Effective April 1st 2024

1.0 Introduction

Just as with the Rules of Golf, the WHS™ Rules of Handicapping are updated every 4 years – this is set to be the year preceding the Rules of Golf change (last update January 2023). This allows WHS to be appropriately adapted to any impacts from the Rules of Golf changes. The next WHS change is from 1 January 2024, and effective in Ireland on April 1st. 2024

Under guidance from the R&A and USGA® these changes have been made to ensure a more unified approach worldwide to WHS, especially within GB&I, this will give consistency to golfers travelling to different jurisdictions and to take advantage of digital innovations and therefore giving further improvement to having more scores which are acceptable for handicapping purposes.

Golf Ireland, England Golf, Scottish Golf and Wales Golf work closely together to ensure a simplified, aligned, and collaborative approach is taken to ensure golfers within GB&I can seamlessly play in each jurisdiction. Therefore, we have all agreed, the new updates to the rules will not take effect until the 1st of April 2024. This will allow further education and understanding for all our counties, clubs, and golfers. These changes are being implemented to enhance the accuracy, fairness, and overall experience of the handicap system.

This information pack details the changes for Clubs within Ireland, how they work and their benefit/impact upon all golfers.

A summary of the WHS 2024 changes are listed below. The links provide a more detailed description with some infographics to explain the principal changes.

• Introduction of Course Rating™ minus PAR (within GB&I nations)
• In line with the rest of the world and is more accurate calculation of playing handicap. Course & playing handicaps may go up or down This will be managed by club software and the Golf Ireland App when registering for competitions or general play. Updated handicap charts will be posted in the clubhouse & published on the website on April 1 st . 2024, here
• Introduction of Acceptable Scores from Four-Ball formats
• In the ongoing attempt to capture all golf for handicap calculations, certain four-ball events can be included for handicap calculations – see more detail here.
• Implementation of Expected Scoring
• A system of calculating a score for holes not played for handicap purposes. This allows us to play any number of holes above 9 holes i.e. 14 holes competitions in Winter. It also allows expected scores to be calculated for holes not played for valid reasons i.e. due to storm or illness
• Using Un-rounded Course Handicap™ calculation
• Currently the CH is rounded before calculating the PH. The new system will only round the PH. Club software will manage this, however, for inter-club competitions there will be manual calculations required.
• Course Rating™ changes
• Rating of courses of a minimum 1500 yards
  Reduced from 3,000 yards to 1,500 yards. Not relevant for Rathcore
• Standardising Par
  More flexibility for clubs for determining indexes and par criteria – not relevant for Rathcore

WHS 2024 Changes - Rules of Handicapping Update
Holes Not Played
Fourball Scores
Calculation Of Course Handicap
Expected Score