Two diaries, one clubhouse
The catering manager takes a booking for a fortieth birthday party in the function room on the last Saturday in September. The competition secretary has had that date down for months for the club championship presentation. Nobody noticed until the week before, when the captain asked about the room.
Or a funeral wake is booked at short notice for the same afternoon as a large society, and the bar staff find out when both arrive. Parking overflows onto the practice ground. The kitchen is short of staff because nobody saw the full picture.
Why clashes keep happening
Function bookings belong to the catering or events side, often run by a franchise or a separate manager. The golf calendar belongs to the office and the committees. Each has its own diary, spreadsheet or booking tool, and neither is checked against the other.
The club's priorities are also unwritten. Most clubs would protect certain dates, such as presentation nights, the captain's day dinner or the Christmas draw, but that list sits in people's heads.
And function enquiries come at any time, often on the phone to whoever answers, who books the date without checking the golf side.
The golf calendar itself changes during the year. A rained-off competition is replayed on a date that was free in the spring, a society moves its day, a county match is added at a few weeks' notice. Each change is made in the golf diary, and the function side never hears about it.
What clashes cost
| Clash | Consequence |
|---|---|
| Function on a presentation night | Members displaced, or a paying customer let down |
| Wake on a society day | Bar and kitchen overwhelmed |
| Parking not planned | Congestion and complaints |
| Staffing based on one diary | Short-handed service |
| Late discovery | Uncomfortable phone calls and refunds |
Function income matters to many clubs. The aim is to take bookings confidently without upsetting members.
How we join the two diaries
- One calendar shows function room bookings alongside the golf calendar: competitions, society days, section events and presentation nights, read from the tee sheet and club diary.
- The club sets protected dates and times, and function bookings on those are blocked or flagged for approval.
- Function enquiries are logged on one form with the room, numbers and timings, and the person taking them sees the golf activity that day before confirming.
- Confirmed functions go to the bar and kitchen rota, with expected numbers, alongside the society and competition numbers for the same day.
- Busy days are flagged when combined numbers exceed limits the club sets, such as parking or bar capacity, so the manager can plan.
- Deposits and final numbers for functions are collected online, and the booking status is visible to everyone who needs it.
If your catering partner uses its own booking system, we connect to it where possible rather than asking them to change.
The next function enquiry
The catering manager starts each week with one view of the clubhouse: which rooms are booked, how many golfers are expected in the bar after competitions and societies, and which functions need a separate bar. Rotas are drawn up from that, rather than from one diary and a guess about the other.
A caller asks about a party on the last Saturday in September. The person answering sees the presentation night on the calendar, marked protected, and offers the Friday instead. The following week a wake is booked on a society day, and the bar manager sees the combined numbers straight away and adds staff.
- One view of everything happening in the clubhouse
- Protected dates respected
- Bar and kitchen staffing based on all bookings
- Clashes caught at the enquiry, not the week before
Signs your clubhouse diaries need joining
- Functions and golf events are kept in separate diaries.
- Clashes are discovered close to the date.
- Bar and kitchen staffing misses one side of the day.
- Nobody has written down which dates are protected.
- Parking problems catch the club by surprise.