I am bit sick of people register and now cancel, as organizer I still make costs , like food and reservations , to day it is "normal" that 10% does not show up!!!! Since more competition will have a limit on the number of competitors , I find this unacceptable behavior and does not show any respect for other competitors and the organization team I propose First time register, not show up and not cancel, yellow card Second time red card , competitor may not compete for WCA competitions for 4 months, after this period 1 yellow card remains, if competitor repeat this behavior the ban is extend to a year. After a probation year the disciplinary card is gone A yellow card can also be given when some misbehaves

Well, assuming you can avoid people registering their "enemies" just so that people get a yellow card, the big thing this would do is to make people register really really late, which I think would be a bigger annoyance.

since the pb is on organisation, like food, reservation costs ... why don't settle a fee on registration that competitor may take back when really present on the competition ? or simply keep this amount as definitive registration ? Isn't that the case for some competitions already ? I agree this behavior is not showing respect to organisation team. I take benefit of this remark to complain also about other disrespectful behaviors that begin to be seen in our competitions like some cubes or stackmat or stopwatch stolen (FCD and now GCD) I do think that organisation must be adapted to face what must not become a "normality" even if it will be difficult.

As BryanLogan said, the biggest problem is that currently anyone can register under any name. There is literally no way to tell whether the person that registered really is the person they say that they are. The best solution to the problem of competitors registering when they will not turn up is to make them pay online as soon as they register. If online payment is not possible (no credit card) then the person can e-mail the organiser and say that they will pay on the day. However even this will not completely solve the problem, as it may not be evident from the e-mail that the person is who they say they are. This would certainly help though.

As a matter of comparison, my wife is practising badminton in competition, and this federation is asking for a fee registration for all competitions. As long as the organisation has not received the money, you are not registered. So if one competitor is not present at the competition the money is acquired for the organisation and doesn't return back to the guy. But a non present competitor receives a ban of 2 months the first time and 6 months the second time he defaults within a year. The thing is that those competitions list money prices to the best competitors in each categories, this is the main difference with our rubik competitions yet, even if the amount are small one like 10 to 50 euros depending on the level of categories. But I think a small ban is a good start as a disciplinary action.

Hi Ton, I haven't seen any good solutions for this, so we cannot do anything for the WCA Regulations 2010. You may administrate the extra cost you made and then ask the competitor to pay an extra fee for a future competition. Ron

To my mind, it IS normal that 10% do not show up. Of course that's very annoying, but I think you have just to factor that knowledge in a competition's organisation. You can easily fix a competition fee that way, that your costs are covered already if 80% of the registered competitor's show up. Acting that way you will most likely gain more money than you have spend before. You can just save that money for the next competition you organise. Beside that I would like to mention: Some competitor's actually have good reasons for not showing up. For example: you plan to travel by train, but the trains don't move due to strike or weather conditions.

I agree with you, Sébastien. Some remarks though: 1) It works if you ask competitors to reconfirm shortly (one week or so) before the competition. I just send an e-mail to every competitor asking for confirmation of participation, which days of the competition, which guests. 2) Some people do not take the time to just send a quick "I cannot participate". I think it is OK to have these people pay in advance for future competitions. And pay the fee of the missed competition. 3) In competitions with a waiting list it is disrespectful to keep your registration and not show up even though that means someone else cannot compete. This is not the behaviour we want to see in our community. 4) There can always be an emergency but even then it is a good habit to inform the organisers on short notice. A quick e-mail or SMS message will do. 5) Payment in advance is possible but sometimes rather impractical. In a competition with mostly local people you could do this with regular national payment systems. In an international competition this is harder, and I do not want to force everyone to have a Paypal or similar account. Also, there should be an opportunity to cancel your registration and get your money back within certain limits. 6) It is a good habit to always send a confirmation e-mail to registered competitors. When you receive a new registration, just send a confirmation e-mail. Sometimes the e-mail address they are using is not correct, or someone used a fake registration. Then at least you will have more chance to spot fake registrations. We have one annoying person in Serbia who is terrorising Russian competitions. Also, with a confirmation e-mail competitors are more aware that they have registered and should take action if they cannot participate.