New FIDE Arbiter fees

The FIDE Arbiters commission have introduce a scheduled set of fees for Arbiters. For now they are listed below, comments to come later

6.1

A titled active Arbiter (International Arbiter or FIDE Arbiter) and a National Arbiter
working in a FIDE rated tournament shall be charged with a “licence fee”.
The licence will be valid for life, on the condition the arbiter remains an active
arbiter, and will be in effect from the day after FIDE has received the fee.
The licence fee for National Arbiters is valid for life.
If a National Arbiter is awarded the title of “FIDE Arbiter” the licence fee for this
title has to be paid to FIDE.
If an arbiter upgrades his/her category only the difference between the category
fee has to be paid to FIDE.
If a “FIDE Arbiter” achieves the title of “International Arbiter”, the fee for the new
title has to be paid to FIDE.
The licence fee will be:
a) for A’ Category Arbiters (only IAs):
300 €
b) for B’ Category Arbiters (only IAs):
200 €
c) for C’ Category Arbiters:
IAs
160 €
FAs
120 €
d) for D’ Category Arbiters:
IAs
100 €
FAs
80 €
e) for National Arbiters
20 €
Failure to pay the licence fee will lead to exclusion from the FIDE Arbiters’ list.
The Arbiters’ licence will come into effect from 01. 01. 2013.
From 01. 01. 2013 all arbiters of FIDE rated tournaments shall be licensed.
An arbiter who has become inactive (see annex 2, articles 1.3 and 1.4) is
considered not to be licensed any more.
In order to be active again the arbiter has to pay for a new licence.
If the article 6.6 is not fulfilled, the tournaments shall not be rated.
From 01. 01. 2013 the licence fee will be charged together with the application
fee for all awarded arbiter titles.

Additional Swiss Pairing Rules

If you have looked at the latest set of Dutch Pairing Rules in the FIDE handbook, you might notice a couple of additions. In the "Introductory remarks and Definitions" Section (Section A) a couple of clauses have been added to A7. They are

d. While pairing an odd-number round players having a strong colour preference (players who have had an odd number of games before by any reason) shall be treated like players having an absolute colour preference as long as this does not result in additional downfloaters (GA 2001)
e. While pairing an even-numbered round players having a mild colour preference (players who have had an even number of games before by any reason) shall be treated and counted as if they would have a mild colour preference of that kind (white resp. Black) which reduces the value of x (see A.8) as long as this does not result in additional downfloaters, (GA 2001)

It turns out that these clauses have been part of the rules since 2001, but were only included in the handbook this year (I have no idea why btw). But now that they are there what do they mean?

I asked this question of the Chairman of the FIDE Swiss Pairing Program Committee, Christian Krause. He said that what these rules do is deal with the case where a player hasn't played the same number of rounds as other players in the same score bracket (through byes or forfeits). For example, in pairing an even numbered round a player may have played an even number of games (eg only played 4 of the previous 5 rounds), the players mild colour preference (ie opposite the last colour played if they have had 2 whites and 2 blacks), shall be used to calculate x (the number of pairings in a group that do not satisfy all colour preferences), rather than treating the colour preference as 0 or undefined.

Dealing with resignation offers

The 2011 Dubbo Open ran pretty smoothly, with only a couple of minor arbiting issues to deal with. But I did come across something I've never personally witnessed before (although I have heard reports of it happening elsewhere).

On the lower boards there was game where one side was easily winning. The player was 2 queens ahead and was a few moves away from mate. She clearly new what she was doing but at one point ,after moving, she simply asked he opponent "Would you like to resign?" in the same manner you would offer a draw. The opponent said "No" and the game soon reached its conclusion.

It was a minor breach of the rules ("disturbing your opponent") and I did not interfere. But if such an 'offer' was allowed in the rules, I wonder how you would signify it on your scores sheet?