APTA develops policy on tournament sanctioning

The first issue of Off The Wire had the full Tournament Sanction Policy:

“The APTA has recently adopted a policy on Tournament Sanction, which is quoted in full as follows:

The purpose of sanctioning of platform tennis tournaments by the American Platform Tennis Association is to insure a high standard of quality covering all aspects of competitive platform tennis tournament play. Tournaments which are sanctioned will be included on the APTA ‘Sanctioned Tournaments’ schedule.

In order for a tournament to receive official sanction from the American Platform Tennis Association certain established standards and procedures must be agreed to in advance by the local tournament committee. Likewise, tournament play itself and post-tournament reporting must be carried out in accordance with established APTA standards. APTA reserves the right to withhold, or withdraw, sanction if established standards are not met. APTA may elect to charge a sanction fee. In requesting sanctioning, the local tournament committee commits itself to strict adherence to all requirements of sanctioning as detailed below.

1. The local tournament committee will submit, in writing, by July 1st, a request for tournament sanction to the APTA. This request will include name of tournament; name, address and phone number of sponsoring club or clubs; name, address and phone number of tournament chairman; requested dates and, if appropriate, alternate dates.

2. The APTA will notify the local tournament chairman of the approved dates. At the same time, APTA will request of the local tournament chairman written confirmation of the acceptance of the APTA’s sanctioning requirements. This written confirmation will be returned to APTA by the local tournament chairman by September 1st. When received, the APTA will include the tournament on the APTA Sanctioned Tournament Schedule, which is published about September 15th.

3. Prior to the beginning of each tournament season, the APTA will designate those sanctioned tournaments, which will be used for purposes of national rankings when publishing the schedule of sanctioned tournaments.

4. As a condition of sanctioning,
(a) the local tournament committee agrees to make use of courts, equipment and material which meet established APTA specifications or have APTA approval.
(b) the local tournament committee agrees to seed the tournament and conduct the draw in accordance with APTA regulations and procedures.
(c) the local tournament committee agrees to conduct the tournament in accordance with APTA regulations and procedures.
(d) the local tournament committee agrees to make no change in the established dates without further APTA approval.
(e) for those tournaments that are designated by the APTA to be used for national purposes,
(i) The APTA National Tournament Director will be invited to participate in the draw and he or his designated representative will attend,
(ii) the local tournament committee agrees to submit to the APTA a complete tournament draw showing results of the tournament within 2 weeks after completion of the tournament.

5. Except for national championship tournaments, the APTA does not exercise any control over the invitations. Invitations for sanctioned tournaments (other than national championships) will be extended and limited at the pleasure of the local tournament committee.

Sponsors of all tournaments requesting inclusion on the APTA Sanctioned Tournament schedule should take special note of the time schedule and other important provisions of the policy. A key condition on sanction is the conduct of the draw in accordance with the established APTA procedure, which is the subject of another paragraph in this Newsletter. The draws of all National Championship Tournaments are to be conducted by the APTA; and the National Tournament Director or his representative will attend.”

Source: Off The Wire, Vol. 5 No 1