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iGolf GPS

raven34

Well-Known Member
Jul 14, 2008
21
0
I agree. If we can't vent and warn people about problems on these forums where can we? After all this thread has got a lot of praise for some companies. Should work both ways.
I just wanted to hop on and say that I have found similar problems with Skycaddie.
I am surprised to hear of iGolfs bad service though as they have always seemed pretty decent and both the Neo and Caddie II are very good units -IMO.
 

warbirdlover

Ender of all threads
Supporting Member
Jul 9, 2005
19,151
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central Wisconsin
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I just received my new igolf NEO I bought from TGW on sale for $131. I've got it set up and ready to go and will report what I find hopefully this week. Initially it's a slick little bugger that is nice and simple to use. And I had joined the igolf site and downloaded about 60 of the 100 courses I'm allowed to my computer. Loading in the 10 courses the unit holds is a breeze and I asked for a course to be mapped on an e-mail. I got no reply but went in and checked and the course is now there. As long as they do what I ask I guess I don't need an e-mail reply. Wish me luck. :)

iGolf.com: Golf GPS, Golf Software, Online Golf Community featuring Golf Course News & Reviews
Image1.jpg
 

Wayneo

From the bunker
Dec 31, 2008
163
11
... also check out the filemaker section, to see how you can enter the points from the PC.
Welcome to iGolf.com's custom filemaker

Jayhawk - this has now been removed without any sort of notice or information from their website. Probably because of me. When I contacted their CS dept. they said they did not know why it was removed, or if/when it would be brought back.

I posted on another forum that if you uploaded a file created by yourself and modified any of the custom names, their filemaker also truncated the accuracy from 6 decimal points down to 5. I don't know if that was fractions of an inch, or an entire foot, but it shouldn't do that.
 
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Pa Jayhawk

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Nov 15, 2005
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Kinda interesting, and another bad business decision. I only used the filemaker to easily enter the names prior to going on the course. Without that option I would likely no longer buy or recommend the device. Seems like it is more likely an issue of greed, as has seemed to be the case in the past.

Seems there are just better options out there if they are going to simply make this a download based system and eliminate the only selling point they had, which was ease to do your own course. They already lost my business and membership when they updated all the files yet would not allow to redownload the files and at the time had no method to know if they were updated. Now it seems apparent they have lost my business for future purchases. Seem like all their newer units are all rechargeable batteries, which means they have now done away with 2 of their top 3 selling points IMO.
 

Wi-Golfer

Golfer on hiatus.
Supporting Member
Jul 25, 2007
8,147
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I love my golflogix & actually feel a bit lost when I play without it now. Has everything I would need out on the course & is foolproof to use.
 
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Pa Jayhawk

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Nov 15, 2005
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Thought this was worth updating. Upon buying the uPro, I renewed the membership for iGolf as I planned to pass that GPS onto my wife. Within an hour of renewing and downloading 10 new courses and updating others, my account was suspended for the following reason:

said:
Our security monitor has identified some unusual activity associated with your account. In order to protect the integrity of the golf course files available on iGolf.com, your account has been temporarily suspended until the security risk can be assessed.
Once the security risk has been resolved, the suspension on your account will be lifted. Otherwise, you may contact us to request your account be reviewed promptly by an iGolf supervisor.
We apologize for any inconvenience this has caused, but it is necessary to protect iGolf.com from any unauthorized access. Thank you for your patience.
Upon attempting to contact them via phone, live chat support and e-mail with no response it prompted this e-mail to both iGolf and then Bushnell (who purchased iGolf)

said:
To Bushnell:
I am forwarding on a most recent e-mail that I sent to iGolf about their service. I did not renew my membership prior because of their inadequate support, which I also documented on this Golf forum thread:
http://www.shottalk.com/forum/equipment-reviews/10610-igolf-gps.html

I venture to guess I will never receive a response to my issues this time as well, and do not have the patience to deal with their lack of support. Apparently my account was suspended within 1 hour of renewing it for security reasons to protect the integrity of their database. I guess downloading 10 new courses and updating others during the span of 1 hour poses a risk. Seems apparent I made the right choice in moving on to the uPro and Callaway for my most recent purchase. Will be updating the above link with this correspondence as well.

Sincerely
xxxx



Sent to iGolf and attached with e-mail to Bushnell:

Per my prior e-mail sent earlier this morning about my 1 hour old renewal being suspended for your security reasons in relation to your database, coupled with the fact that I can not reach anyone at your toll number listed, no one responded to my e-mail in a timely fashion, and your online support chat is unavailable.

At this point could you please cancel my renewal and refund the full cost of the membership to my Credit Card. I renewed this in an effort to download courses for travels I am about to make, and it seems apparent I am going to be unable to do so by the time I leave.

Please Credit the $34.99 fee back to my Credit Card immediately, otherwise I will be filing a grievance with my Credit Card company. It seems apparent since my leaving as a member for support issues, that you are still not capable of providing adequate support for your product. I will also be forwarding this information on to Bushnell to let them know of the past and current issues, and will let them know that they have lost my future business by way of Callaway and the uPro, whom are well known for their good support of their products.

Sincerely,
xxxx
 
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Pa Jayhawk

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Nov 15, 2005
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Amazing, I guess it is easier to consider their paying customers criminals for the sake of their lack of security measures. You would think they would have fixed the issue by un-suspending my account in this case as opposed to just telling me to wait it out and lose me as a customer. I guess they still don't trust me???

said:
[FONT=&quot]From:[/FONT][FONT=&quot] xxx [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Thursday, June 25, 2009 2:34 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: RE: Member Email Support[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Hi xxx, [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]What time of day did you attempt to call us? Our phones are open from 9-5 PST Monday-Friday. Did you leave a voicemail? If you ever have trouble with our system again, please feel free to dial my direct extension at (xxx) xxx-xxx Ext. xxxx.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]There is a limit of 25 downloads per 24 hour period. If you exceed that, your account will be suspended for 24 hours while that unusual activity is checked. We had an issue with our course files being pirated, so we implemented this security procedure. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Access to your account will be restored 24 hours after it was originally suspended.[/FONT]


[FONT=&quot]iGolf Support[/FONT]
said:
[FONT=&quot]I tried calling at 9am when I sent the initial e-mail, as well as later. I also tried your Live Chat numerous, which seems to be a fictitious attempt to lead your customers to believe you have adequate support. Had it indicated there was a limit when I signed up this would not have been an issue. This is unacceptable, and unfortunately for you I had not download the courses that I need prior to the trip that I am making that led to my renewal of my membership. So per the other e-mail that I sent approximately 1 hour later, the renewal of my membership will serve no purpose and the conditions that you mention are not what I signed up for on the renewal. Which is further compounded by the fact that you did not resolve the issue and because you seem worried I will “Pirate” files from your system.l So per the prior e-mail, please cancel my membership and refund the full amount to my credit card, otherwise I will file a dispute with my credit card company and forward this email onto them, as well as Bushnell.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Attached is the second e-mail I sent.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
Sincerely,[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]xxx[/FONT]
 
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Pa Jayhawk

Well-Known Member
Nov 15, 2005
7,196
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[FONT=&quot]Continued...
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]You failed to provide the service I signed up for and made no mention of a limitations you are invoking on downloads. So the fact that it says it is non refundable is irrelevant because you did not provide the agreed upon service. Had it been mentioned, there would be no issue. I do not have the time or patience to work with you to address your support issues, as well as your lack of security measures to prevent the “Piracy” you mention. For which I also do not like the inference you are making.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]I will be filing a grievance with my Credit Card company and forwarding this correspondence onto Bushnell.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
Good Day!!![/FONT]


[FONT=&quot]From:[/FONT][FONT=&quot] xxx[mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Thursday, June 25, 2009 4:01 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: RE: Member Email Support[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Hi xxx, [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Unfortunately, we do not have the ability to lift that suspension before the 24 hours. If you'd like to list the courses you need for your trip, I'd be happy to download them for you, and email them over so that you can load them onto your device for your trip.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Since you have downloaded course files since updating your account, a refund will not be an option for you. The iGolf.com membership is non-refundable once [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]used.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Do you recall which option you selected on the phone system when you attempted to call us this morning? It is strange that that call would not come through if it was placed after 9. You are correct, our live chat feature is currently unavailable for the rest of the week, but will be back up and running normally on Monday of next week. In its place, customers are able to send in an email message. We responded to your original email in about 2.5 hours, which I don't feel is inadequate in any way.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Let me know if you have any other questions, or if you'd like me to send over the files you need for your trip.[/FONT]


[FONT=&quot]iGolf Support[/FONT]
 
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Pa Jayhawk

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Nov 15, 2005
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They billed my card today, I called the CC company and they instantly removed the charge upon telling them my account was suspended for the given reason, they further put a block to allow no further charges from iGolf.

Guess I'm Pretty much done with iGolf.
 

VtDivot

SLIGHTERED
Supporting Member
Apr 16, 2005
7,154
32
The email from iGolf says 9am Pacific. I am assuming for the sake of clarity you are speaking with them in Pacfic time zone terms. You actually called at 12pm EST correct? I don't doubt you, I was just a little confused on the timing.
 
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Pa Jayhawk

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Nov 15, 2005
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Very pleased with my little NEO. And haven't had any issues yet with igolf.
Sad part is, they have a very good product line and likely the reason Bushnell picked up on them, unfortunately I have had nothing but poor experience with their support.

Interestingly enough, Bushnell did get back to me and said if there was anything they could do, let them know. Although I had already cancelled the charge through my CC..
The email from iGolf says 9am Pacific. I am assuming for the sake of clarity you are speaking with them in Pacfic time zone terms. You actually called at 12pm EST correct? I don't doubt you, I was just a little confused on the timing.
Correct, and I further called back later that day, well after the 9am PT and was asked to leave a message.

edit 1 - after viewing the second e-mail, would have been just prior to the 12:36pm ET e-mail I sent explaining such. The first was right at 9am PT, or 12pm ET per the time on the first e-mail
 
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Pa Jayhawk

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Actually the sad part is, it is unlikely I ever would have had to renew my membership had they given me the same courtesy of downloading prior downloaded course that they currently offer.

Furthermore, the reason this happened and I reached the non-specified 25 limit, is that I was updating the prior courses. Of the 25, only 10 were new. I basically did a search based on Zip Code and started downloading.

Thinking more about this, it seems they could fix the entire issue by simply setting the limit to the 100 course specification that you pay for as part of the agreement. If they are going doing it to limit pirating, it seems they would do their customers a service by setting it to the paid for limit. Pirating 25 or 100, not sure I see much of a difference if it means pleasing your customers or offending them, all as a matter of profit.

Either that or pay the necessary money to enhance the security. Don't instead basically tell the customer that anyone that downloads over 25 courses is a security risk, when if they further posted the update dates of the courses, the customer would not have to waste their time updating all of them in the first place.

I used about 20 of my initial 50 credits to update courses because it was not something they offered at the time, nor something they posted to show if there were adequate updates. In several years, it basically seems they hold their customers responsible for providing feedback to enhance their service, then when they use the feedback they do not even let the customer providing the feedback reap the benefits of such.

edit 1 - or better yet, they could also limit the download of each old course to 1. Just really seems they are saying it is the customers problem they do not have the time to update their site or security, which is the same thing that teed me off early and even after fixing it later, they did not provide that to the people that led to fixing the issue nor even respond at that time.

Would seem like Sling saying that every member is limited to posting 1 link a day for the sake of not having to hunt down the people that join and post multiple links the first day to spam the site. Just seemed like a lazy cost effective approach to me. End Rant!!! :)
 

SteadmanTech

Well-Known Member
Jul 9, 2009
2
0
I've got to chime in here with my own experience. In a nutshell it has been totally positive.

I have been using the iGolf NEO for just over one year now and it has been an excellent addition to my golf tools. For me, the front, center and back distances are quite enough information for approach shots to the green. This GPS unit has definitely shaved some strokes off of my play consistently in almost every round.

I have found it very easy to map specific points on holes, and have done so many times during regular play. It takes less than a minute and benefits future rounds greatly. As someone previously mentioned, every golfer is going to value different information on the course. For me having 4 specific points (in addition to the front center and back of greens already in the maps) available for mapping on every hole is quite enough. Water hazards, sand traps, the corner of a dogleg... I've yet to find a hole where I felt limited by 4 programmable points.

Someone commented on needing more points of reference around the green. What if you are coming at the green from the side? The unit could actually tell you the same distance for front, back and center. Well, I can deal with this on my own on those infrequent occasions that it comes up. If you can't do the simple math on these occasions to know that center plus or minus 5 or 10 yards will give you a darned good bet on your close edge vs. the far edge, well, you haven't been golfing for long then have you.

Considering:

  • the significantly lower cost of this unit vs. the more commonly recognized competitors out there
  • the fact that there is not really an annual membership requirement (or any initial requirement of membership to begin with)
  • the fact that once you do gather your commonly played courses you will have them all backed up on your own local computer
  • this unit is as accurate as any other out there (in my experience)
This iGolf NEO is hard to beat, truly.

I have had some personal experience with the customer support folks at iGolf and my experience there was very positive. I was trying to make a move from PC to Mac. I contacted them initially via their chat and had someone on the line for a while as they walked me through my issues. They then followed up with an email to me including an application file for the Mac. This was when they had just released the Mac version of their app and I had jumped on it quickly. They even followed up again later with a phone call.

I found their customer support to be very thorough and helpful.

I was impressed with their responsiveness with handling my one course mapping credit with my initial one year membership. I sent the request for the one single local course that they did not already have in their database. I think they had that course available on the site within one week of my request.

That also brings up their extensive list of available courses. For me I searched roughly 25 courses I knew I would likely want to have available. From that I only found 1 (mentioned above) that was not in their system. Pretty good I think.

So, for my purposes, the unit is very accurate, easy to map custom points, inexpensive, offers tons of course maps and the customer support has been great.

Just my two cents.
 
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Pa Jayhawk

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Nov 15, 2005
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Someone commented on needing more points of reference around the green. What if you are coming at the green from the side? The unit could actually tell you the same distance for front, back and center. Well, I can deal with this on my own on those infrequent occasions that it comes up. If you can't do the simple math on these occasions to know that center plus or minus 5 or 10 yards will give you a darned good bet on your close edge vs. the far edge, well, you haven't been golfing for long then have you.
I would agree with most of your assessment of their product, which has never been an issue for me. I have specifically stated such.

Actually though the part I quoted above, I believe was taken out of context. Mapping multiple points on the green, as I did, was not a criticism of their product but more of a compliment. It was informative method on how I chose to map the course and in how it related to the nature of my game and the courses I play. It stated such. Having 8 additional points to map was always a plus, and it was only because I had extra points that I used that option as it provided better detail that was easier to access. Had nothing to do with thinking they did not provide enough detail around the green and was never stated as such. I would actually have to ask based on your comment in relation to "If you can't do the math..." Why do you even have a GPS? Have you not been golfing long enough if you can't look at a couple yardage markers and guess within 5-10 yards? Come on. That comment just goes against the very nature of a golf GPS, and while not only taken out of context, was unfounded in its very nature???

It is their lackadaisical customer support for which I had a problem. I also think you will find from reading my comments that they did in fact respond to the questions posed. However it was when the issue fell outside of the realm of their existing business nature that on most occasions approached the situation in a way that was oriented towards their best interests, in spite of how the customer was affected. In the initial nature a couple years ago, it was a matter of they chose not to respond when it reached that point, yet then eventually changed their business practice accordingly. Then compounded the issue by not doing right by the people that were effected by the initial practice. Glad it is now working for you, it was the initial people that through their suffering that likely made it to what you view acceptable.

As in the most recent interests, I am sure the will likely resolve the issue when they realize it is detrimental to the business, but not beforehand. Likely with little remorse though, outside of how it affected their business and bottom line.
 

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