Settlement calculator
MatchPlay settles the moment the card is confirmed.
MatchPlay is being built to take the final scores from the group chat, work out each player's net result for the agreed stake, and settle it automatically.
How the ledger settles
Every amount is handled in whole cents, not floating-point dollars, so nothing is lost to rounding. The ledger must sum to exactly zero — if your net results don't balance, the tool tells you by how much rather than silently approximating.
Once the ledger balances, debtors and creditors are sorted by name and matched off in that order, each paying the smaller of what they owe and what the other is due, splitting across multiple people if needed. This always produces a valid settlement — every payment is real and the ledger reconciles to zero afterwards — but it is a greedy, deterministic sweep, not a proven minimum-transaction-count solver. We are not claiming this is the fewest possible payments, only that it is a correct one.
Worked examples
| Participant | Net result | Suggested payment |
|---|---|---|
| Alex | +$12 | Receive $7.00 from Ben and $5.00 from Chris |
| Ben | −$7 | Pay Alex $7.00 |
| Chris | −$5 | Pay Alex $5.00 |
| Dana | +$0 | No payment |
Ben pays Alex $7.00; Chris pays Alex $5.00, leaving every net balance settled. These transfers reflect an agreed ledger, not an official Rules of Golf payout.
A debtor split across two creditors
Alex owes a combined $9, split between Ben (owed $4) and Chris (owed $5): Alex pays Ben $4.00; Alex pays Chris $5.00.
Related tools
For skins and Nassau's own stake conventions and settlement logic, use the skins calculator and Nassau calculator directly. Pick a format first with the game picker, balance sides with the team generator, and work out handicap strokes with the stroke allocator. Background on casual-game stakes is in the betting games guide.
Common questions
Does the calculator move or collect money?
No. It displays an illustrative settlement ledger and a suggested list of payments. It does not process payments, operate a wallet or place bets.
What happens if the entered ledger does not balance?
It is rejected with the exact amount it is off by. A golf settlement must sum to zero — one group's winnings are exactly the others' losses — so the tool asks you to correct the entries rather than hiding a deficit by inventing a payment.
Does this find the fewest possible payments?
No, and we are not going to claim otherwise. The solver pairs debtors with creditors in a deterministic, sorted order, which always produces a valid list of payments that reconciles the ledger, but it is a naive greedy sweep, not a proven minimum-transaction-count optimiser. For most small golf groups the result is already small; it is just not guaranteed to be the smallest possible.
Can I use this for skins, Nassau, Wolf or Vegas?
Those formats already have their own dedicated calculators (skins calculator, Nassau calculator) that apply their specific stake conventions. This tool is the generic version: once you know each player's net result in any game, enter it here to get the payment list. It does not yet re-derive those formats' results automatically.
What currency does it use?
Whatever you are settling in — the tool works in whole cents (or your currency's smallest unit) internally so nothing is lost to rounding, and displays dollar amounts to two decimal places.