Wrong! – That was the case before ECF introduced ‘rolling membership’ – Now it isn’t.
Arguably it should be. Now it’s counter-intuitive and has caused much confusion.
How so? – Traditionally when a player joined ECF (or renewed) membership applied to the whole of the current playing season regardless of the date on which they apply. Membership included free grading of all games played during that season.
|<=================== playing season =======================>|
|<================= membership period ======================>|
|<================ free grading period =======================>|
If you were not a member, your club could encourage you to join (or rejoin if a previous membership expired) and not select you to play after reaching your quota of 3 graded league games. This helped avoid the league being invoiced for potential grading fees.
If you confirmed a membership application was in process and about to be published, this would be taken on trust. Clubs knew they would be expected to cover any invoiced game fees for their players so could use leverage on players to join. Any occasional delay on this only tended to be a SHORT period of uncertainty before everyone knew where they stood.
This was the situation for so long that most players were ingrained in the belief that there was no grading fee for games played while you’re a member – and was true.
‘Rolling Membership’ – In 2024 rolling membership disrupted the status quo. It applied to the 12 months from when you join/renew (actually 12 months from from the beginning of the month in which you join/renew) so now generally spans more than one playing season. Unfortunately ECF then considered it inconvenient to administer free grading in line with the same new period of membership – so they stayed with the traditional system of free grading of all games played in the season of joining/renew. This created a bit of a problem!
|<======= playing season 1 ======>||<======= playing season 2 =======>|
………………|<===== membership period 1 =====>|
|<====== free grading 1 =========>||<== ?? grading 2 ?? …..
Although membership period 1 still covers the free grading period 1 – it does NOT cover ANY of the graded games played in playing season 2 (marked ??). This is where the impact begins and has caused much confusion!
Liability for potential game fees starts from the beginning of playing season 2, until the start of membership period 2 (cushioned only by the 3 game quota) – but not easy to accept for some liable members? I use the term ‘liable members’ for players in playing season 2 still in membership period 1. Their memberships texpire on or before 30th June of season 2. For game fee purposes, we have to treat them the same as non-members during playing season 2 so their game counts are also shown on the website to help clubs track this.
Impact? – Firstly, a LONGER period of uncertainty concerning future memberships
Most players do renew but who would pay the invoice for grading period 2 if they don’t?
ECF clearly hold the league responsible for this – even though neither league, club nor player can guarantee renewal.
Treasurers need to avoid the league having liability, so the league treasurer now has to manage a grading fee reserve funded from transfers in from club treasurers.
Clubs no longer have the previous leverage, as players would not expect to be asked to pay for membership period 2 in advance (because that would cover games in grading period 2). Hence NECL rule 22b rule had to be amended saying
…. “Any players incurring a pending fee to ECF via NECL will be ineligible whilst
their club has insufficient credit to cover all of such players’ fees.”
Furthermore, ECF do no help here as they will not allow renewals until near to expiry, and do not provide a means to pay part/extended renewals that would allow players to synchronise to an early-season cycle. The longest periods of uncertainty therefore arise due players who may have joined late in the playing season 1, and is destined to perpetuate. I feel that all this has not had a positive influence on chess.