Appeals Deposits

[mr1303]

To avoid further thread highjack, I thought the issue of appeals deposits warranted a separate thread.

 

My take on this is as follows. Back in my student days, I had enough budget for my transport to a congress and (just about) my entry fee. Accommodation invariably involved the floor of which ever fellow junior happened to live most locally, and dinner was chips from the local fish and chip shop, or pre-made sandwiches. I certainly wasn't alone in this regard.

 

Certainly the concept of paying £20/£30 for an appeal was comfortably unaffordable. Yes, I know it's only a deposit, but the point is I couldn't afford to be wrong, otherwise this would sometimes mean the sacrifice of my journey home.

 

Compare this to (for example) Janet de Botton, whom I refer to solely to suggest that she has more money than I. For her, I imagine, £20-£30 is a drop in the ocean, and would therefore be much more able to afford to appeal a decision.

 

As a suggestion for an alternative, a small fee for members of an appeals committee at the larger congresses might well be in order. This would avoid the comments of "wasting everyone's time".

[Lanor Fow]

Which does nothing to deter 'we might as well appeal just in case...'

[jeremy69]

You don't suggest what the alternative to a deposit is. If you had appealed in your impecunious days it would have cost you £10 if you then lost your deposit. I think there would be very few whose journey home would be affected by this.

Giving members of an appeal committee a small fee would add to costs and also not remove the wasted time feeling experienced when someone wastes the whole committee's time plus that of the director and the opposition. In English tournaments the number of kept deposits is quite small which suggests to me that it works reasonably well. IMO even people to whom the deposit is truly peanuts do not like someone telling them it is forfeit

[dburn]

Those who serve on ACs at EBU tournaments, at least as Chairs, have their entry fee discounted. This probably does not make much difference to them - I have yet to hear of anyone whose decision to attend (say) Brighton was influenced by the fact that as an AC Chair, he might save a few quid. But I would not wish you to form the impression that the miserable old fogeys who rule against you on principle are not remunerated for so doing.

 

"To no man will we sell", says Magna Carta, "to no man refuse or delay justice or right." I have a lot of sympathy with the view that if monetary deposits are involved, it may well seem that "justice" or "right" could be sold to the highest bidder. That's why I hate them, and why I would much prefer that a system could be devised whereby any contestant had the right to a fixed number of unsuccessful appeals during a fixed period of time.

 

They already have such systems, you say? Cricket? Tennis? Maybe I should get out more.

[gordontd]

In English tournaments the number of kept deposits is quite small which suggests to me that it works reasonably well.

It suggests to me that committees are reluctant to keep deposits even when they should.

[jeremy69]

They already have such systems, you say? Cricket? Tennis?

 

I look forward to the L&E buying a hawkeye machine for Brighton. That will help with appeals.

 

It suggests to me that committees are reluctant to keep deposits even when they should.

 

I think that has been true in the past and there are still one or two appeal committee members still who are reluctant but I have seen few appeals in the last year where it is clear to take the money. The system of advisers has cut out some but not all silly appeals. some get through still either becuase of obstinacy or the adviser being given an account which bears no resemblance to the facts.

[bluejak]

My view is that there are still too many silly appeals. But my experience as a TD suggests that there would be more if we did not have monetary deposits. I think the problem is not so much that monetary deposits are fair but that suggested alternatives are usually unfair or ineffective or both.

 

In Australia they have the right to give a PP for a meritless appeal. Just consider how effective that is at stopping appeals in the last segment of a knockout match, for example! :ph34r: In England in Swiss events, there are a lot of appeals where the quarter-green is at stake. To explain, if a player is doing poorly, he has no real worries about his score. But he gets a quarter of a national master point [a "quarter-green"] for winning a match. So if he has lost 12-8 and thinks an appeal could get him a win, he appeals. A PP if it is deemed meritless is totally irrelevant so ineffective. The point it that a PP is random in its effectiveness, and is unfair in the same way as a monetary deposit. Just as a monetary deposit seems far more effective against poorer players than richer, a PP sanction works far better in some cases than others, ranging from quite effective to totally ineffective.

 

How about an AWMW as in the ACBL? The trouble is that I understand that no-one ever gets anything as a result so they are understood to be ineffective. If they led to something, perhaps they would be effective, but it is difficult to see what they should lead to, and I have my doubts as to the fairness. Suppose, as was claimed when they were introduced, players get "investigated" if they have two in a year, or something. Investigated how? What happens as an effect? Do AWMWs from Sectionals get reported to the ACBL? What sanction is applied? Why has it never happened?

 

Talk earlier of the quarter-green has made me think of applying a master point sanction. Many average players in England lover the quarter-green, and enter Swiss events with no thought of winning, but just to see how many quarter-greens they can get. Suppose a frivolous appeal meant a quarter-green was taken away? Would that be effective? Would it be fair? I think the answer is the same as for monetary deposits. It would be unfair, and would be effective against some players and not others. Consider my case. I cannot reach the next rank because there is no higher rank. I do not play enough or in the correct events to win an annual master point prize. I am always the leading master point winner in my County. So to lose a quarter-green means very little to me, far less than losing ten or twenty pounds. and less to me than to my wife, who picks up very few greens a year but needs them for the next rank.

 

No doubt we could devise other sanctions. But when people talk about the unfairness of monetary deposits, I think they should consider the alternatives. We could fail to discourage meritless appeals, and there would be more and more from a certain type of player, wasting everyone's time. Yes, we could pay the AC members, but that may be impractical and is also ineffective: I have great trouble arranging appeals now: the system would not work for three times as many. Remember that wasting time includes opponents' time, and TD's time. Yes, I know TDs are paid to work, but appeals in the EBU are usually held when TDs have other jobs to do such as scoring or clearing the room. Most EBU TDs cover for each other at such times, but suppose all of them were involved in appeals?

 

Alternatively we could try one of the other methods above. But none are fair, in my view, even AWMWs which will affect serious players considerably more than casual ones, and there are problems of effectiveness because of the lack of fairness.

 

Have I any solution? Well, there are two solutions that have occurred to me, both cumbersome, and one that will definitely be disliked by ACs themselves. Since monetary deposits are effective with some people, PPs in some circumstances, losing master points with some people, and AWMWs might be effective with some people if some basis for further sanction really existed unlike th ACBL's toothless version, I suggest either:

• If an AC decides an appeal is meritless, it then decides to sanction the people who brought the appeal, choosing one out of retaining a deposit, issuing a PP or AWMW, or deducting a quarter-green [or whatever is decided]. ACs will hate the extra decision. A possible alternative is they decide to apply a sanction, someone else [the L&EC, perhaps] decides what sanction: maybe a magic formula, or something. But it seems so cumbersome.
  
• If an AC decides an appeal is meritless, it then decides to sanction the people who brought the appeal, applying all of retaining a small deposit, issuing a PP and an AWMW, and deducting an eighth-green [or whatever is decided].
  

I am not convinced these last two are right, and would go for the package - the last one - myself, but the advantage of these is that they should be fairer than the present system.

 

What would I do, personally? Stick with monetary deposits. Despite what people say, no-one likes losing money, whether Janet de Botton or mr1303.

[jeremy69]

It's finally happened. I think I agree with all of the previous post. Now I must go and lie down in a darkened room!

[mycroft]

I think that there are three reasons that the ACBL AWMW system hasn't shown any teeth:

 

1) The barriers are way too high. 3 "without merit" appeals in 9 NABCs? I know there are inveterate appealers, but how many average more than 1 a NABC? And even if they have 7 or 8 in the three years, that's 30-40% that have to be ruled without merit to trigger a C&E hearing.

2) The appeals committees are treating AWMWs as having in and of themselves, too strong an effect, and aren't handing them out when they should be. That means that for the above 30-40% to be ruled without merit, probably 50-60% of them have to *be* without merit.

3) My guess is that it is, in fact, working; once someone gets two, they either stop appealing, or don't appeal anything that isn't perfectly clear.

 

So, nobody's been hit with the automatic C&E hearing. How many have "modified" their appealing behaviour because they're on 2? No idea. Does it work? Not in enough cases to notice.

[Echognome]

I rather like the idea of X appeals per year. Every time an appeal is made, all players on the appealing side use up one of their appeals. If one of the players has already used up their quote for the year, tough luck!

 

Perhaps as an alternative, if you get Y frivolous appeals per year, you can no longer appeal for the remainder of the year. This would be similar to an AWMW, except that there is a known and transparent penalty. This may be fairer, so that you have, in theory, an unlimited amount of legitimate appeals.

[Nickboss]

One fun idea might be to, instead of retaining the deposit in the case of an appeal without merit, give it to the other side.

 

Perhaps this might reduce any possible acrimony, and you never know, if in your student days you end up buying Team Rich a round of drinks, they might be happy to reciprocate ;)

[jeremy69]

One fun idea might be to, instead of retaining the deposit in the case of an appeal without merit, give it to the other side.

 

Give it to the chairman would be more fun! :D

[Mbodell]

I rather like the idea of X appeals per year. Every time an appeal is made, all players on the appealing side use up one of their appeals. If one of the players has already used up their quote for the year, tough luck!

I strongly disagree with this approach as I don't think there should be any cost to a successful appeal. I think, for instance, the NFL is quite silly in limiting coaches use of challenges when the challenges are correct. I mean if the ref/TD has made a mistake, why is it your fault?

[blackshoe]

Because we're supposed to blame the victim?

[jeremy69]

I mean if the ref/TD has made a mistake, why is it your fault?

 

It isn't but if there isn't a limt the game will grind to a halt because the players always think the referee or umpire must be wrong. I think limits on appeals are also wrong but there needs to be some deterrent to the timewaster.

[Echognome]

I rather like the idea of X appeals per year.  Every time an appeal is made, all players on the appealing side use up one of their appeals.  If one of the players has already used up their quote for the year, tough luck!

I strongly disagree with this approach as I don't think there should be any cost to a successful appeal. I think, for instance, the NFL is quite silly in limiting coaches use of challenges when the challenges are correct. I mean if the ref/TD has made a mistake, why is it your fault?

I did offer an alternative! I also gave myself plenty of wiggle room, since X is a variable. Of course we can go farther and have both an X and a Y limit, with Y < X. Endless possibilities. But seriously, if we made Y something like 2 and X something like 10, would that be all that awful for one year?

[nigel_k]

I agree with loss of deposit for truly frivolous appeals but I think committees take the money much too often.

 

It shouldn't be enough that the committee thinks the issue is clearcut. Ideally the appellant should keep their deposit any time they genuinely believe their appeal is reasonable, and have a basis for that belief even if not a particularly strong one. And I think appellants have this more than 95% of the time.

[nige1]

In principle, I agree with Echognome. Rule-makers should mandate that a pair or team be denied an appeal if, during the previous 12 months, any member exceeds both

• a specified percentage of unsuccessful appeals and
  
• a specified absolute number of unsuccessful appeals.
  

We should count only unsuccesssful appeals -- because we should actively encourage successful appeals, in the hope of improving director decisions.

 

Counting unsuccesful appeals with an AWMW (or equivalent) might be a better candidate, if AWMWs were more consistent and frequent.

 

The percentage limit is to avoid handicapping frequent competitors.

 

Also, an unsuccessful appeal would count as several, if you refused or ignored the advice of an independent appeals advisor.

[gordontd]

I agree with loss of deposit for truly frivolous appeals but I think committees take the money much too often.

Really? How often have you known them do it?

 

I've not actually experienced, either as a player, a director, or an AC member, an appeal where the appellants lost their deposit. I know they do exist, but I have no first-hand experience of it.

 

On the other hand, every year I read the round-up of EBU appeals which have many instances where the commentators think the deposit should have been kept but it wasn't.

[jeffford76]

I mean if the ref/TD has made a mistake, why is it your fault?

 

It isn't but if there isn't a limt the game will grind to a halt because the players always think the referee or umpire must be wrong. I think limits on appeals are also wrong but there needs to be some deterrent to the timewaster.

Why would the game grind to a halt? You're not going to be *right* over and over in thinking the ref made a mistake, so you'll soon exhaust your challenges. And if you somehow are right over and over, getting the calls right is worth the delay.

[Cyberyeti]

I had a situation a year ago where I had to appeal to the national authority. I had to think very hard about that one as I am a full time student, my partner is on benefits and losing the appeal would have had consequences for both of us. I think the appeal was £75.

 

As it happened, a pair who'd qualified for the event I'd originally qualified for, and the appeals committee turfed me out of, weren't prepared to wait for the outcome of the appeal to the L&E and pulled out, so we qualified as subs anyway and the appeal was withdrawn.

 

There is an issue where the appeal fee is inconsequential to some players and serious money to others.

[Finch]

I also don't think there's an easy answer.

 

I like the concept of only being allowed X unsuccessful, or X frivolous appeals per year, but who's doing the counting? Is that per person (might be unfair on his partner) or per team? Does it count all events, including at your local club? What about county events?

 

In my impecunious student days it was generally fairly well known that if you pleaded serious poverty you would usually get your deposit, or most of it at any rate, back as long as your appeal wasn't of the "but we always appeal" type. The difficulty with that is that I remember someone once claiming he couldn't afford an appeal to the national authority.... who had been playing in a recent congress with a paid professional.

[bluejak]

I agree with loss of deposit for truly frivolous appeals but I think committees take the money much too often.

How often do you think they keep the money?

 

Completely frivolous appeals often have the deposit refunded.

[dburn]

I agree with loss of deposit for truly frivolous appeals but I think committees take the money much too often.

Really? How often have you known them do it?

 

I've not actually experienced, either as a player, a director, or an AC member, an appeal where the appellants lost their deposit. I know they do exist, but I have no first-hand experience of it.

 

On the other hand, every year I read the round-up of EBU appeals which have many instances where the commentators think the deposit should have been kept but it wasn't.

The number of retained deposits is of the order of a dozen a year. Every case in which a deposit was retained is reviewed by the L&E (and on a handful of occasions, that deposit has been returned).

 

With the introduction of the scheme of appeals consultants, and with the introduction of split and weighted scores under Law 12, the number of appeals has shown a marked decline over the past decade or so. Other major contributing factors have been the continued improvement in standard among Directors, and the much increased awareness by players of their rights and duties under Law. Prime movers in these educational efforts have been Max Bavin, Jeremy Dhondy and David Stevenson, to whom tribute is due.

 

In the bad old days, the number of appeals reviewed by the L&E was so great that the backlog was never cleared from one meeting to the next. Nowadays, we finish them all and still get to the pub by five thirty at the latest, an obvious improvement for a number of reasons.

 

It is true that some appeals are still greeted by some reviewers with a cry of "keep the money!" But the write-up of an appeal does not necessarily reflect every issue involved in the discussion of it - English bards and Scotch reviewers tend to be considerably more perfunctory than their counterparts in other countries. Moreover, we also tend to be more tolerant of players who, although they do not actually have a leg to stand on, are genuinely knowledgeless with respect to their leglessness. The decision to return a deposit is often based on the perception by the AC that the appellants genuinely believed they had a case, regardless of the extent to which they "should" so have believed.

 

It appalled me when monetary deposits were introduced, and it continues to appal me, that anyone might be discouraged from bringing a case simply because he could not afford to do so if he lost. My experience (and the raw data) do not convince me at all that the introduction of monetary deposits was in any way a contributing factor in the decline in the number of fatuous appeals (or appeals generally), but I am fully prepared to concede that this may be due to bias on my part.

 

In international competitions these days, the Conditions of Contest contain a warning along these lines: "our Directors are highly trained; and the procedure they follow when giving an initial ruling (consulting players, consulting colleagues, and so on) is well enough structured that any appeal is most unlikely to succeed; so don't appeal, because you will almost certainly lose."

 

What you will lose may be intangible - even though the annual budget of your NBO or even your country may not exceed the amount of money Janet de Botton has at her disposal, you can probably afford the deposit. But you will lose credibility, you will lose face, you will lose time and effort. If you also lost some part of your right to bring further fatuous cases... well, that could scarcely be a bad thing.

[wank]

there are of course other deserving minorities in society and you can't help them all, but the EBU gives discounted entry to young players, so it would seem in keeping to similarly discount appeals fees.