Tee Sheet
Your tee sheet is the system every other tool plugs into: online booking, point of sale, memberships, gift cards and your golfer list. This guide covers what to look for, how vendors charge, and the questions to ask before you sign or switch.
Pros
- Streamlines the booking and scheduling of tee times, reducing conflicts and optimizing course usage.
- Offers golfers the convenience of viewing and booking available tee times, improving satisfaction and service quality. *requires attached booking engine
- Enables dynamic pricing strategies and better management of peak and off-peak hours, potentially increasing revenue.
- Gathers valuable data on player habits and preferences, aiding in strategic planning and marketing efforts.
- Automates and organizes tee time scheduling, minimizing manual work and administrative errors.
Cons
- Involves upfront investment in software or technology and ongoing maintenance costs, which can be significant, especially for smaller golf courses.
- Reliance on digital systems can pose challenges during technical malfunctions or internet outages, potentially disrupting tee time scheduling.
- Requires staff training for effective use, and some golfers may prefer traditional booking methods, necessitating a period of adaptation and education.
Your tee sheet is the system every other tool plugs into. Online booking, the pro shop register, memberships, rain checks, gift cards and your marketing list all read from it. Pick the right one and your staff spend less time on the phone. Pick the wrong one and you live with it for years, because switching is hard.
This guide is written for owners, general managers and head professionals. It covers what a tee sheet should do, what it really costs, and the questions to settle before you sign.
What a modern tee sheet does
- Manages tee times in one place. Phone, walk-up, online and third-party bookings land on the same sheet, so nobody double-books a slot.
- Feeds your online booking engine. Golfers see real availability on your website and can book at 10 p.m. without calling. Some tee sheets include the booking engine; others connect to one. See our list of tee time booking engines.
- Handles rates and rules. Member, resident, twilight and league rates, booking windows, player minimums and blocks for events.
- Connects to point of sale. Check-in, green fees, carts and range sales flow to one register and one set of reports.
- Keeps your golfer data. Names, emails, play history and no-shows. This list is one of the most valuable things your course owns.
What to look for
- Who owns the golfer data. Make sure the contract says you own it and can export it at any time, in a usable format, at no extra charge.
- How the vendor makes money. Some charge a monthly fee. Others are "free" in exchange for tee times they resell (barter) or a fee added to each online booking. Barter can cost far more than a subscription on busy days, so price it in rounds, not dollars.
- Your website and brand. Can golfers book on your own site, with your look and your rates, or are they sent to a marketplace that also shows the course down the road?
- Integrations. Check the POS, F&B, membership billing, email marketing and GPS or cart systems you already use, and ask whether each connection is built in or custom.
- Reporting. You should be able to see utilization, revenue per round, booking channel and no-show rates without exporting to a spreadsheet.
- Support in season. Ask who answers the phone at 6:30 a.m. on a Saturday in July, and how long a fix takes.
Questions to ask every vendor
- What is the total yearly cost, including booking fees, processing and any tee times you keep?
- Can we export all golfer, member and booking data whenever we want? In what format?
- How long is the contract, and what happens to our data if we leave?
- Which of our current systems connect today, without custom work?
- How do you move our gift card balances, memberships and future bookings from our current system?
- Who trains our staff, and how long does go-live take?
- Can we speak with two courses like ours that switched to you in the last year?
Thinking about switching?
Most switching pain comes from data: future bookings, gift card balances, member accounts and your email list. Settle those before you sign, and plan the move for your slow season. Our free 12-point tee sheet switch checklist walks through each one.
Not sure where to start? Scroll up to see the tee sheet vendors we review, or ask for a free shortlist and we will send the three that fit your course, with the questions to ask each one.
