FIDE ELO – reporting requirements (3/4)

In our April survey, a majority of respondents indicated their preference of moving towards a unified global rating system (FIDE). In order to have a good understanding of both systems, we are launching this series of articles. This is the third of four articles explaining the reporting requirements for FIDE rated tournaments.

1. the FIDE ELO system, calculation rules and differences with our national ELO system
2. the FIDE ELO cost structure
3. the FIDE ELO reporting requirements
4. the FIDE ELO arbiter requirements

How to report tournaments for FIDE ELO?

There are four main steps to be done in order to report your tournament for FIDE ELO:

1. pre-register your tournament using a standard form and send it to the RBCF FIDE delegate
2. report results per round if the tournament lasts longer than 30 days
3. send in the tournament results report, latests …
4. pay the rating fee as soon as the RBCF received the FIDE invoice and forwarded the tournament costs to you

1. Pre-register your tournament

Registration of tournaments is done through the RBCF FIDE delegate. In order to respect FIDE deadlines, registration needs to be done latest:

• 14 days before the tournament start for tournaments where players cannot score a norm
• 21 days before the tournament start for tournaments where players can score a norm

Registration of a tournament is done through the registration form availabe on the FIDE forms overview page. Fill in at least all the required fields, and send it to the RBCF: fide@frbe-kbsb-ksb.be.

The RBCF FIDE delegate will review your request, register the tournament at FIDE, and send you back one or more FIDE registration number(s). Your tournament is then visible in the list of FIDE registered tournaments.

2. Report intermediate results if tournament lasts longer than 30 days

For tournaments lasting longer than 30 days, a registration needs to be done per round and intermediate results need to be reported per round. The reporting deadlines are the same as indicated in the next section.

For these longer tournaments, only the first round will be invoiced. This means, there is no financial drawback in having multiple registration numbers.

In order to submit a homologation application, the RBCF manager must choose between three options:

• All rounds in 1 report
• New long tournament → needed for the first round of a tournament lasting more than 30 days
• Add rounds to existing long tournament → needed for an additional round

3. Send in the tournament report in time

Final tournament results need to be submitted for reporting at the latest 3 days after the tournament ended.

FIDE calculates for each homologated tournament (or round) the month in which the results will be processed. The rule is that if the end date of the tournament or round is until the third last day of the month, then it is month + 1. If the end date of the tournament or round falls on one of the two last days, then it is month + 2. Examples:

• 01/07/2024 to FIDE Rating List (FRL) of 1 August 2024
• 15/07/2024 to FRL of 1 August 2024
• 29/07/2024 to FRL of 1 August 2024
• 30/07/2024 to FRL of 1 September 2024
• 27/02/2024 to FRL of 1 March 2024
• 27/02/2025 to FRL of 1 April 2025

If a tournament ends on 30/07/2024 and the report is sent to the RBCF manager the same day and he also loads the results the same day, the results will only be processed for the FRL of 1 September.

This is not the case the other way around. If the tournament results are not uploaded by the RBCF manager three days before the end of the month, the results will only be processed in month + 2. For example, the report with the results is uploaded by the RBCF manager on 30/07/2024, then these results will only be processed for the FRL of 1 September 2024.

4. Pay the rating fee

An invoice is send by FIDE to the RBCF twice a year, in January and July. The RBCF sends through indivual invoices to the tournament organizers, with the costs for the tournament reporting. All costs charged by FIDE for rating reporting are invoiced to the tournament organizers. The RBCF does not add any markup to these invoices.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the benefit of tournament pre-registration?

Visibility, controllability and discipline.

Visibility, because players can consult the FIDE rated tournaments list for an overview of tournaments that will be rated.
Controllability, because both RBCF and FIDE can verify whether tournament results are reported as expected.
Discipline, in order to avoid late submissions.

The benefits of tournament registration far outweight the additional effort. As such, the RBCF is also preparing pre-registration for national ELO processing. Regardless of the fact that we’ll migrate our ranking system to FIDE only, pre-registration will become a requirement in the future. We plan a transition period for all organizer to adapt to this new way of working.

What are the requirements for games to be rated?

• the rate of play must be accepted by FIDE.
• all listed arbiter must have a FIDE arbiter license and there must always be at least one chief arbiter
• there must be a chief organizer who must have a FIDE ID

How do I generate an (intermediate) tournament report?

FIDE ELO reporting is natively integrated in the SWAR pairing software. Consult the SWAR manual for more details.

What are player requirements to be able to participate?

All players need to have a FIDE ID in order for the tournament results to be processed.

• Affiliated Belgian players without a FIDE ID are allowed to participate in tournaments organized in Belgium and will automatically receive a FIDE ID when uploading the first tournament file. However, the full date of birth must be filled in for the players without FIDE ID in the report.
• Non-affiliated Belgian players without a FIDE ID need to affiliate in order to be able to participate. The underlying reason is that membership with FIDE involves costs and that these must be recovered at least once if a membership with the association is obtained.
  If this requirement is not fulfilled, the player will not receive a Belgian FIDE ID and hence the tournament will not be sent to FIDE for rating treatment.
• Foreign players need to have a FIDE ID in order to be able to participate. The RBCF manager cannot assign a FIDE ID to them. Assignment of the FIDE ID needs to be done by the player’s foreign chess federation.
  If this requirement is not fulfilled, the tournament will not be accepted by FIDE.

Is there a penalty if results are submitted after the deadline?

The clubs must send the RBCF manager no later than three days after the end of the tournament (and in the case of a norm by a player also the pgn file). If a report is uploaded too late by the RBCF manager, a fine will be imposed. This fine will increase each month that the reports are not processed.

If after three months in which the report could have been processed, the results have not yet been received, the tournament can no longer be processed and a fine will follow. FIDE invoices the fine to the RBCF, but the RBCF simply invoices this fine to the club / league / federation of the organizer.

For the sake of clarity, let’s give an example. Suppose a tournament ends on 27/07/2024. The calculated FRL will be 1 August 2024. However, a club can send its report without a fine until 30/07/2024. If it does so on that day, the games will not be processed for the FRL of 1 August 2024, but they will be for the FRL of 1 September 2024. FIDE will NOT impose a fine because all deadlines were respected.

What are the additional requirements in case a norm is obtained by a player?

When a Belgian player obtains a norm, he should receive a signed document from the chief arbiter. In the best case it should already been signed by the organizing federation. He must without delay scan this document and send it to the Belgian FIDE Delegate. Additionally, he must send the link of the tournament website of the result and also a pgn-file containing the relevant games:

• Is this in a Swiss tournament or in a team tournament, then only the games of the player(s) who achieved a norm should be put in that pgn-file.
• Is it achieved in a Round Robin Individual tournament, then ALL games should be put in that pgn-file.

Finally, if there is not a recent players photo on the FIDE ratings website, the player must send a recent photo with the exact measures of 480 pixels wide and 600 pixels high.

What if an incorrect result is reported to FIDE?

If an error is found in a reported (round of a) Belgian tournament, then the organizer/chief arbiter must (i) inform the Belgian FIDE Delegate and (ii) share the corrected report.

There are two possibilities, depending on whether the error was discovered within the same month that the tournament must be reported:

• If yes (same month): then the Belgian FIDE Delegate can resend the corrected report
• If not (different month): then the Belgian FIDE Delegate has no possibility to change something. He will send a correction request to the FIDE Rating Officer. In the past the most correction requests were not treated. It’s crucial for organizers to understand the importance of accurate reporting.

Questions & references

The FIDE Rating Regulations are the official FIDE source of information. For all questions or feedback, please reach out through fide@frbe-kbsb-ksb.be.