Access control is one of the most consequential infrastructure decisions you will make for your indoor golf venue. Get it right and your venue can operate efficiently with minimal staff involvement. Get it wrong and you will spend a disproportionate amount of time managing access issues, dealing with customer complaints, and worrying about security.
This guide covers the two main access control approaches used by indoor golf venues, the trade-offs between them, and the integration requirements that determine whether either approach will work for your operation.
How PIN-based access works
PIN-based access is the most widely used approach at indoor golf venues. The mechanism is straightforward: each booking generates a unique 4-digit PIN that is valid for the duration of the booked session. The PIN is sent to the customer by email when their booking is confirmed. At the venue, the customer enters their PIN on a keypad to unlock the bay door.
The simplicity of this approach is its main advantage. Customers understand how it works immediately, there is no app to download, no account to create beyond the booking itself, and no hardware dependency on the customer's side. A customer with any mobile phone, or even just an email address they can check on a computer before leaving home, can use PIN-based access without any friction.
The security model is also straightforward. PINs are time-limited, so a customer from a previous session cannot re-enter after their time has expired. PINs are unique per booking, so you can identify which customer was in which bay at any given time. And because PINs are generated and distributed by the booking system, there is no manual process that can be bypassed or forgotten.
Phone-based access via the customer portal
An alternative to keypad entry is phone-based access, where the customer unlocks the bay through the Golf O'Clock customer portal on their phone. The customer navigates to their upcoming booking in the portal, and a button becomes active within a configurable window before the session start time. Tapping the button sends an unlock command to the smart lock on the bay door.
This approach has advantages for venues where keypad hardware is impractical or where the customer experience of entering a PIN feels out of place with the overall venue aesthetic. It also provides a clear digital record of when each bay was accessed, since the unlock event is logged against the customer's account.
The trade-off is the dependency on the customer's phone and internet connection. A customer whose phone battery is dead, or who does not have mobile data at the venue, cannot access their bay through the portal. For this reason, venues that use phone-based access as the primary method typically also configure PIN codes as a fallback.
Choosing the right hardware
The access control hardware you choose determines which software integrations are available to you. Not all smart lock systems integrate with booking platforms, and not all integrations are equally reliable.
The key requirement is a native integration between the lock hardware and the booking system. This means the booking system can send unlock commands and generate time-limited PINs directly through the lock manufacturer's API, without any intermediate steps or manual configuration. A native integration ensures that access credentials are generated and distributed automatically when a booking is confirmed, and that they expire automatically when the session ends.
When evaluating hardware, ask the manufacturer specifically about their API documentation and their existing integrations with booking platforms. Ask whether PIN codes can be set and expired programmatically, and what the latency is between an API command and the lock responding. These technical details determine whether the integration will work reliably in practice.
Multi-bay considerations
For venues with multiple bays, each bay should have its own lock with its own PIN. This prevents customers from accessing the wrong bay and makes it possible to run simultaneous sessions without any risk of interference between customers.
The booking system needs to understand the bay-level structure of your venue and generate separate PINs for each bay. A customer booking Bay 2 should receive a PIN that only works on Bay 2, not a master PIN that works on any bay in the venue.
For venues with a main entrance in addition to individual bay doors, a two-layer access model works well: a venue-level PIN for the main entrance that is shared across all bookings for a given time window, and a bay-level PIN for the specific bay. This keeps the main entrance secure while allowing customers to navigate to their bay independently.
What to tell customers
Clear pre-arrival communication eliminates the majority of access-related customer service issues. Every booking confirmation should include the customer's PIN, the bay number, a brief description of where the keypad is located, and a contact number for the rare cases where access does not work as expected.
A short "how to arrive" section in the confirmation email, covering the three steps from parking to starting their session, takes five minutes to write and prevents dozens of confused phone calls. Customers who know exactly what to expect when they arrive have a better experience and are more likely to return.
Written by Mathieu Morin, CRO at Golf O'Clock. Based on operating data from 200+ indoor golf venues across North America, the UK, and Europe.