The Golf Collective has become the second company in two months to make a submission to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) against Golf Australia (GA), this lodgement alleging that the national body has engaged in anti-competitive conduct.

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The claim alleges that on December 1, 2025, GA entered the golf handicap market with the Golf Australia Club to compete against existing golf clubs as a handicap provider and that GA used its significant market power to leverage an unfair advantage over its competitors. Last month a complaint submitted by Social Golf Australia, one of the country’s largest virtual golf clubs, claimed GA engaged in anti-competitive conduct after the launch of its own subscription-based membership product.

The Golf Collective (TGC) is a Perth-based Australian handicap provider and event management business with more than 600 members maintaining official GA handicaps and offering more than 50 events per year to support golfers who play regular competition golf and wish to hold an official Australian handicap. TGC claims the type of product, value proposition and inclusions GA offers in its GA Club are virtually identical to those of several operators already in the market, including TGC.

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As the national governing body of Australian golf, GA owns, controls and oversees the management of the country’s handicap system. The current technology platform that hosts the Australian handicap system is GA Connect, which is a product GA has licensed from DotGolf, a company co-owned by the R&A and Golf New Zealand.

The allegation in TGC’s submission to the ACCC is that GA promoted the new GA App as a means of submitting Conforming Social Scores (CSS) for members of the GA Club, while withholding that same scoring systems from its competitors.

The option for competitor virtual clubs to offer this function to their members was disabled in the back-end settings of GA Connect. Golf Australia exercises complete control over these settings and functionality. The allegation in TGC’s submission to the ACCC is that by withholding this option from its competitors, GA has breached Australian competition law by misusing its significant market power to gain an advantage over its competition.

According to Ruben Martins, director of The Golf Collective, if the score submission pathways are inconsistent or withheld, then it undermines trust in the system and creates the potential for frustration across the national golf community.

“Australian golfers love having the option of tracking their progress and improvement by having an official handicap,” Martins said.

“For many people, their handicap is central to their golfing experience and participation in the game and its associated communities. But if the score submission systems are unfair or inconsistent, it can undermine people’s confidence in the entire handicapping system.

“The game of golf is unique because it is built on foundations self-regulation, integrity and honesty,” Martins added. “Handicapping sits at the heart of that.

“It is our view that the guiding principle for our governing bodies should be to lead the game in a positive and ethical way with a focus on what best serves golfers and protects the integrity of the game. That is what we want for golf, and that is what we hope this submission will help to achieve.”

Since the first allegation against GA of anti-competitive conduct in March, the body has publicly stated it is not ‘competing in’ the virtual club market, but rather ‘complementing’ the market. Martins says the suggestion here is that if GA is not a competitor in the market, then it cannot engage in anti-competitive behaviour.

On face value, this seems a nonsensical argument, Martins adds. But as GA 100 percent owns, controls and regulates the golf handicap market in Australia, TGC says its preference is for the ACCC to determine whether GA is complementing or competing in the market.