Grading Fee breaking the monopoly

[Roger de Coverly]

Currently the ECF has the monopoly on grading you either pay up (increasing amounts) or you dont get an ECF grade.

I'd be inclined to dispute the "you" bit. The Game Fee bill goes to organisations rather than individuals and it's a price they pay for corporate membership of the national chess body. A main reason they pay is the perception that players would not wish to play in a non-graded event. If the ECF adopted a Scottish style membership approach, there would be a fee for a county organisation to join the national body and in return it would be entitled to grading services.

Nobody is going to tell me there is no alternative to the monoploy the ECF operates on gradings until I have exhausted every possibility and intend to do so.

It's probably not that difficult to set up a grading or rating system given the power of present day computers. You would need some decent IT skills to get a robust implementation though. Where the "Ernie Grading Organisation" would struggle is getting everyone to send results and having the calculated grades accepted by players and organisers as valid for issues like tournament eligibility, pairings, prize money, board orders etc.

In any event you have to know as well whether you want a national chess body in the first place. I commented once rather unkindly that some in the north don't think there should be one, or if they do that someone else should pay for it.


They probably wouldn't let you join, but why not look at the hypothetical costs and benefits of Cleveland moving north of the border - in other words joining Chess Scotland ?

[Sean Hewitt]

You could run a National Grading system perfectly sensibly at a cost of something like £2-£3 per player per year.

[Roger de Coverly]

You could run a National Grading system perfectly sensibly at a cost of something like £2-£3 per player per year.

That's probably about what it costs the ECF. There's a fair bit of volunteer costs that don't go through the books as well though. What is unknown is how much of the work of the Battle office is on grading.

[Roger de Coverly]

Read what I said. I am looking at a grading system run by the CCA for CCA members (ie a local system) Not for me to try and tell other counties what to do nor would I ever attempt to do so.

There's nothing and never has been anything to stop Cleveland running their own local system. Don't expect anyone outside your local area to pay any attention to your local grades though. Some junior organisations run their own ratings so as to get a faster turn round on player rankings than the annual updates of the national system.

[Roger de Coverly]

Just had a private message from an interesting source asking me about an alternative to the ECF grading system at National level. Maybe not national but NCCU - theres another thought, h'm maybe thats something else to look at.

Once upon a time, grading was handled at the level of the unions (SCCU, NCCU etc. ). This lead to the obvious problem that if you played in more than one union, you got more than one grade. Non-disclosure of the "other" grade lead to disputes over grading prize eligibility as well. The grading system went national in the mid 1980s (and almost crashed in its second year of operation)

[Alan Walton]

Hi,

There are alternative grading lists available (i.e. Yorkshire and one produced by Harry Lamb for the North West), but Roger is correct that they are only useful for local purposes, and with the small sample of games available make them statistically inaccurate.

I have noticed that my NW grade produced every six months by HL fluctuates quite alot depending on the volume of league games I play in that period

I think people would support a national grading system if they understood the exact cost to an individual, and if it is accurate in its calculation

The current system falls down on both the above, the game fee is sometimes mindboggling ,and the calcuation still uses a basic averaging calc (also the dubious inflations that have recently happen don't exude confidence in the system)

[Ljubica Lazarevic]

I understand very little about the operation of the current grading system. However, I thought that the majority of the work is handled by volunteers. Could someone explain what the game fee pay for?

[Roger de Coverly]

Could someone explain what the game fee pay for?

The office in Battle.

[Adam Raoof]

Could someone explain what the game fee pay for?

The office in Battle.

It's not possible to be that specific. You can say that game fee raises X amount of money, and you can say that the office in Battle costs Y, but the two are not co-dependent.

Also the grading is not entirely done by volunteers, and that costs a reasonable amount in honoraria every year. There are costs associated with printing the grading list, and costs that would be incurred if our grading database host was not so generous!

[Ljubica Lazarevic]

Surely those who choose to have a grading list pay the associated costs to have one...

[Alan Walton]

Hi,

I think this is the problem with the game fee

The general player would believe that the game fee is relating to the game being graded, and the membership fee being for the running of the federation

But elements of the game fee are being diverted to non-grading related purposes, therefore this makes game fee look like some kind of stealth tax to help fund the running costs of the ECF

[Adam Raoof]

Surely those who choose to have a grading list pay the associated costs to have one...

I am not sure I understand the question; could you rephrase it?

[Roger de Coverly]

I am not sure I understand the question; could you rephrase it?

I'd presume she meant that if you want a printed list, then you pay for the costs of printing with the cover price. That's one area where the web has worked against the ECF in a financial sense. Fifteen years ago, the accounts implied that grading was self-financing because the direct costs of grading were offset by income from the sale of printed grading lists. You wouldn't be able to not publish grades on the web, so that income source is no longer available.

[Adam Raoof]

My apologies; Roger and Alan and Ljubica. You are all right - the exact amount of game fee is not calibrated to precisely match the cost of grading. If you like, it is a tax on playing chess, but I don't mind paying taxes to support the whole of the ECF. Hypothecated taxes (like the Television Licence) have their own, unique problems.

The bottom line is we could keep game fee and membership fees at steady levels and still have a successful and financially solvent ECF. Just not yet. We need to do a bit of work first, and that is definitely in hand.

[Roger de Coverly]

3. A Game is played between someone with a local grade in the local league and one of those with a national grade. Will the ECF grade the game for the ECF member?

Only if played in an event which is a corporate member of the ECF and pays its corporate membership fee for inter alia grading services. Congresses and leagues have always been able to opt out of ECF membership with the games in their events not being included in the national grading system.

In the past, full direct members of the BCF could get games rated in the circumstances you describe. This benefit is now only available for non-English events and when participation in the foreign event is notified in advance. This helps remove the possibility of grade manipulation.