Can APA hold me accountable for past due fees of other players?

S

S.G.B.

Registered
Hey guys, I am fully aware that this is an incredibly common thread, and I do apologize for creating another... But I do believe mine is a little unique, and I was wondering if you guys could help.

I started APA about 3 years ago. I was playing 2 nights, Sunday night and monday night double J.

My sunday night team disbanded because all the lower rank players moved up and the team was too top heavy. so another team was formed, and I was nominated to be the team captain. I didnt really want the responsability, but I took it anyway. on monday night, the team captain said he didnt want to do it anymore, and he made me the captain without my knowing...

my issue is this:
through out the course of the session, all my lower ranked players, and 2 of my higher ranked players decided to stop showing up, and stop paying for forfeited matches. the team was not dropped by the league opperator because said players told both him and I that they were going to come back, and pay. they never did. at the end of the session I was told I owe the LO 600 dollars. most recently upon trying to re-enter APA he said I owe him a little over 800.

as I understand it, when team disbands all fees due are divided up among the players who owe money, and it is to be repaid upon re entry of APA.

am I actually responsible for the dues? is there some way I can contact the home office of APA with this issue to try and get it resolved? I have spoken with my local league operator, and he is only willing to allow me to bing another team, and pay him between 10-20 dollars extra every week until I have paid it off, untill it is paid off I am ineligible for qualifiers for single events, and any city or higher level tourny play. I feel like I am being raked over the coals here. is there anything I can do?


Thanks for the help guys.
 
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beav99_4life said:
Sounds like the perfect opportunity to get away from APA.
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I have not played for a little over a year, and honestly, I miss the people, and the competition... There is nothing else even close to where I live where I can compete.. not even little weekly tourneys.
 
beav99_4life said:
Well, if you're going to pursue it, might as well get the answer from the home office. Here's their contact information: http://www.poolplayers.com/contact.html
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Thanks for the info.
I will call them for sure.

Please keep posting, if ideas come up. Because I want to be able to present a case to the APA when I contact them.

The LO has told other players in my area I stole the money, which is absolutely not the case.

I just want to play pool again, and I don't feel it is fair to place such a substantial amount of money one a person who paid their fees every week, and covered players who couldn't pay, but needed to play.

Thanks for the help everyone!

p.s. beav99_4life, I greatly appreciate you're timely response to this thread, and being helpful. I have been reading these forums for about 2 and a half years, but never posted anything. I am glad I did today.
 
They'll probably see it and might respond, but you might want to PM APA Operator and LeagueGuy (these being their forum names here). They will be able to give you very good advice on how to handle this.
 
S.G.B. said:
Thanks for the info.
I will call them for sure.

Please keep posting, if ideas come up. Because I want to be able to present a case to the APA when I contact them.

The LO has told other players in my area I stole the money, which is absolutely not the case.

I just want to play pool again, and I don't feel it is fair to place such a substantial amount of money one a person who paid their fees every week, and covered players who couldn't pay, but needed to play.

Thanks for the help everyone!

p.s. beav99_4life, I greatly appreciate you're timely response to this thread, and being helpful. I have been reading these forums for about 2 and a half years, but never posted anything. I am glad I did today.
Click to expand...
My question is, did your team still play? I mean if some players did not show up or stopped playing did you replace those players and able to compete on league nights? If so and the replacements all payed then the LO should be happy that the team was able to play and they could still make money. If your team did not have replacements and were not able to play then what would you be paying for? Let me know cos that all sounds crazy to me.
 
bfdlad said:
My question is, did your team still play? I mean if some players did not show up or stopped playing did you replace those players and able to compete on league nights? If so and the replacements all payed then the LO should be happy that the team was able to play and they could still make money. If your team did not have replacements and were not able to play then what would you be paying for? Let me know cos that all sounds crazy to me.
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Oh and $800.00??? WTF??
 
A little background:
The APA sees the weekly dues as a "team fee." They don't care if one person pays it, or if the fee is divided evenly amongst the team (which is what typically happens.) They make no effort to track that Johnny Smith didn't pay his share this week, and then chase Johnny.

1.) Usually a "bonus point" is offered each week for paying and completing your scoresheet properly, so if you don't pay each week your team typically will have no chance of placing near the top to earn your way into the play-offs.
2.) Many times a wild-card spot will be offered as a blind draw to the teams that didn't place high enough to earn their way into the play-offs. Any team that still owes money at the end of the session is NOT elegible for the wild-card draw.

It happens all the time that a team or two end up owing money at the end of the session for one reason or another, and I think it's usually up to the LO as to how to handle it. Only an idiot would try to hold only the team captain accountable for the entire amount due. What I have seen happen is usually the LO will forgive the debt because he doesn't want to lose a team worth of players, but then again, I have NEVER seen one team owe so much money. For your team to owe $600-$800, your team must have never paid... Is the LO holding your old team members accountible for their share? Are they still playing in that league? This situation is quite ridiculous. If you have other leagues to chose from, I would tell that guy where to stick it and move on. If there is nothing else available for you, you have no choice but to either call the APA HQ or work it out with the LO.
 
Just so you understand, part of it is to keep people from signing up until cities/states/whatever the qualifier is, and then dumping if they lose. For instance, my team is qualified to go to the state Vegas qualifier. We will have been 4 weeks into the summer session by that point.

In the past, teams stayed signed up until those events, and then dropped out if they didn't make it through to go to Vegas. This then makes the LO have to juggle schedules and such for the remainder of the session. And yes, they lose money, which of course bugs the hell out of everyone, that a business is concerned about losing money.

I'm sure there are any number of other reasons/explanations/excuses, but what I've described is at least one of them. And it has at least some merit. As I said earlier, APA Operator and LeagueGuy could probably explain it much better, and exactly what the OP really has an obligation.

(I'm betting not as much an obligation as it seems. My guess is that the amounts will be kept track of, and if any of the players want to play APA again they will have to pay back that mount before they are allowed to play again. Or some negotiated amount. Just a guess.)
 
APA to its league members (the ones looking upwards from the bottom of the hole):

"It puts the league fees in the basket. It does as it's told."​
 
Mr Hoppe said:
A little background:
The APA sees the weekly dues as a "team fee." They don't care if one person pays it, or if the fee is divided evenly amongst the team (which is what typically happens.) They make no effort to track that Johnny Smith didn't pay his share this week, and then chase Johnny.

1.) Usually a "bonus point" is offered each week for paying and completing your scoresheet properly, so if you don't pay each week your team typically will have no chance of placing near the top to earn your way into the play-offs.
2.) Many times a wild-card spot will be offered as a blind draw to the teams that didn't place high enough to earn their way into the play-offs. Any team that still owes money at the end of the session is NOT elegible for the wild-card draw.

It happens all the time that a team or two end up owing money at the end of the session for one reason or another, and I think it's usually up to the LO as to how to handle it. Only an idiot would try to hold only the team captain accountable for the entire amount due. What I have seen happen is usually the LO will forgive the debt because he doesn't want to lose a team worth of players, but then again, I have NEVER seen one team owe so much money. For your team to owe $600-$800, your team must have never paid... Is the LO holding your old team members accountible for their share? Are they still playing in that league? This situation is quite ridiculous. If you have other leagues to chose from, I would tell that guy where to stick it and move on. If there is nothing else available for you, you have no choice but to either call the APA HQ or work it out with the LO.
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Basically what happened is after the first week of players not showing up I contacted the LO and we both contacted all the players. they informed us both they would be returning the next week to play, and pay for matches forfeited. This happened on both Sunday, and monday night, around the 3rd week of the session. So there were no attempts to replace them.

I contacted the LO last week, and I told him I wanted to play again and offered to cover his losses to the APA, players fund, ect. which i estimated would be around 250 - 300 bucks. and bring in a team on sunday night with players from other nights, and 4 new players. i did this in hopes to get this all taken care of, and I thought it was a good offer. mark off 500 as a loss, make it back in half a session, and get back in the green for as long as we all play.

He told me I could play, but was ineligible for everything except weekly league play. BUT I would still have to make payments every week to slowly chip away at the total owed.

While I was forfiting matches, I made notes on the sheets as to who did not show up, and how much they owe. he should have all the records of who owes him what. and several of those players are currently playing in his league right now, and have been since all this happened a little over a year ago.
 
S.G.B. said:
Thanks for the info.
I will call them for sure.

Please keep posting, if ideas come up. Because I want to be able to present a case to the APA when I contact them.

The LO has told other players in my area I stole the money, which is absolutely not the case. I just want to play pool again, and I don't feel it is fair to place such a substantial amount of money one a person who paid their fees every week, and covered players who couldn't pay, but needed to play.

Thanks for the help everyone!

p.s. beav99_4life, I greatly appreciate you're timely response to this thread, and being helpful. I have been reading these forums for about 2 and a half years, but never posted anything. I am glad I did today.
Click to expand...

I would call him on this in front of everyone at a league night or awards ceremony!!! and if he persisted well I hope the lie is worth the pain!
 
i played on an apa team where each of our players went up 1-2 skill levels in our 1st round of playoffs. thus pushing us over our added points for a matchup. we later find out from a assistant to the LO he had a hardon for us because we had won 1st place 4 sessions in a row. our team was no longer going to deal with the nonsense we were forced to during the session. we all quit. 2 years later im the only one who decided to return with an entirely different set of players. upon joinging and playing the first week i was told i owe 100 dollars for playoff terminations fees....then another 100 dollars for the players who had quit and "stiffed" the league of membership dues. so i called corporate office what have you and told them the story. final bill 20 dollars and an investigation into the LO.sadly nothing even happened to rectify the nonsense that was being dished out.

long story short make a call to head office. you will most likely be cleared and only asked to pay for your portion from previous apa attendance and current financial obligations :) hope it helps
 
daimion said:
i played on an apa team where each of our players went up 1-2 skill levels in our 1st round of playoffs. thus pushing us over our added points for a matchup. we later find out from a assistant to the LO he had a hardon for us because we had won 1st place 4 sessions in a row. our team was no longer going to deal with the nonsense we were forced to during the session. we all quit. 2 years later im the only one who decided to return with an entirely different set of players. upon joinging and playing the first week i was told i owe 100 dollars for playoff terminations fees....then another 100 dollars for the players who had quit and "stiffed" the league of membership dues. so i called corporate office what have you and told them the story. final bill 20 dollars and an investigation into the LO.sadly nothing even happened to rectify the nonsense that was being dished out.

long story short make a call to head office. you will most likely be cleared and only asked to pay for your portion from previous apa attendance and current financial obligations :) hope it helps
Click to expand...

I am going to contact the APA home office this evening.
hopefully they will be able to work this out, since my L.O. is being hard to work with.

I appreciate the help guys.
Keep the good info rolling in, if anything else comes to mind guys!!!
 
No they cannot, they tried that crap with my step son. We just laughed and ignored the rest of what they had to say.
 
S.G.B...I would never go for this deal. You cannot be held responsible for other players fees. Now if your team was qualified for Vegas, then he could hold fees over your head, and as captain, you'd have to collect from everybody. But if he's letting the others play without "paying up", you should get the same treatment. You made him a nice offer (more than I would have done)...too bad he's too tight to accept it.

Scott Lee
www.poolknowledge.com

S.G.B. said:
He told me I could play, but was ineligible for everything except weekly league play. BUT I would still have to make payments every week to slowly chip away at the total owed.

While I was forfiting matches, I made notes on the sheets as to who did not show up, and how much they owe. he should have all the records of who owes him what. and several of those players are currently playing in his league right now, and have been since all this happened a little over a year ago.
Click to expand...
 
S.G.B. said:
The LO has told other players in my area I stole the money, which is absolutely not the case.
Click to expand...

Wow....and why would you continue to want to give this guy money every week? I know playing/competition/etc...but that is a pretty scummy thing to do, and personally I would rather drive an hour to find a league operated by someone who isn't a dirtbag than give that local guy 10 cents. Just my opinion.
 
Mr Hoppe said:
A little background:
The APA sees the weekly dues as a "team fee." They don't care if one person pays it, or if the fee is divided evenly amongst the team (which is what typically happens.) They make no effort to track that Johnny Smith didn't pay his share this week, and then chase Johnny.

1.) Usually a "bonus point" is offered each week for paying and completing your scoresheet properly, so if you don't pay each week your team typically will have no chance of placing near the top to earn your way into the play-offs.
2.) Many times a wild-card spot will be offered as a blind draw to the teams that didn't place high enough to earn their way into the play-offs. Any team that still owes money at the end of the session is NOT elegible for the wild-card draw.

It happens all the time that a team or two end up owing money at the end of the session for one reason or another, and I think it's usually up to the LO as to how to handle it. Only an idiot would try to hold only the team captain accountable for the entire amount due. What I have seen happen is usually the LO will forgive the debt because he doesn't want to lose a team worth of players, but then again, I have NEVER seen one team owe so much money. For your team to owe $600-$800, your team must have never paid... Is the LO holding your old team members accountible for their share? Are they still playing in that league? This situation is quite ridiculous. If you have other leagues to chose from, I would tell that guy where to stick it and move on. If there is nothing else available for you, you have no choice but to either call the APA HQ or work it out with the LO.
Click to expand...


A team in my APA league had a player that could not decide if he really wanted to play but they kept him on the roster the whole session. He never paid anything and never paid his membership dues of $25. When it came time to pull names for wild card, the whole team was disqualified. Oh well!! All the other teams followed the rules. Too bad.

As for owing $800..... one player couldn't run up that bill. For 12 weeks @ $9 a week it comes to $108. That means that none of the team members paid for the whole session.

You reap what you sow. Shut up or pay up.

As for a temporary team captain required to pay all the money.... that's BS.

Something smells and it ain't in Denmark. Me thinks there is more to the story.

Kim
 
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