Indoor golf chain files for bankruptcy

Chapter 11 filing by locally based KiS Golf Inc. follows customer complaints about sales practices

Email | Print By E. Thomas Wood

Golf enthusiasts in seven states, who paid thousands of dollars each for golf club sets that came with "lifetime" access to a golf pro and indoor practice spaces, will apparently be among the creditors in a bankruptcy case filed this week in Nashville. And some of them claim they never meant to sign up as customers in the first place.

KiS Golf Inc., based in Nashville, filed for reorganization on Tuesday under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code and shuttered the Opry Mills location of its mall-based KiS Country Club and Golf Academy chain. The company has also ceased to operate Sycamore Valley Golf Course in Ashland City, which it had leased. That course remains open under the management of its owners.

The bankruptcy petition states that KiS has assets of $100,000 to $500,000 and liabilities between $1 million and $10 million. The company has not yet filed detailed disclosures of what it owns and owes, and so it is not clear whether it has included as liabilities the payments that its customers made in signing up as members of KiS Country Club.

Those payments, often exceeding $5,000, entitled members to a customized set of golf clubs and the right to receive tutelage from golf pros at KiS facilities. The stores featured simulators on which members could play famous golf courses such as Pebble Beach and St. Andrews.

Nashville attorney J. Carson Stone, representing KiS in the bankruptcy proceedings, described the members' experience in a statement issued to NashvillePost.com yesterday:

"KiS Golf has a strong following in the Southeast region of the United States and has provided hundreds of families and individuals with a successful, enjoyable and entertaining program for learning, practicing and experiencing the world of golf. The packaging of custom equipment and lessons from an elite teaching staff, as well as the availability of time on the golf course has proven to be a highly successful practice that affords the opportunity of the complete golf experience."

The Better Business Bureau, however, has found KiS to have an "unsatisfactory record" of sales practices as it dealt with 10 complaints filed since August 2006. "According to complaints on file with BBB," the consumer watchdog's listing for KiS states, "the company holds promotions offering consumers the chance to win a golf cart. Once consumers register for the promotion they are contacted by phone several days later and told their name was drawn indicating they had won a free three-day, two-night vacation and dinner coupons.

"The consumer is then required to attend a one-hour tour of the company's store in order to redeem their prize; however, during the tour the consumer is pressured into signing a contract for custom made golf clubs. Complaints state after indicating their desire not to purchase the golf clubs the company pushes them between several store employees and managers who continue the high pressure sales tactics, encouraging the consumer to purchase the golf clubs. The one-hour tour turns into several hours of continuous sales pitches where the consumer feels pressured into signing the contract in order to leave the store."

Dawn Harris of Fort Mill, S.C. told NashvillePost.com about the sales process she witnessed when she and her husband walked into a Kis store in September of this year. "We sat through the information, and, my husband being a lover of golf, we decided to just have our credit run to see what we would get approved for," Harris recalled. "Well, instead of just 'checking' for us, the salesman came back with a credit card receipt already run."

Harris says the sales personnel claimed she and her husband could cover the cost of their membership by recruiting other people to visit the store, with a payment to them of $100 for each person who took the tour and $200 for each who became a member.

The couple committed to the membership, but Harris claims they thought better of it and tried to rescind the contract within three hours after signing it. She says they have been unable to get out of the contract and are facing a bill for $6,600.

After being shown the account Harris gave of her experience, KiS attorney Stone responded as follows:

"The KiS Golf program incorporates many aspects and a number of occasions where misunderstandings, misinterpretations and consumer financing issues may arise. The vast majority of customers of KiS have enjoyed the benefits afforded them without issue. In fact, the customer disputes which KiS Golf experienced were some of the lowest in the retail revolving-term consumer financing industry.

"KiS Golf takes exception to any reference of alleged misrepresentation by its staff or otherwise. Further, KiS Golf denies that it has failed to provide the products and services which it has represented would be available as part of the program.

"Regrettably, as a direct result of the credit industry actions, KiS Golf could no longer expand and provide its customers the experience and service to which they had become accustomed. Each customer had the full availability of the dispute process, both through the particular financing entity at which the account was created or through the dispute department at KiS. When issues of buyer's remorse would arise, such matters were handled with the appropriate degree of compassion for those who had entered a transaction that they could not truly afford, had entered a transaction of which they could not take full advantage or lastly, for which a proper right of rescission was provided.

"Until the availability of consumer credit became severely restrained by the financing entities, KiS had the intent and practical ability to satisfy, not all, but virtually all of its customers."