Umpire Assignment

When a competition is created, the organiser declares its umpire requirements: how many officials are needed, the minimum grade demanded by the competition level (drawn from the tenant's required-grade-per-level table), spoken languages for international fixtures, and whether a referee team with a designated head referee, the arbitre principal, must be appointed. The assignment engine then queries the umpire registry for officials who hold the required grade or higher, are marked available on the relevant dates, are not disqualified by conflict-of-interest rules, and live within an acceptable travel distance.

Conflict-of-interest detection is automatic. The engine flags any umpire whose home club or licensed players appear in the entry list, and prevents auto-suggestion in those cases. Suggested officials are ranked by a composite score combining grade fit, distance, prior assignment cadence to balance load, language coverage, and recent evaluation grades. The organiser reviews the shortlist and dispatches invitations; each invitee can accept, decline, or ask for clarification through the assignment workflow, which keeps a full timeline of states.

Accepted assignments populate the assignment calendar, which the umpire sees in their portal alongside travel distance, expected per-diem, and compensation. Expense reimbursement is captured against the assignment record: kilometres travelled, lodging, meals, and the per-event fee defined in the federation's referee compensation schedule. After the competition the head referee submits a post-event evaluation of supporting officials, and players or organisers can submit their own evaluation. These ratings flow back into the umpire profile and influence future ranking. Every assignment is permanently filed in the official's history, available to the federation, the umpire, and downstream selectors.