Wrong! – It’s intuitive to expect any benefit or condition of being a member of ECF to apply throughout the period of membership, and this used to be so – until ‘rolling membership‘ was introduced, causing much confusion. If you’re not aware of why there can now be a fee liability for some of the games you play whilst a member, the following explanation may clarify. If you’re au fait with this recent change, skip to ‘What changes could NECL make’.

How so? – Traditionally, when you joined ECF (or renewed) the annual membership applied to the whole of the current playing season. Regardless of when you paid, membership included free grading of all games played throughout that season. Prior to 2011, new grades were calculated annually, at the end of each season; then twice yearly, Jan and July, until 2020; then grades were recalculated and published monthly – though game fees, often called grading fees, have been charged annually throughout. These are invoiced to leagues after the end of each playing season and clubs contributed their share of this after checking with their players.

|<=================== playing season =======================>|
|<================= membership period ======================>|
|<================ free grading period =======================>|

Up to 2017, ECF charged a set amount per graded game, so those who played fewer games would often wait to decide if it was cheaper to pay that instead of paying a membership fee. Then, ECF decided it was uneconomic for ECF to chase small amounts and set game fees to be the same price as bronze membership, but apply to any number of games above a free quota of 3, per league (or per club for graded internal club games). Game counts of non-ECF-members were therefore shown in player lists on the NECL website to help track this, and those likely to play more than 3 graded games in the season were encouraged to join (or renew). Although clubs could not guarantee a non-member will join/renew, they could delay inclusion in team selections until ECF membership is assured, so paying a subscription up front was preferable to later having to cover invoiced fees (and more economic for players who play in more than one league, or have internal club graded games, as the same level of fee is repeatedly invoiced to each ‘cost centre’ where the quota is exceeded). If an application was shown to be in process it’s completion was taken on trust, otherwise any occasional delays on this tended to be only a SHORT period of uncertainty before player, club and league all knew where they stood.

Under ‘Rolling Membership‘, started in 2023, you are labelled as a member for 12 months from the beginning of the month in which you pay to join/renew, which can now generally span parts of two playing seasons. However, ECF considered it inconvenient to shift the grading period in line with this new period of membership – so they stayed with the traditional system of free grading of all games played in the season of joining/renew!

|<======= playing season 1 ======>||<======= playing season 2 =======>|
………………|<===== membership period 1 =====>|
|<===== free grading period 1 =====>||<== ?? grading period 2 ?? …..

So membership period 1 above covers games played in the free grading period 1 – but does NOT cover ANY graded games played in playing season 2. This is where the issue begins! LONGER periods of uncertainty now arise, particularly where players join/renew mid-to-late-season. It also means more instances of uncertainty, due to more liabilities, are likely to arise during playing season 2.

Liability for potential game fees starts from the beginning of playing season 2, until the start of membership period 2 (if that takes place). Some ‘liable members’ find this hard to accept. I use the term ‘liable members’ for players in period 1 of their membership who are playing graded games in playing season 2. Their memberships expire on or before 30th June in playing season 2. For game fee purposes, we have to regard them the same as non-members during playing season 2, so we now also show their game counts in player lists on the NECL website to help clubs track this.

Impact? – After the now longer period of uncertainty, if a player doesn’t eventually renew, who should fund payment of the invoice for grading period 2?
ECF clearly hold the league responsible. Item 2 of their invoicing policy says:-
“By submitting game results to the rating server, organisations accept liability for any pay to play or game fee that is incurred.”
This ‘liability’ on a league is questionable, when ECF membership is contracted between player and ECF. When leagues submit match results, leagues they can no longer ensure a player will be a member on a future date (30th June of season 2). Somehow, without consultation or prior-agreement, ECF now expect leagues to anticipate and secure funding for future invoicing when neither league, club nor player can absolutely guarantee future renewals, in situations where expiry of current memberships can be several months away, whilst clubs no longer have their former leverage. It is no longer practical to await renewals by liable members before picking them for team matches – and It would be totally unreasonable to meanwhile disallow participation when they reach quota! Also, those players would not expect to be asked to pay for membership period 2 in advance, just to avoid potential fees for the games they are now playing in playing period 2 – and even if those players wanted to reassure certainty by paying the future renewal in advance, ECF currently do not even allow it, insisting that..
“Membership can be renewed on the existing level from 28 days before the membership expires“.

In a scenario of say 50 non-renewals @£21 the league would be liable for £1050 – so measures had to be taken to limit this perceived liability. This required extra work. The league treasurer now has to manage a game fee reserve fund, made up of transfers-in from club treasurers. The webmaster had to facilitate this in the on-line accounts as well as the extra tracking to easily identify liable members for monitoring by club and league treasurers. A list of players, filtered to show only those at-or-over quota in league or club games and confirming the status of any league reserve fund payments, is shown here. If/when players join/renew, their reserve is transferred back to their club account.

This was formalised at NECL AGM with rule 22b rule amended by appending:-
…. “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.“
The rule was meant as a deterrent, but when clubs overlook this and game points are lost due to the ineligible player, the played game is still graded, so it doesn’t change any liability.

How could ECF help?
1. Revert to previous system – unlikely now the step has been made?
ECF say players now get “a full year membership”, though that was already the case for grading purposes if you’d already played games in the season you joined (but not for ‘benefits’ such as discounts on goods from partnering sites – so if partner discounting was the driver for this change, issuing time-limited-discount-codes could have done this instead?)
Arguably, players who only started a series of graded games when joining still don’t get “a full year membership” – but would do if …
2. ECF could restore the free grading periods to again be in line with each player’s new membership period, this would a) restore the status quo to what is intuitively expected! and b) restore previous club leverage (though the invoicing process may need to be done monthly instead of annually).
3. Provide a means to pay part/extended renewals to help players synchronise to an early-season cycle – which would help reduce periods of uncertainty and ease the required size of club floats at no extra long-term expense to players. When I asked ECF on this (Oct 2024), they said it had been considered but decided to not allow it. Hence, it is destined to perpetuate! – not a positive influence on league chess?

What changes could NECL make? – failing above actions by ECF, NECL could;
1. Ring-fence a set amount (or defined proportion of the league balance?), to be used as a general game fee reserve float and just recover any end of season liabilities from clubs? – avoids many in-season dialogs and ‘to-ing and fro-ing’ of pending reserves.
2. Delay submissions to grading for results of all games that involve a new or liable-member player who has already reached quota – until such date that membership status as of 30th June of the current season is verified. This is because the stated assertion of league liability by ECF rests on the action of the league making the grading submission – so no submission – no liability!
This would of course also delay the normal grading process for opponent-players, who may have got used to expecting to see grade details change on a monthly basis (and due to previously clarifying with ECF that ‘events’ be submitted in entirety or not at all, the full match result should possibly be delayed?) – with a knock-on effect of causing small differences in published grades during the season, compared to there being no delay. This would dispense with the need for a grading reserve fund, though tracking is still needed.
3. A more drastic measure is to not submit games for ECF grading at all and instead use a local equivalent calculation. Again, no submission – no liability! – but contentious – as it depends on what value club members place on having an ECF authenticated grade? No doubt some would consider it essential and be ECF members anyway so maybe play less league. Others may simply appreciate not needing to pay an ECF membership. This has happened in the past, e.g. Yorkshire had it’s own system until 2018 (despite issues raised with the BCF as to formula being patent-able and data it produced being copyrightable, or not, with attempts to charge local leagues for this). About 185 players are registered to play NECL league – worth about £4k annual revenue to ECF – typically about a dozen may have a potential game fee liability at any one time.
4… Other suggestions?

Update: ECF acknowledged this issue by attempting to address it with the following wording in the 2025/26 version of the “game fee document”;-

“Players who were ECF members at Bronze level or above in the relevant league season at the time all of their league games were played. Clubs are asked to check any game fee invoices they receive and bring to the ECF Office’s attention any instances of players who were not members as at 30^th June but were members at the time they played all their games in the preceding season. For example, players who are not members as at 30^th June 2026 will be expected to have been ECF members at Bronze level or above for all the games they played in the preceding 2025/2026 season. If players satisfy that condition, we will always consider a waiver for such cases when they are brought to our attention.”

Presumably settlement of account would be required from the player before they can again renew in the future. This could work, but the wording seems somewhat ‘high-handed’ by putting the onus on leagues to check details and ‘appeal’ to be considered for a waiver! Leagues might instead, expect that ECF, who have full game and player details, simply not invoice fees for games played whilst a player was a liable member (and therefore were full members in the said proceeding season) – and any exceptions that accidentally get through and pointed out by leagues be immediately accepted as an error on the part of ECF, rather than insist the league appeal for a waiver?