play 18 by myself to  practice, drive up to the Club house not to many trucks/cars in the parking lot, a foursome just loading up to go home and a two some loading up going to the first tee box, great this is going to be a good day. well go to the putting green see how i will fair today (looking good from some of the putts) go to the 1 tee box and the two some was clearing the green it's a par 4 well low and behold i cracked a bomb the tee to pin was 350 i went looking for my ball (usually i am 220 maybe and a big maybe 250 well i was like a hunting dog knew were it went but damn it disappeared, so i drove close to the green and i was 30 yards from the fringe wtf, well it went down hill from there took two chips to the green and 3 putted . okay now it begins play 2, 3 then approach 4 get to the tee box and what the f*^$ there is a five some right in the middle of the fairway waiting for the same two some on 5, well they finally see me after some nice gestures and pull off to the right side of the fairway in some trees, oops bad decision i duck hook one right towards them . i didn't get close but it was going there. well they let me play through on 6, again run into a couple more two somes, wtf did every one come from i was surprised but everyone was cool about it so played through and had some what a productive round but i was surprised of all the jumping around of the groups. Now understand this is a small muni course close to a naval airfield so no marshals or such (even a beer cart) but beside a couple of blow up holes it was a good day. btw i was behind a mesquite tree and went for a low punch shot but caught it fat and bam played a little pin ball in the tree my ball came out could not find it. that sucked.

Wow man.  With all due respect I have no idea what that says..

I consider any course that doesn't prevent people from jumping around like that to be mismanaged. But the OP became part of the problem when he decided to head to the back 9 after starting the front. Honestly I've played anywhere something like that could happen. If it's slow you wait. Doesn't matter if there's HS kids out there or whatever. Sometimes it's slow and sometimes it's fast. At the places I frequent doing something like that would result in being asked to leave. Does this course not have a starter and rangers?