Hi, I recently joined the USCF and will be attending my first tournament in 2 weeks. How long does it usually take for a rating to update in the system after an event? Also, do I need to play a certain number of games in order to get rid of my “unrated” rating? Thanks.
From msa.uschess.org/FAQ.php:
It takes 4 ratable games to get a published rating, it takes 26 ratable games to get an established rating.
On the other hand, you can get a sneak unofficial peek at what your rating will be (even if based on fewer than 4 games, I believe) as soon as your tournament organizer submits the crosstable. Often, this is done the same day the tournament finishes, or within the next day or two.
From the USCF home page go to Players and Ratings, then Player-Rating Lookup. Type in your 8-digit USCF ID number. Go to the Tournament History tab, and bingo – your name is up in lights.
That rating won’t become official, though, until the first of the following month, or the month after that, and then only if it is based on at least 4 games. In the meantime, you’ll probably still show up as unrated on the wall charts and pairing sheets of any tournament you play in.
Bill Smythe
Another way to get to the member ratings area is to go to msa.uschess.org
You can also receive an email whenever an event you have played in has been rated.
To update your email preferences, go to secure2.uschess.org/email/email-pref-update.php.
You will need to know your USCF ID and PIN,
Thanks for the info guys, I appreciate it.
Your rating may also move a few points when the rating becomes official relative what the unofficial rating was because the initial rating is based on the order the events are received and sometimes that is not the same as the order the events ended. When the monthly supplement is created this is corrected.
It can change for other reasons as well. The USCF processes dozens of corrections to rated events every month.
Most of them are mis-reported results, eg, player X won a game with player Y that was reported the other way around.
ID corrections are also fairly common. We have over 800,000 names in our database now, and many cases of players with similar if not identical names. (A good reason to keep your USCF ID card and show it at every tournament.)
Either of those types of corrections can cause someone’s rating to change, and once one player’s rating changes it can affect other players in that event, and all of those players in subsequent events.
Or an MSA printout showing your recent tournament history.
Bill Smythe
Although if I wanted to play in the U1600 section of the World Open, say, I could just as easily print out someone else’s recent tournament history.
Alex Relyea
They’re not idiots at the CCA. If you offered a printed tournament history at the World Open, I’ll bet you’d be asked for another form of ID as confirmation.
– Hal Terrie
The tournament history page doesn’t necessarily show someone’s current published rating, nor does it show a member’s expiration date.
So it fails in all three things that a TD may need to know:
- Proof of someone’s USCF ID/identity
- Proof of current USCF membership
- Proof of current rating/eligibility for an under section
Mike - Once someone has established a web site/forum account as a USCF member, that person has demonstrated knowledge of their USCF ID number and PIN.
I suggest that access to the member’s settings mechanisms you refer to above be granted to anyone here who logs in as a USCF member, to simplify the number of hoops through which members must jump.
In my opinion, only TDs and Affiliates need more security in establishing access to certain USCF web site functions than this basic level, and even that could be addressed by recognizing who is a TD or an Affiliate, and performing some higher level of verification of who they are as they establish an account, and also requiring a strong password for such accounts.
As you are probably aware, Hal, the secure2.uschess.org server is a different server than the uschess.org website server, making it relatively difficult to verify on THAT server that someone has logged in on THIS server.
That won’t happen on my watch at the World Open. The last person who pretended to be someone else in one of my sections not only got kicked out of the tournament but also had an ethics complaint filed against him which led to a lengthy suspension from all USCF tournaments.
I would think that a method should not be hard to devise, and that there may be several ways to do accomplish this. Perhaps Marty or Brian would suggest something workable if you asked either of them, or I could help figure it out in with you or with someone like one of them. Certainly, once trust has been established on one server under USCF control, it should be possible for a second server under USCF control to be told that this is so.