My child participated in a USCF rated tournament this Saturday 2/2/2008. About 140 players participated in 3 USCF rated sections. I think this makes it a class B.
The club website, and the tournament flyer clearly stated that the event was to be USCF rated. They collected the $7 jr tm from non members and sold full memberships/renewals also.
Maybe I’m just impatient… but I was having trouble finding the tournament crosstable, and my child’s rating page does not yet list this tournament… so I started digging a little further.
I found the membership of the person running the tournament (the guy operating the computer, who is also the main contact for the affiliate - club president) I think he used to be a Club Level TD.
On the TD tab it says… “TD Certification has Expired (Expires 2008-01-31)”
I’m just shaking my head, as this person has shown poor judgment in other areas. Example: Failed to contact the clearinghouse and scheduled an event that he calls a " State Championship" across the street from an event being held on the same day by the true “state affiliate”.
Not to speak to any other issue, but yes you are being impatient to expect this to be posted and rated already. Often one can, but there are sometimes issues with memberships and other matters. The requirement is to submit within 7 days.
In this case, I think if the TD isn’t active the system will not let him submit the event.
Back to the impatient parent - for example, I did a 330 player event yesterday. I am clearing memberships between church obligations and work issues. At least one of the memberships has an issue that I have to get resolved and may have to get the office involved or I may have to talk to the coach. So it will get done when it gets done.
ADDED - Just for the record I submitted my 2/2 event for rating on 2/8. It took until Wednesady to clear up the problem with the membership.
If any of the new memberships were paid by a check made out to the USCF then the check will have to travel to the office and be processed before the tournament can be rated. That is the most obvious of the possible reasons for a delay. Also, just a few years ago people were often happy if a tournament got rated within a month, let alone a day.
As far as the TD goes, you mentioned he was the primary contact, but not whether or not he was the primary TD at the tournament (the person doing the computer is often, but not always, the chief TD - at the nationals and many state tournaments the chief TD does either very little or nothing on the computers). I direct a number of tournaments (some over 700 players) for affiliates that have expired TDs or non-TDs taking the entries and handing things over to me the day of the tournament. People looking only at the contacts on the flyer may get one impression that the presumed director(s) is/are out of their depth when the actual case is that the staff readily satisfies the official requirements for the tournament.
The apparently "competing’ state championship is something that would lend itself to causing some concerns. You can contact the state affiliate with any questions you have about it.
It’s awfully easy to have your TD certification lapse, because it isn’t necessarily concurrent with your USCF membership.
Club certification is not automatically renewable. (It used to not be renewable at all, but a few years ago we were able to convince TDCC and the Delegates to let it be renewable for three years providing the TD takes and passes an open book exam based on the rulebook. If the TD in question here asks, the office will usually send out the test and extend his certification for a couple of months while he takes the exam. We would prefer he upgrade to local TD certification, providing he has the necessary experience, of course.)
Local, Senior and ANTD certification is supposed to be automatically renewed by the office providing the TD has the requisite number of events (1 per year, I think.) I’m not sure if Larry Pond always gets this done on time, he only works part time.
TD/A won’t let a lapsed TD log in, so usually they figure that out quickly. Right after the first of the month I suspect Larry hears from several TDs about it.
When an affiliate takes memberships by check on site with the checks made out to the USCF or when the affiliate chooses to send in the payment as opposed to paying for it online using a credit card, someone (often the chief TD) has to forward the check(s) to the USCF office so they can process the funds. For obvious reasons, the USCF isn’t going to activate those memberships before the check(s) arrive, and that means the event can’t be rated until then, either.
With rerating, even if an event isn’t rated for a couple of weeks it will be put into the proper place in sequence once it has been rated.
Are automatic notification emails sent out? I know that some of us TDs are primarily assistants at scholastic events who never have a need to log into the TD/A area.
I believe Larry Pond mails out notices based on a computer label run as soon as they appear on his desk (well, pretty close to pretty soon) which is fairly often.