No-Show Management, Sport City Squash
The undersigned Sport City members (“Player Group”) are avid squash players who heavily utilize the squash facilities at Sport City Leiden Anthony Fokkerweg and Sport City Leiderdorp Winkelhof. Many members of the Player Group play daily, and most play at least three times a week.
Over the past several years, court capacity management at each club has become an increasingly serious problem. The problem is especially acute in the Leiden facility, which houses just four squash courts and has a disproportionately large, student-driven membership roster.
It is always difficult (and generally impossible) for serious players to secure courts in Leiden during weekday evenings. Therefore, the members of the Player Group routinely use the Leiderdorp facility as a “spillover” club, which has seven courts, for which there has been far less competition historically.
The Player Group is particularly concerned about the management of “no-shows”—players who book courts but fail to show up. The problem has grown so severe that, during any given week, enormous percentages of court capacity are simply wasted as courts stand empty. Members of the Player Group regularly arrive at fully booked clubs, only to find that theirs is the only court occupied during the hourly slot. As capacity shortages have worsened in Leiden, less serious players have begun booking Leiderdorp courts, which they then abandon just as they did in Leiden. This is extremely frustrating for the Player Group’s members, who are frequently forced to skip matches or travel to alternative clubs, simply because club management refuses to address capacity issues.
As an example, please consider the evening of 13 December 2023. Two members of the Player Group wanted to play at 20.00, but were forced to look for spillover courts in Leiderdorp, as Leiden was fully booked from 18.00 to 23.00. Upon checking, they learned that Leiderdorp was also fully booked until 22.00. The members decided to “risk it”, and simply went to the club, hoping that a free court would materialize due to a no-show.
A single cancellation occurred at 19.50, the members secured the slot, and when they stepped on-court at 20.00, they were the only two players in the club. All seven courts booked for the hour (100% of court capacity) resulted in no-shows. When the members finished their match, they gave their court to two other members of the Player Group, who were the only two players to show-up for the fully-booked 21.00 slots. So, over the course of two prime-time hours, 13 of 14 bookings in the Player Group’s “spillover” club resulted in no-shows. It’s important to note that such scenarios aren’t the exception: They’re the rule.
The Members argue that the obvious problem is a lack of deterrents against no-shows. Although club management claims to have implemented mitigations, this—if true—has clearly had no noticeable impact on the capacity problem, which continues unabated.
This problem is not new to squash clubs, and the Player Group asserts that its solution is simple. Most members of the Player Group have belonged to other squash clubs in the past, and—in the vast majority of these clubs—no-shows were deterred by penalizing offenders with hourly court fees (€15-€20 per hour) for each abandoned booking. Once implemented, these policies solved no-shows almost immediately, as players who faced financial penalties for no-shows became far more cautious with their bookings. Instead of grabbing multiple slots that they later abandoned, they booked only those slots that they were sure to use.
Of course, there are legitimate reasons for no-shows, and the Player Group acknowledges the need to make special exceptions. In the systems described above, Management simply reviewed challenges to penalties on a case-by-case basis, generally waiving the penalties for first-time offenders and making exceptions for those who no-showed due to circumstances beyond their control. Conveniently, such approaches are self-regulating, as each subsequent challenge has a significantly lower chance of success.
The Members suggest that, although likely less effective, non-financial penalties such as booking blocks could also prove effective, but only if said penalties are sufficiently severe. For example, players who abandon a booking could simply be barred from booking courts as per a clearly articulated penalty schedule---first offense, 30-day ban; second offense, 60-day ban; third offense, 90-day ban; fourth offense, 120-day ban; fifth offense, 365-day ban; etc. Although local management claims to have implemented such a regime, whatever they’ve put in place is wholly ineffective, as the problem’s persistence very clearly demonstrates.
Whatever the method, something must be done. The result of Sport City’s approach to-date is that the undersigned, deeply loyal members are simply not receiving the service for which they’re paying, and this fact is clearly attributable to negligence on the part of Sport City management. Accordingly, the Player Group is considering its options should Sport City persist in its refusal to address this issue. These options range from moving en masse to a competing club, mounting public pressure campaigns, and/or initiating legal action against Sport City for failure to fulfill its service obligations under the applicable membership agreements.
The Members hereby request immediate audience with Sport City management apropos of this matter. Failure to honor this request in a timely manner will result in the Player Group pursuing one or more of the actions listed above.
The Player Group hereby requests written response to this letter by no later than 28 December 2023. It asks that you direct all such correspondence to nick@nickhogan.com.
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