The Board discussed FIDE ratings fees this morning. No decision has been reached, so for now those fees will remain the same after December 1st.
Paul is going to discuss the USCF’s concerns over what fees FIDE will charge for large open Swiss events with FIDE officials at the World Championship in Mexico City in September, so the issue will likely come up again after that, either by email or at the November meeting, which is currently scheduled for the first weekend in November, in Crossville.
The 2nd meeting is tentatively the first weekend in February and will be held online (technology to be determined), the 3rd meeting will probably be at the US Championships, depending on when and where they are held.
An important point to bear in mind is that the USCF must give a minimum of four months’ notice if the FIDE rating fees are changed. Otherwise (especially if you go to a per-player format) organizers could be sandbagged into paying a grotesque amount.
That’s precisely why they aren’t being increased in December, John.
We don’t yet know what the new fees need to be in order to recoup our out-of-pocket expenses, in large measure because we don’t know if FIDE intends to charge us something like 1100 Euros for an 1100 player event like the Amateur Team East or more like 200 Euros if that’s how many players had FIDE ratable results.
(Either way it’s more than the $35 we charged the 85 FIDE rated events that ended during FY 2006-07.)
If Paul Truong gets a final answer from someone at FIDE during the World Championships, the Board might be able to make a decision on that by November, in which case we’d probably be looking at an implementation date no earlier than April or May of 2008.