[bd71]

ACBL. I don't have hands, but they're not relevant. Club game with 4 intermediate-ish players at the table.

We are defending against 4 hearts. Our trumps are drawn early in 3 rounds, and in the few tricks played after that it seems that both my partner and I lost our minds.

On a trick where I lead the AD and dummy/partner follow with diamonds, declarer discards a spade. Both my partner and I assume he has ruffed it as we credit him with the trick and let him lead to the next trick. (In retrospect, I'm not sure if he thinks he's ruffed it too, or if he's pulling a fast one).

With 4 cards left, he claims by stating he is going to cash a winner in dummy (he did have one), dropping a losing spade in his hand, and then he has only trump left (having started with 6). He shows his 4 cards...the spade and 3 hearts. Ostensibly making 4.

As we are all gathering up our cards, and partner is writing the score, I am starting to realize what happened. By the time I put it together and say something, cards are all back in the board. (Please limit the remonstrations that I shouldn't have gathered my cards up...so noted.)

When asked what he played on the AD trick, declarer said he didn't recall but thought he had ruffed it. We point out that with six trumps, there weren't enough to draw 3 rounds early, ruff a diamond trick, AND have 3 remaining at the end for his claim.

Director is called at this point, responded to by a pseudo-assistant director (this being a somewhat informal club). Because we are late for the next round we are told that we should settle it after the entire match. At the end of the match, lead director/club owner says she can't do anything about it then, that it had to be settled right after the hand.

Questions:
1. What should have happened when director was first called? Should we get credit for down one, or because we missed our opportunities to correct things when there was solid evidence of what happened (e.g. first right after the trick in question, and second before cards were gathered) are we stuck with the result of them making 4?
2. Was the lead director right that she couldn't do anything about it at the end of the match?

[mjj29]

bd71, on Apr 15 2010, 04:25 PM, said:

As we are all gathering up our cards, and partner is writing the score, I am starting to realize what happened.  By the time I put it together and say something, cards are all back in the board.  (Please limit the remonstrations that I shouldn't have gathered my cards up...so noted.)

When asked what he played on the AD trick, declarer said he didn't recall but thought he had ruffed it.  We point out that with six trumps, there weren't enough to draw 3 rounds early, ruff a diamond trick, AND have 3 remaining at the end for his claim.

Director is called at this point, responded to by a pseudo-assistant director (this being a somewhat informal club).  Because we are late for the next round we are told that we should settle it after the entire match.  At the end of the match, lead director/club owner says she can't do anything about it then, that it had to be settled right after the hand.

Questions:
1. What should have happened when director was first called?  Should we get credit for down one, or because we missed our opportunities to correct things when there was solid evidence of what happened (e.g. first right after the trick in question, and second before cards were gathered) are we stuck with the result of them making 4?
2. Was the lead director right that she couldn't do anything about it at the end of the match?

Short answer - you should get get credit for down one, whenever you call the director, certainly within the Correction Period (30mins from the final score being availlable) and potentially even later.

Long answer:

L69B said:

Agreement  with a claim or concession may be withdrawn within the Correction Period: 1. if a player agreed to the loss of a trick his side had, in fact, won. The board is rescored with such trick awarded to his side

L71 said:

A concession must stand, once made, except that within the Correction Period the Director shall cancel a concession: 1. if a player conceded a trick that his side had, in fact, won. The board is rescored with such trick awarded to his side

L79A2 said:

A player must not knowingly either accept either the score for a trick that his side did not win or the concession of a trick that his opponents could not lose

L79C1 said:

An error in computing or tabulating the agreed-upon score ... may be corrected until the end of the period... Unless the Tournament Organiser specifies a later time, this Correction Period expires 30 minutes after the official score has been made available for inspectiion.

L79C2 said:

... a scoring error may be corrected after the expiry of the Correction Period if the Director and Tournament Organizer are both satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that the record is wrong

The trick that declarer discarded on is certainly required to be credited to the defense. If you could have taken more tricks if you had noticed the discard you are probably out of luck, although it's possible that law 23 could apply:

L23 said:

Whenever, in the opinion of the Director, an offender could have been aware at the time of his irregularity that this could well damage the non-offending side... the Director awards an adjusted score if the offending side has gained an advantage

The irregularity in this case being the lead out of turn

[blackshoe]

bd71, on Apr 15 2010, 05:25 PM, said:

At the end of the match, lead director/club owner says she can't do anything about it then, that it had to be settled right after the hand.

This is worrisome. If the club owner is going to allow other people to act as director in her stead, she needs to be sure they get their rulings right, or that she corrects the ruling herself.

This is a scoring problem, not a lead out of turn problem, because you accepted that lead when you followed to it (Law 53A). Mjj29 gives the applicable laws. One more trick to defense, 4H down one is the correct ruling.

[FrancesHinden]

bd71, on Apr 15 2010, 05:25 PM, said:

At the end of the match, lead director/club owner says she can't do anything about it then, that it had to be settled right after the hand.

This isn't true.

But even if it is true, the lead director would then have to rule under 'director's error' if his/her assistant had said has said that because we are late for the next round we are told that we should settle it after the entire match. Now the table have been denied any hope of a ruling.

Quote

...we missed our opportunities to correct things when there was solid evidence of what happened (e.g. first right after the trick in question, and second before cards were gathered) are we stuck with the result of them making 4?

You are better off correcting things before picking up your cards, because there is a danger that the other side say "I can't remember how the play went but I'm certain I made 10 tricks". In this case it may well have been that there was no way declarer could have got to 10 tricks, but in other cases (typically a declarer revoke) it may be impossible to establish what happened unless both pairs can remember how the play went.

But just because you are better off calling the TD while it's still possible to go through the play, you certainly haven't lost your right to a ruling.

Note: Edited by Blackshoe to make sure people realize that what isn't true (see above) was a statement by the OP quoting the club owner, and not a statement by me.