ECF Agm 2017

Debate directly related to English Chess Federation matters.
John Reyes
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by John Reyes » Mon Oct 23, 2017 2:49 pm

I hope to see what the ECF will come back, but for £5 for bronze/silver members, it make sense to just offer it straight to silver member for a £5

that is good for English chess?

but I feel that for Gold member is £17 ok or maybe an round number to either £20 a year and fix that payment for the next 10 years?
Any postings on here represent my personal views only and also Dyslexia as well

Roger de Coverly
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Roger de Coverly » Mon Oct 23, 2017 3:02 pm

John Reyes wrote:that is good for English chess?
The context is mass participation events for inexperienced juniors. These are more often than not organised as individual Swiss events even where participants are present representing their schools. By the nature of the event, for some players it may be their first and only experience of organised chess.

So the questions for the ECF, are whether such events should be graded, and if so, how it should exploit its monopoly status on grading to collect money from either organisers or the parents of participants. In previous times, if an event had 100 participants, the ECF would levy the organiser around £ 1 a head, giving it an income of £ 100. If there was another event next week with the same people, it would want another £ 100.

John Reyes
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by John Reyes » Mon Oct 23, 2017 3:51 pm

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Roger de Coverly wrote:
John Reyes wrote:that is good for English chess?
The context is mass participation events for inexperienced juniors. These are more often than not organised as individual Swiss events even where participants are present representing their schools. By the nature of the event, for some players it may be their first and only experience of organised chess.

So the questions for the ECF, are whether such events should be graded, and if so, how it should exploit its monopoly status on grading to collect money from either organisers or the parents of participants. In previous times, if an event had 100 participants, the ECF would levy the organiser around £ 1 a head, giving it an income of £ 100. If there was another event next week with the same people, it would want another £ 100.


these were the figures for memberships

Annual Total Membership
Mem Cat 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16 2016-17
1. Jnr Bronze 446 288 256 218 172
2. Jnr Silver (FREE) 528 515 438 463 1008
3. Jnr Silver (paid) 401 556 526 512
4. Jnr Gold 475 458 483 544 565
5. Jnr Platinum 4 6 6 5 6
6. Bronze 4320 4019 4033 3951 3993
7. Silver 2041 2170 2205 2106 2148
8. Gold 1706 1836 1933 1965 2013
9. Platinum 279 210 190 126 127
10. Lifetime 42 39
Total members 9799 9903 10100 9946 10583

These statistics are those calculated at the time, and earlier years have not been adjusted to make them directly comparable to later figures. The following qualifications apply:
Figures for 2015-16 onwards are for members joining for the given season (including 3-year memberships). Previous years figures are for membership at 31 August, and include members re-joining for the following season prior to 1st September.
Figures prior to 2015-16 do not separate Lifetime Members from those paying a Platinum subscription
Figures for 2012-13 do not distinguish between free and paid junior silver memberships.

Current Membership at date of AGM
Mem Cat Oct 15 Oct 16 Oct 17 change
1. Jnr Bronze 121 83 78 -6.0%
2. Jnr Silver (FREE) 167 317 1236 289.9%
3. Jnr Silver (paid) 426 417 569 36.5%
4. Jnr Gold 426 408 475 16.4%
5. Jnr Platinum 5 4 6 50.0%
6. Bronze 2141 2066 2238 8.3%
7. Silver 1455 1434 1522 6.1%
8. Gold 1514 1558 1619 3.9%
9. Platinum 115 114 100 -12.3%
10. Lifetime 47 41 40 -2.4%
Total members 6417 6442 7883 22.4%
Paying members 6203 6084 6607 8.6%
Any postings on here represent my personal views only and also Dyslexia as well

Michael Flatt
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Michael Flatt » Mon Oct 23, 2017 5:58 pm

Annual Total Membership
Mem Cat 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16 2016-17
1. Jnr Bronze 446 288 256 218 172
2. Jnr Silver (FREE) 528 515 438 463 1008
3. Jnr Silver (paid) 401 556 526 512
4. Jnr Gold 475 458 483 544 565
5. Jnr Platinum 4 6 6 5 6
Is the huge increase in Junior Silver (FREE) purely due to the efforts of the Director of Home Chess in grading EPSCA events last season and registering previously unrecorded junior players as ECF members?
Have many of those players taken out paid Silver membership in the following season?

The decline in those taking out Junior Bronze membership would seem to indicate that there is insufficient benefit to continue in that class. Should it be abolished?

Roger de Coverly
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Roger de Coverly » Mon Oct 23, 2017 6:20 pm

Michael Flatt wrote: The decline in those taking out Junior Bronze membership would seem to indicate that there is insufficient benefit to continue in that class. Should it be abolished?
Relatively few junior only events are structured as leagues, most get classified as tournaments.

Alex Holowczak
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Alex Holowczak » Mon Oct 23, 2017 7:26 pm

Michael Flatt wrote:Is the huge increase in Junior Silver (FREE) purely due to the efforts of the Director of Home Chess in grading EPSCA events last season and registering previously unrecorded junior players as ECF members?
No, it isn't.

It's mostly due to the efforts of the Director of Home Chess, not in his capacity as Director of Home Chess, in grading the UK Chess Challenge Gigafinals last season and registering previously unrecorded junior players as ECF members.

I did the same thing for Warwickshire Chess Association junior events last season, and this will have been another 200 or so free junior silvers. They are up for renewal this year. So far about 2/5 of them have renewed, but the raw number of renewals is about the same number as free junior silvers I had this time last year. Last year, we had about 80 players at a junior tournament in Coventry. This year we had about 80 players at a junior tournament in Coventry. They're the only decent-sized junior event we've run so far. So I'll see how it develops throughout the season.

Because they were members after 1st July - that's when the Gigafinals were held - they do not need to renew until 31st August, 2018.

EPSCA didn't attempt anything like this, because they were quite satisfied to pay the Game Fee.

Michael Flatt
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Michael Flatt » Tue Oct 24, 2017 12:24 am

Because they were members after 1st July - that's when the Gigafinals were held - they do not need to renew until 31st August, 2018.
Strictly, the Free Silver memberships for the GigaFinalists shouldn't have been included in the 2016-17 season since the associated games won't be graded until the Jan 2018 ECF grading list. Presumably, any games in other competitions that these juniors played will have been subject to the normal game fee during the 2016-17 season.

So, EPSCA may have been able to avoid some of the fees levied on them if they had adopted the same approach as the UK Chess Challenge Gigafinals and preemptively registered previously unrecorded players as ECF members.

Would EPSCA be able to benefit by doing that this season?

Incidentally, I had refrained from grading the Megafinal I had helped organise because of the level of the grading fees. Had I know that I could have registered players for free silver membership the event could have been graded, as could all the other Megafinals.
Last edited by Michael Flatt on Tue Oct 24, 2017 12:35 am, edited 1 time in total.

Roger de Coverly
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Roger de Coverly » Tue Oct 24, 2017 12:32 am

Michael Flatt wrote: Strictly, the Free Silver memberships for the GigaFinalists shouldn't have been included in the 2016-17 season since the associated games won't be graded until the Jan 2018 ECF grading list.
Notwithstanding the alleged row a few years ago between an ECF Director and an ECF Manager, I thought it was now a well established practice that joiners on 1st July or later have membership rights until 31st August in the following year.

Alex Holowczak
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Alex Holowczak » Tue Oct 24, 2017 9:49 am

Roger de Coverly wrote:
Michael Flatt wrote: Strictly, the Free Silver memberships for the GigaFinalists shouldn't have been included in the 2016-17 season since the associated games won't be graded until the Jan 2018 ECF grading list.
Notwithstanding the alleged row a few years ago between an ECF Director and an ECF Manager, I thought it was now a well established practice that joiners on 1st July or later have membership rights until 31st August in the following year.
Yes, Michael is just wrong on this point.
Michael Flatt wrote:Would EPSCA be able to benefit by doing that this season?
It won't need to. As I explained at the EPSCA AGM you attended, the events are 3-round team events, so they're covered by the exemption for people playing in 3 games or fewer in a league. (Or 6 Rapidplay games in this case, the EPSCA Association events being Rapidplays.) I sought clarification from Paul Buswell, Chief Invoicer, and David Thomas, the relevant Director, in advance of the meeting to make sure. NYCA has already benefitted from this with its 3-round Jamborees, and Warwickshire is involved with two 4-county invitationals coming up in the next month or so. They're played as mini-leagues over 3 rounds, so there is no liability.
Michael Flatt wrote:Incidentally, I had refrained from grading the Megafinal I had helped organise because of the level of the grading fees. Had I know that I could have registered players for free silver membership the event could have been graded, as could all the other Megafinals.
Indeed. People complained about the cost, so the idea was that if you get rid of the cost, there couldn't be a complaint. But of course there was then a new complaint - now it wasn't the cost that was the problem, it was administratively burdensome. :roll:

It was never clear to me why so few people were taking advantage of the scheme - it is written into the rules, so it was just a case of reading them: http://www.englishchess.org.uk/membersh ... hip-rates/

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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Tue Oct 24, 2017 10:22 am

Alex Holowczak wrote:It was never clear to me why so few people were taking advantage of the scheme - it is written into the rules, so it was just a case of reading them: http://www.englishchess.org.uk/membersh ... hip-rates/
Nudge theory

Michael Flatt
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Michael Flatt » Tue Oct 24, 2017 2:11 pm

It was never clear to me why so few people were taking advantage of the scheme - it is written into the rules, so it was just a case of reading them: http://www.englishchess.org.uk/membersh ... hip-rates/
With the Gigafinals taking place in July, any players enrolled in the ECF Free Junior Silver membership scheme by the tournament organiser would benefit from a full year's membership; however, for players enrolled at the Megafinals, which generally take place around May, the benefit is very much less since there are only two months to the end of the grading year (30th June) and they will have completely missed the half year grading list in January.

It is likely that players and parents would rightly complain if an organiser enrolled a junior player into the membership scheme at an inappropriate time in the calendar.

The fact that the ECF has removed game fee charges for the first 3 standard rate games (and 7 rapidplay games) is welcome since it will be of benefit to all organisers and not just the UK Chess Challenge Gigafinal.

It also raises the question, "Shouldn't players taking out membership after the cut-off for the mid-year grading list (Jamuary) be entitled to a fifty percent reduction of the subscription?"

The six monthly grading list doesn't allow Juniors and fast improving players to easily track their performance, so could some consideration be given to publishing live grades to supplement official grading list?

Roger de Coverly
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Roger de Coverly » Tue Oct 24, 2017 2:19 pm

Michael Flatt wrote: The six monthly grading list doesn't allow Juniors and fast improving players to easily track their performance, so could some consideration be given to publishing live grades to supplement official grading list?
Isn't that what the League Management System is about? The data is already collected for tournaments, so an inaccurate calculation of "this is what your next grade will be if you don't play any more games" is already possible. The hack for juniors from a few years back of treating them as new players makes that more complicated to do than it ought to be.

On recent performance, the ECF will announce one day that grading has gone monthly Elo and as it's an operational decision, no-one will be consulted or invited to vote their approval or disapproval.

Michael Flatt
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Michael Flatt » Tue Oct 24, 2017 2:50 pm

Isn't that what the League Management System is about? The data is already collected for tournaments, so an inaccurate calculation of "this is what your next grade will be if you don't play any more games" is already possible. The hack for juniors from a few years back of treating them as new players makes that more complicated to do than it ought to be.
The ECF League Management System is still in the early days of development and, I understand, has been released for Beta testing and user feedback. It will take some time, if ever, for it to be universally accepted by English Leagues since many have invested considerable time and effort in developing their own systems.

The current ECF grading system is designed for season long leagues. Something more suited to the needs of congress players is needed where 5 or more games are typically played over a weekend.

The publishing of live grades shouldn't be contingent of everyone signing up to the LMS.

Some weekend tournaments that have three standard rated games in a single day wouldn't satisfy FIDE's requirements for the rate of play of an Open event.

Also, if all England's tournaments were to become FIDE rated, would there be sufficient FIDE recognised Arbiters to support them?

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Michael Farthing
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by Michael Farthing » Tue Oct 24, 2017 3:05 pm

Michael Flatt wrote: The current ECF grading system is designed for season long leagues. Something more suited to the needs of congress players is needed where 5 or more games are typically played over a weekend.

The publishing of live grades shouldn't be contingent of everyone signing up to the LMS.
It has been stated quite clearly that it isn't.
Some weekend tournaments that have three standard rated games in a single day wouldn't satisfy FIDE's requirements for the rate of play of an Open event. Also, if all England's tournaments were to become FIDE rated, would there be sufficient FIDE recognised Arbiters to support them?
Don't know what you're driving at here Michael. The (hypothesised) replacement of the current grading system with an ELO system is not the same as moving to FIDE rating, though undoubtedly this may also grow, particularly in the North where we tend to play Friday, 2 Saturday, 2 Sunday. [Leyland is an exception - one thing that regularly puts me off playing there].

David Sedgwick
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Re: ECF Agm 2017

Post by David Sedgwick » Tue Oct 24, 2017 3:10 pm

Michael Flatt wrote:Also, if all England's tournaments were to become FIDE rated, would there be sufficient FIDE recognised Arbiters to support them?
There could be.

The constraint on becoming a FIDE Licensed "Arbiter at National Levels" In England stems from ECF Regulations, not FIDE Regulations. If there were not sufficient, the ECF would have to train more people, relax the Regulations, or accept that some tournaments could not take place.

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