I often get the impression that Organizers/TD are not always full respected around my area.
“They make too much money”.
“You don’t know that rules”.
And sometimes it is deserved. But clearly that can be a problem
Your experiences?
You have organizers who make money?
It’s axiomatic around here that unless your name is Goichburg or Cuchi, you don’t make money organizing tournaments. Most tournaments here just about break even over time, making a little one year and losing it back the next.
If you look at the TLAs and crosstables and do a little math, there are a number of CCA events that don’t make much money. A few are very profitable, but I suspect they aren’t as profitable as some believe.
Scholastic tournaments can be quite profitable, depending on how they are run and overhead costs. Adult chess, however, is not a very good investment–in fact, I suspect most California organizers either break even or lose money.
Michael Aigner
Actually no of course not.
We do however have some TD (including myself now) who do run tournaments for profit.
But really I am interested is there some disrespect for organizers where you live?
I guess I shouldn’t have brought the money issue. Distracted for the point
If a TD is accused of not knowing the rules, it could be that either (a) the TD doesn’t know the rules, or (b) the person making the accusation doesn’t know the rules.
A common example occurs when a lower-rated player with BWB is paired against a higher-rated player with xWB (x=first-round bye). The TD probably knows that BWB should get the white pieces (color equalization takes priority over color alternation), but the higher-rated player may claim he should get white (“higher-ranked gets due color”, the only color rule some players seem to know).
Bill Smythe
And some players knowing the equalization over alternation priority still make a mistake when the lower rated is xBWB and the higher rated is BxWB because the lower rated gets W due needing to alternate from the second round (last with a difference), which is a change that came in with the most recent rulebook. You can get some interesting discussions when a player is quite knowledgeable, but that knowledge is no longer completely correct.
It bothers me a little when the pairings program came out with slightly unusual pairings and the local TD couldn’t explain why. When challenged, he simply proclaimed the pairings program was always right. In this case, it turned out the program was indeed right, but it took me a few days to get an explanation from a more experienced TD.
A, 3.0, 2250, due white
B, 3.0, 2000, due black
C, 3.0, 1950, due white
D, 3.0, 1800, due black
The program paired A-B and C-D. I am sure that 90% of tournament players would have paired A-D and C-B due to top half vs bottom half.
By the way, what should the TD have said in this case? The pairings questions on the local TD exam are quite simple, meaning a local TD wouldn’t be expected to know all of the technical details. What if a player actually insisted and it was the last round with prizes at stake? At first glance, maybe the pairings program was indeed wrong!? Contacting a special arbiter would be nice, but in practice that’s not so simple to do when the round begins in 5 minutes, you don’t have the phone number and you never met the guy you’re trying to call.
Michael Aigner
Well he ought to know how and why he set rating limits in the program for color equalization and be able to explain that. Which he can do with his trusty copy of the rule book.
I would hope that most TDs, including those who haven’t studied the rulebook intensely (or even lately), would still know enough not to pair two players with a 450 point ratings difference when other less divergent pairings with equivalent color issues exist.
Aren’t both interchanging B-C and transposing C-D still safely within the 200 point rule for color equalization? (It was not explicitly stated in the original post that all four players were due a certain color for equalization of white and black.)
From my personal experience, few club and local TDs would be able to do proper pairings without a computer these days. They know the basic principles of swiss rules: top half vs bottom half, you can’t play the same guy twice, 2 colors in a row is undesirable, +3 of any color is really bad, and you can switch pairings to alternate and equalize colors. However, a general understanding of these principles is insufficient to explain the pairings.
I dare say that a majority of local TDs (at least in California) would struggle to explain the difference between a transposition and an interchange without opening their rulebook to read the definitions. And indeed, the desirability of breaking the “top half vs bottom half” principle to make the smaller interchange instead of the larger transposition is central to this example (as I found out a few days after the tournament).
So back to my original question. The TD knows that he doesn’t know the answer. He trusts his pairings program, but he can’t explain why the “top half vs bottom half” principle was suddenly ignored. The round starts in 5 minutes and researching the rulebook won’t be a quick solution. What to do?
Michael Aigner
The examples under 29E5e explains when the interchange is superior to the transposition.
The pairing programs I’ve worked with (WinTD now and the DOS version of SwissSys some time back) will come up with legal pairings. If the settings are done properly then the pairings are decent. Just as multiple TDs (even NTDs) may come up with different pairings in the same situation, TDs and a program may come up with different pairings. Even many of those TDs that have a LOT of experience manually doing pairings will use a pairing program because of the difference in speed in doing the pairings for large sections. The interesting thing is that generally all variations are quite legal and usable.
One thing an experienced TD can identify is what might have happened when there is a weird-looking pairing, and whether or not it is merely a difficult-to-explain situation or if it is a case of not having the pairing settings done the way the TD would like to see them. One example that I had is one where the program came up with strange pairings for the top sections in the final round of the IL Open. I looked at it and did a manual pairing, at which point the back-room person removed the interchange-restriction and the program paired the same way I did when a repairing was done for those boards.
To answer your final question, unless a TD is experienced enough to REALLY know that a pairing is incorrect and needs to be changed, the TD should not make a change.
Also, a TD that is using a pairing program should understand what the settings are and how they should be used.
This is indeed a situation where the interchange is superior to the transposition. The C-D transposition is a 150-point change which corrects the color conflicts. But the B-C interchange is only a 50-point change which also corrects the color conflicts. Normally, transpositions are used to correct color conflicts so long as the 80-point rule is maintained. Although the C-D transposition is legal under the 200 point rule for equalization, it violates the 80-point rule and a smaller interchange has priority. The B-C interchange is the better pairing. The transposition would be correct if the alternative interchange were not available, i.e. if it involved a larger rating difference than the transposition.
Don Millican
Senior Tournament Director
Even if one completely understands this, and many TD’s do not, there is often little time to explain as in your example. Frequently I will see if I can defer the explanation until later. That is easier to do in a scholastic event when the one to whom you are trying to explain the pairings is the concerned parent. Once I start explaining the rule and the terms interchange and transposition my experience has been that the questioner usually figures out 1. I really do know what I am talking about and 2. They don’t and they decide we are done. Not always but usually.
Try explaining tiebreaks (usually to parents) when you have all of the following:
A. Players in the same score group with unplayed games/forfeits (both wins and losses.)
B. Players in the same score group who were given a full point bye.
C. Players in the same score group with half point byes.
D. Players who fall into either A or B but were given a chance to play a rated game during that round (often to give some players their 4 rated games to get a published rating) which will be rated in an ‘extra games’ section but doesn’t affect tiebreaks for this section.
Oh, and for lagniappe, throw in a player who mis-reported the result of an early round game but didn’t get around to pointing that out until just before the last round pairings went up.
But it still begs Michael’s question as to what to say if the TD does not fully understand the method, but nonetheless has to frame a response.
I think that could be applied to any situation which the TD isn’t fully conversant with what the rules say (at least highly complex or technical areas…) Yes, it is great to say, “The TD should have known thus-and-such.” For all we know, the TD above could have went home, whipped out his rulebook, and studied his eyes out until he or she now does understand pairings. 
That still does not answer the question behind it: What do you say when you don’t have the answer readily to hand, and it appears that finding out will take longer than one has?
It could also apply to areas outside the rulebook, also, as this has as much to do with the tact and approach of the TD as it does the rules.
In Michael’s example, the TD at least had the virtue of honesty. More tactful might have been, “That may seem a little unusual, however, it does also seem to have internal logic. I’m going to allow it to stand. You have the right to appeal this.”
Or should the TD have delayed the round while he or she tried to find the answer?
At any rate, is there anyone who is a TD who has never come across an unforseen situation?
ETA: The other part that is hard to explain is the program logic itself. I can understand that thorough knowledge of pairings can lead a TD to understand how the program might have made a decision, but in the end it is the program that made the pairings… The TD has to confirm the pairings, but as has been pointed out, it’s not terribly wise to override the program unless one understands it intimately. Maybe the answer wasn’t the most satisfying, but the program wasn’t incorrect and the ruling wasn’t technically incorrect.
Does a TD have to have perfect knowledge before a TD is respected?
Thank you for understanding the point of my question. My example was from a real tournament, but merely one out of many examples I could have given. The TD in question was a novice back then and made several other strange decisions while running the tournament. Somehow, he was a local TD. I highly doubt he even understood the difference between an interchange and a transposition. Today, 2.5 years later, that TD is a prominent and respected local organizer and a senior TD. I should give him this example again now. 
Remember that the local TD exam doesn’t really emphasize pairings, giving only a small number of relatively easy examples. You could even miss every one of those questions and still pass the test. In this day and age where most TDs use pairings programs, I would bet your average local TD doesn’t know how to use pairings cards like in the old days–certainly not for complicated examples.
Michael Aigner
The easy explanation is that the computer did it, so it is correct. IMHO this is not a good enough answer, but I will admit when I have seen it used by other TDs it usually gets them off the hook. I don’t agree with this, but that is due to past experience. I once saw a computer programs [don’t remember if it was Swissys or WinTD] drop down a 1700 to play a 2100 in the second round of a 4 round event. The computer refused to drop down a 1000 or a 1300 [both with upset wins in Rd 1] due to color conflict, so the computer went with the 3rd lowest player (as odd man) in the score [1 point] group. FYI: yes the 2100 loss the game to the 1700.
Isn’t it better to take the time to look the answer up & start the round late, then to leave players with an obscure or unsatisfactory answer? I actually once did change the pairings due to a complaint, which got another complaint, so I called a special TD and ended up with the original pairings. The thing is that there are many views by players on how pairings should be done, but the TD is the person responsible. The TD needs to know what to do, and [even if they are uncertain] to do it consistantly throughout the tournament. In other sports the official may not get a call right, but as long as it is always called the same way then at least the players know what to expect.
Larry S. Cohen
“Don’t print what I say, print what I mean” -Mayor Richard Daley 1968
The best approach is for the TD not to override the computer pairings as long as those pairings are legal. For example, if the program makes a 150-point switch in order to equalize colors, it’s legal because it’s within the 200-point equalization limit. Even if the TD thinks he sees a better transposition, leave well enough alone.
In an Illinois Open several years ago, the TD ripped the pairings out of the printer and posted them without examining them. A player complained, so the TD changed the pairings (for the top 4 boards in the last round of the Open section). But with a little reasoned analysis (taking more than just a minute or two), one could see that the original computer pairings were better.
If the TD wants to examine pairings after the program makes them, that’s fine, but if you’re going to change them, at least do so before posting them. Better yet, don’t change them at all, unless you’re absolutely sure your way is better – and it’s likely not to be, even if you’re an NTD.
Bill Smythe