Terms and Conditions

General

• Prizes may be amended subject to numbers of entries. 

• Grading prizes will be awarded to the lowest graded player in the event of a tie unless otherwise stated. 

• Rating prizes will be awarded to the player with the best performance relative to rating (W-We) unless otherwise stated. 

• No player may win more than one prize.

• All place prize money will be shared equally amongst tied players.

• English players playing any FIDE rated section or event must be members of the ECF. 

• Decision's of an arbiter (except decisions under article 10.2) may be appealed to the controller provided that

  • (i) Such appeal is received within 30 minutes of the arbiters decision

  • (ii) Such appeal is accompanied by an appeal fee of £10 which will be returned if the appeal is upheld

• The controller’s decision is final in all matters.

• The submission of an entry form and payment of the entry fee is acceptance of these terms and conditions. 

• Players will be defaulted if they are not present at their board within 1 hour of the published start time of the round. 

Swiss Events

• The controller reserves the right to transfer players between tournaments at any time.

• Pairing will be done in accordance with the FIDE swiss pairing rules using the Swiss Master pairing program.  Published pairings will not be changed unless

  • (i) They are in breach of one of the absolute pairing rules specified by FIDE

  • (ii) They are based on incorrect results from previous rounds

  • If either (i) or (ii) applies the controller will only change the published pairings if s/he decides it is in the best interests of the event. 

• Re-pairing may take place where possible, and at the controllers discretion, 30 minutes after the start of any round.  Any player refusing to play a re-paired game will be deemed to have lost be default.

• Players who find themselves without an opponent because they have arrived more than 30 minutes after the start of any round may only receive a ½ point bye.

All Play All Events

• Where ties need to be broken (for example, where the winner of a group qualifies for a subsequent free entry) the tie break will be as follows.

  1. Ignore the score of all tied players against all players in the lowest score group.

  2. If this breaks the tie, the process ends. 

  3. If two or more players are still tied then ignore the scores of the remaining tied players against all the players in the next lowest score group.

  4. Repeat stage 3 until there is no tie.

  5. If two or more (n) players cannot be separated in this way then the tie remains and each player will received 1/n of the prize.  If the prize is free entry then they receive a 1/n discount.

• Any player can qualify for a Challengers event, regardless of their rating, if they achieve a TPR of 2000 or above in the Major.  This entitles the player to then play in one subsequent Challengers event.  The player is responsible for the entry fee for the Challengers.

• Any player can qualify for a Masters event, regardless of their rating, if they achieve a TPR of 2150 or above in the Challengers.  This entitles the player to then play in one subsequent Masters event.  The player is responsible for the entry fee for the Masters.

• In the event of a withdrawal prior to the event that player will be replaced if possible.

• In the event of a withdrawal during the controller will decide in the interests of  the event which of the following options to invoke:-

  • a) Replace the player for the remaining games

  • b) Expunge the players record from the event

  • c) Allow the players existing scores to stand and award default wins to the remaining opponents