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EmailChessPoint: game and tournament rules
until 2023.11.30

Preliminary remark

Any player who has ever written down a game of chess or replayed it using a notation can start without breaking any rules. The rules help in acute situations. It is useful to know then that there is something to clarify the situation.

So you do not need to know the following rules in detail to play.

By the way - amici sumus - as chess buddies we're on a first-name basis.

The most important differences to other applicable regulations consist in the different regulations of the time exceeding. For the latter see also the link: link: The reflection period in EmailChessPoint.

In EmailChessPoint numerous web forms support the game operation and especially the partiestarts. There is no explicit obligation to use these forms. However, they are useful for the players and it is requested to use the forms in the interest of the players and the tournament directors.

§ 1

These game and tournament rules apply to the correspondence chess game in the EmailChessPoint.
Deviating regulations in announcements and in start mails take precedence over these rules.

In the case of a player who is unable to comply with the rules due to exceptional circumstances, the project director may, at the player's request, create different conditions, in particular by approving longer reflection times. The longer reflection times shall also apply to the opposing player in the games concerned, unless the tournament director expressly orders otherwise.

§ 2

The correspondence chess game at EmailChessPoint is free of charge.

§ 3

No one has a claim to play correspondence chess in EmailChessPoint.

Whoever grossly disturbs the game operation may be excluded from participation in further tournaments.

In particular, a player is considered to be grossly disruptive if he makes insulting comments with reference to another player or a tournament director or the project director or the project itself, or behaves in a comparably grossly unsportsmanlike manner, or behaves in a comparably unsportsmanlike manner again after receiving a warning, before he has in the meantime played at least 12 games without complaint.

Disturbances of the game operation, which do not yet require an exclusion from the game operation, are punished by the tournament leaders with a warning. Such disturbances include, in particular, the tacit withdrawal and the abandonment of one or more games not justified in the position reached.

Who is warned or who is excluded from participation in further tournaments, can challenge this within 14 days at the revision. This must be pointed out to him at the time of warning or exclusion from participation.

§ 4

A friendly interaction with each other is the basis of our common games. It is expected that the players welcome each other at the beginning of their game and introduce themselves if necessary.
In individual cases, a player is allowed to ask the opponent to refrain from further accompanying correspondence, especially remarks or eventualities relating to the match. He must then act accordingly himself.

§ 5

The tournament director is always right except cases of § 22. He is allowed to reject entries, whose acceptance cannot lead to an advantage for the submitter, without giving further reasons.

§ 6

A game scheduled by an EmailChessPoint tournament director is scored according to the result communicated by the players, if it was played according to the rules of chess, the start of the game is indicated to the tournament director and the result and the order of moves leading to the result is communicated to him and there is no reason to doubt the communicated result.

A game is finished with the result given by the 7 pieces' endgame databases if its position is included in them and the player on the move invokes it instead of moving.

§ 7

The following rules shall be followed if a player wishes to do so. Players are free to deviate from these rules by mutual agreement. The agreement can also be reached tacitly. The rules of the § 13 sentence 1, 14 and 15 are binding for the players.

§ 8

It is played via e-mail. If the players deviate from this, the game is a draw, unless there is a case of § 6. The drawn game is rated if the players tell the tournament director a correct sequence of moves that indicates that the game was actually played.

§ 9

Each move e-mail contains the entire game played up to that point in PGN format with the English piece designations (KQRBN-) at least in the course transmitted with the e-mail. The move tax must clearly identify the given move. Mistakes in writing bind the person making the mistake.
A move is not invalid because it contains or does not contain chess signs such as "+", "x", "=", "e.p." or because it is placed at a position other than immediately after the answered move, but easily found and assigned.

§ 10

The available reflection time is 40 days. In the 11th, 21st, 31st etc. move other 40 days will be added to the available reflection time. Each player's used reflection time will be increased by 1 day, starting at 0 days, whenever the player's turn comes at the end of a calendar day. This does not apply to calendar days before the tournament starts. The reflection time is exceeded if the used reflection time is longer than the available reflection time. Exceeding the reflection time leads to the loss of the game if the opponent makes a valid complaint. The game is drawn, however, if a position has arisen from which the opponent is unable to checkmate the king of the player by any sequence of regular moves, even in the most awkward of situations. It is also a draw if the player making the complaint has exceeded the reflection time. Complaints are only admissible in relation to the last move made and only if the player who has exceeded the reflection time has made this move more than 24 hours after receiving the last move of the complaining player and if the complaining player could have made a move instead of complaining. The complaint shall be inadmissible if the exceeding of the reflection time can be based on trust in incorrect or misleading information on the reflection time provided by the player making the complaint. Furthermore, the complaint is inadmissible if the move e-mails of both players immediately preceding the exceeding of the time limit do not contain any information about the reflection time of the player exceeding the time limit. Whoever wants to complain against this, can make up for the information. He can complain if the move is not made until after another full day has elapsed.
The complaint about exceeding the reflection time becomes inadmissible as soon as the complaining player makes another move.

§ 11

It is allowed to include information about the reflection period in the move mails. However, there is no obligation to do so beyond the significance for the complaint of an exceeding the reflection time according to § 10.

§ 12

A player may in a game in which no time has been calculated at first or in which the calculation has been stopped while the game is in progress, cause mutually binding reflection times. He may calculate the reflection times in advance, taking into account all the data sent and received. Instead, he can assign the days that have passed since the tournament started, minus vacation days, to each player in equal parts. If the number of days is odd, 1 day will be omitted. The opponent can contradict under statement of all send and receive data. Whoever calculates all send and receive data, has to present all move mails to the tournament director in case of an objection of the opponent. The tournament director declares the determination to be binding if necessary. In case of not only minor inaccuracies or incompleteness he will reject them.

§ 13

Responses must be made within 6 days, unless a later response is announced within the 6 days. Whoever does not receive such an announcement sends a reminder e-mail to the opponent on the day corresponding to the designation of the day of dispatch, repeating the move. The tournament director will receive a copy (CC). Anyone who has waited another 6 full calendar days in vain for the answer will notify the tournament director on the day that corresponds to the name of the day of sending.
Whoever reminds earlier or without stating his last move or without a copy for the tournament director, has to repeat the reminder in due form and time, if necessary.
Whoever informs the tournament director earlier or without stating his last move and the reminder or without a copy for the tournament director, has to repeat the reminder in due form and time, if necessary.

§ 13a

Cancelled

§ 14

The players will inform the tournament director at latest on the 7th day after the start of the tournament that all their games are running or which are not and why not. Players who deviate from § 8 will inform the tournament director at the opportunity and will report the moves made until then. This way they avoid the risk of a scoring against both players.
The tournament director will temporarily assign the status 'waiting' to their game.

§ 15

A game comes to a standstill if a player has taken more than 6 days to consider his move, has not announced a later answer, has not been reminded by the opponent of his obligation to move, and has not been questioned by the tournament director about the progress of the game or if a player sends an illegal move and his opponent does not resonse within 3 days. In the standstill of the game no reflection time runs. The standstill obliges everyone who recognizes it to work towards its termination. The standstill ends when the opponent makes up for the reminder, the tournament director asks the player to reconsider the progress of the game or the player draws. The tournament director may attribute periods of standstill to one or other of the players involved as reflection time, if the player is at fault for the standstill, which is not due to a failure to draw or to remember. The attribution of times of standstill may not interfere with the available reflection time of the player to such an extent that he no longer has at least one day for each move to be made until the next time control.

§ 16

Each game must be sent to the tournament director immediately after its completion. For this purpose the form provided for this purpose, linked in the status field of each running game, should be used. Otherwise, the PGN format is to be used.
The obligation to send in is first for both players. It ends when the tournament director publishes the result of the game. It is allowed to send the notation by e-mail.
The tournament director may reject incorrect notations. Such notations must be corrected by the players immediately.

§ 17

If players leave unanswered questions from the tournament director regarding the progress of their games or do not send in completed games, a loss can be detected, even against both players at the same time.

§ 18

A player who for technical reasons is temporarily unable to send e-mails or can only send e-mails under considerably more difficult circumstances or who is temporarily unable to play reasonably due to extraordinary circumstances that could not be foreseen at the beginning of the tournament, may be granted a time-out at his request for the duration of the difficulty. If the aggravation prevents the application, the time-out can also be applied for subsequently and subsequently approved. A time-out does not reduce the holiday entitlement.

§ 19

A player can take up to 42 days leave per game year. The 1st year of play begins with the start of the tournament. The vacation can be taken for different games in different times. The vacation begins at the earliest on the day after the notification to the opponent.

§ 20

A player can take all or part of his vacation as absence time. An absence period lasts at least 7 days. It gives the player time off in all tournaments and games played in the EmailChessPoint. During an absence period and the day after, no time limits expire against the player. The player has to inform all opponents and all tournament directors in played or registered tournaments about the time of absence.

§ 21

During a time-out, a vacation or an absence there is no reflection time against the player. The player is allowed to move during these times. The reflection time of the opponent is calculated according to the general rules.

§ 22

If a player disagrees with a formal decision of a tournament director, the player may appeal the decision within 2 weeks. He must be informed of this in the decision. A player can accordingly complain that the tournament director does not comply with his request to make a decision.
The appeal may confirm, amend or annul a contested decision. The decision on appeal is no longer subject to appeal. The revision has 3 members. Any player or tournament director who may be directly affected by a decision of the revision may not participate in it. In the rest, the revision regulates its own internal affairs.

§ 23

These rules applies from 1 February 2022 and the rules of the invitation to tender shall apply to tournaments started before that date.
§ 15 without Sentence 4 applies from 1 March 2022. §§ 13, 13a, 23 and § 15 S. 4 apply from 2 June 2023.


Link to the rules valid until 31.01.2020

Link to the rules valid until 31.01.2022

Link to the rules valid until 01.06.2023

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