Golf simulator booking software, built for indoor golf venues
Golf simulator booking software lets customers book and pay for a bay online at any hour, and gives your team one calendar for every bay, lesson and walk-in. Golf O'Clock is that software, built only for indoor golf. It runs 200+ venues, has processed 1.3M+ bookings, and starts at $150 CAD a month with no fee per booking.
By Mathieu Morin, CRO at Golf O'Clock · Updated
What it actually does
Some people call it reservation software, some call it a scheduling system. The job is the same. A customer picks a bay, a time, how long and how many people, pays, and gets a confirmation. Nobody at your desk touched it.
When someone calls or walks in, your staff book from the same tee sheet, against the same availability. One calendar instead of two is what stops a bay being sold twice. That matters more than any feature list.
Around that core sits everything that makes indoor golf its own business: hours priced differently, members spending prepaid balances, coaches who need a bay, and doors that have to open when nobody's there. The online booking engine is where it starts.
Why a general booking app runs out of road
Plenty of venues start on an appointment tool built for salons or consultations. It works until it doesn't, usually around the first membership or the first evening with nobody on site.
| Typical appointment app | Golf O'Clock | |
|---|---|---|
| What gets booked | A staff member's time | A bay, with its own session lengths and group sizes |
| How it prices | One price per service, or a few | Peak, off-peak, member, tier, package and promo rates, in order |
| Lessons | Coach and bay booked separately | One booking holds the coach and the bay |
| Getting in | Not part of the product | Access link, PIN or QR; the bay PC unlocks with the booking |
| Members | Usually a separate pass or gift card | Credits and included hours come off at checkout |
None of that makes a general tool bad software. It's software for a different business.
Every hour priced the way it sells
A Friday at 7 PM and a Tuesday at 2 PM aren't the same product. Pricing them the same leaves money on one and empty bays on the other. It's like charging the same for a coffee at 7 AM and at 3 PM. One of those is worth more.
Golf O'Clock resolves peak, off-peak, member, tier, package and promotional rates in order on every booking, and applies them the same way online, at the desk and on the phone. A basic setup has over 2 million possible combinations, and utilization can itself be a condition, so a quiet afternoon can price itself. More on pricing rules.
Members, packages and lessons in one calendar
Recurring memberships, punch cards, prepaid hour packages and seasonal passes renew and bill on their own. When a member books, their credits or included hours come off at checkout, so nobody at the desk is doing arithmetic. See memberships and packages.
A lesson books the coach and the bay together, in one booking, so you can't end up with one and not the other. Each coach has their own hours and their own column on the grid. Lessons can repeat weekly, sell as prepaid packages, and price themselves for members through a rule on your member tag. See lessons and coaches.
The booking can open the door
This is where golf-specific software earns its keep. Access arrives with the booking confirmation as a Getting in link the customer opens on their phone, with a PIN and a signed QR code available too. There's no app to download. It works with Kisi, Avigilon, RemoteLock, Rhombus, generic HTTP locks and the O'Clock SmartLock.
Screen Marshal handles the bay itself. It runs on the bay's Windows PC, keeps the screen locked between bookings, unlocks it 15 minutes before the start by default (anywhere from no early access to 24 hours), and locks it again at the end. Staff can launch the simulator software on any bay from one screen. If a customer wants more time, they add it from their phone, pay, and the bay unlocks again.
That's what lets a venue run staffed, unmanned, or a mix of both. The detail is on bay access.
Money lands in your own account
Payments run through Stripe or Square in your venue's own merchant account. You pay their processing rates directly, and Golf O'Clock takes no fee per booking at any volume.
You decide what a booking costs at the moment it's made: nothing, a saved card, a deposit, or the full amount. The rule can change by time, day, party size or customer, so prime time can require a deposit while a Tuesday morning stays free to reserve.
We've seen what that one setting does. An operator was running a 15 to 20% no-show rate on off-peak bookings, with no deposit and no card, just a name and a time. They started requiring a card at booking. Not a charge, just a card. Within a month, no-shows were under 5%. Nothing else changed.
Currency is set per venue, and tax takes as many rates as you need, so GST plus QST in Quebec and VAT-inclusive prices in the UK both work. Food, drink and retail in person run through Lightspeed K-Series or Square. More on payments.
What 1.3 million bookings say about how people book
Booking software should be built around how people actually book. Across 200+ venues on our platform:
- The busiest booking times are 1:00 PM, 7:00 PM and 6:00 PM, in that order.
- Friday, Saturday and Sunday are the busiest days. Monday to Wednesday are the quietest.
- March is the busiest month, ahead of January and April. High season runs November through May.
- The average booking runs 1.95 hours in peak season and 1.75 hours in low season.
- A first booking is usually a group of more than 3. By the third booking, the average party is under 1.8 people.
That last one matters most. The customer who comes back is often coming to practice, alone or with one partner. A booking flow that only sells two-hour group sessions at Friday prices has nothing for them. Your reporting shows the same patterns for your own bays.
What it costs
The price is on the page, which in this category is rarer than it should be.
- Standard: $150 CAD a month for the first 4 bays, plus $25 a month for each additional bay.
- Advanced: from $250 CAD a month for the first 6 bays, plus $25 per additional bay, for venues that need custom scripting or deeper automation.
- Enterprise: custom pricing for multi-location operators and large facilities.
Every plan is month to month with no contract and no fee per booking. Per-booking pricing looks cheap at 50 bookings a month. A flat fee looks the same at 5,000. The full breakdown is on pricing.
Switching from another system
Your customer list comes across from a CSV export of your old system, along with active subscriptions. The import is silent: no emails or texts go out, so customers hear nothing until you point your booking button at the new system. Running it again updates people rather than duplicating them.
Past bookings and gift card balances don't import. Bring membership status across as a customer tag and members land already marked.
What it doesn't do
Better to know now than in week three.
- There's no league module. Venues run leagues with recurring bay blocks and registration sold as a product, or connect dedicated league software.
- There's no point-of-sale terminal of our own. In-person sales run through Lightspeed K-Series or Square.
- Payments run on Stripe or Square only.
- The interface, emails and texts are in English.
- Multi-location groups share pricing, products, memberships and credit balances, but each site reports on its own. There's no single dashboard across every site. See multi-location.
Comparing options? Our comparison of golf simulator booking software covers the other platforms, and operators' reviews are on the customers page.