Criticism of the Bavarian State Sports Association: One million for Schleswig-Holstein

AThe signing was celebrated almost four years ago as an “alliance with a beacon character” when the Bavarian State Sports Association (BLSV) sold its club software to the Schleswig-Holstein State Association (LSH). The software verein360 Managerdesigned by a BLSV subsidiary, is intended to help clubs, among other things, with member administration and department management, according to the product homepage. At that time, a minimum term of seven years was set for use; The state of Schleswig-Holstein contributed 1.4 million euros. A report from the Schleswig-Holstein State Audit Office has now revealed that the cooperation was ended in 2025.

Due to the extraordinary termination by the state of Schleswig-Holstein, the BLSV refunded the “amount that had not yet been economically used up (for the future),” according to a request from Munich. The umbrella organization did not want to name the exact amount, although this is clear from the report from the Schleswig-Holstein Court of Auditors. It says that the club’s software has turned out to be “increasingly unsuitable”, and through the termination the LSH was able to “repay almost €1 million to the state”. The BLSV points out that this amount was reimbursed by the wholly owned subsidiary Tuesday.sport IT-Service GmbH, not by the BLSV.

When asked, the BLSV did not want to comment on possible consequences, such as budget gaps. When asked which other customers use the club software, it was said: “We support (…) a large number of other customers, especially sports clubs. We ask for your understanding that we cannot provide any information about specific customer relationships.”

When the software was introduced in Bavaria, it quickly became clear that only a few clubs had serious use for the software, which was created as part of a multi-million dollar, then very controversial digitization campaign. Two months after the start in October 2022, the BLSV stated when asked that “more than 400 sports clubs in Bavaria”. club360 would have converted – 400 of around 11,700 clubs in the Free State at the time. Before the association day in summer 2023, BLSV President Jörg Ammon first had to sort out a serious dispute in his own house must. The main trigger was the high costs of digitalization, which three vice presidents considered to be non-transparent: They had filed a criminal complaint. At the association day, Ammon had the commercial success of before his re-election club360 highlighted, the cooperation agreement with the LSH was signed one month later.

The BLSV had repeatedly been criticized for expensive projects, which was often accompanied by accusations of opaque financing

The report by the Schleswig-Holstein Court of Auditors goes on to say that the LSV “could and should have reacted to warning signals earlier”. For example, two other regional associations dropped out early after “acceptance problems” arose. Schleswig-Holstein, however, stuck to the software, partly on the grounds that commercial providers of club software were too expensive. On the other hand, the report criticizes the fact that the LSV’s role as a sales partner resulted in “clashes of interest compared to the interests of its member clubs, which are also represented by the LSV”. The LSV promoted the product intensively in 2024, but fewer than a hundred clubs had ordered the software by the end of the year.

Over the past decades, the BLSV has repeatedly been criticized for expensive projects, which was often accompanied by accusations of opaque financing. This could now also affect a property that the BLSV once described as a “lighthouse project”. When asked, the Bavarian Supreme Audit Office confirmed that it had been examining the donations for the construction of the Northern Bavaria sports camp since September 2023. The facility in the Fichtelgebirge opened at the end of 2021 and was funded with 23.4 million euros by the Bavarian Ministry of the Interior. The result of the obviously quite extensive test should be available in about five weeks, it was said.