You can find the approved by the FIDE Presidential Board Report of the Arbiters' Commission here.

You can find the approved by the FIDE Presidential Board IA and FA titles and the approved FA titles from the FIDE Arbiters' Seminars here.

The FIDE Arbiters' Commission publishes the list of licensed arbiters so far.

The procedure of acquiring the license will continue. The non-licensed arbiters should contact their respective federations in order to obtain the license.

You can see the list here (updated 19-06-2013).

After FIDE Treasurer's decision, the Arbiters' names of non-service Federations will not be published, until these Federations pay their overdue FIDE arrears.

The FIDE Arbiters’ Commission intends to supply the Arbiters who will get the Arbiters’ license with identification cards that will indicate that they are licensed.

For this purpose all the Arbiters who wish to get their license are kindly requested to send to their Federation a good quality photo (250X300) to be included in the card. Each Federation with licenced Arbiters should collect and send these photos to FIDE ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ).

To all National Chess Federations

Subject: Arbiters’ License

Dear friends,

from 01.01.2013 the new regulations for the Arbiters’ License will be in effect.

Attached you will find the regulations, as they will be published in the FIDE Handbook (B.05, art. 6).

The main change because of the new regulations will be that from 01.01.2013, in order a tournament to be rated, all its Arbiters (IA, FA, National Arbiters) must be licensed.

A tournament with non-licensed Arbiters will not be rated.

The procedure of paying the license fees will be as follows:

1. The Federation will send to FIDE Office ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) the list with all its Arbiters (IAs, FAs and national Arbiters) who will get the license.
2. FIDE will send to the Federation the invoice with the license fees to be paid according to the regulations (art.6.3).
3. The Federation will collect the fees and send them to FIDE.
4. FIDE will send to the Federation the cards for its licensed Arbiters and the Arbiters will be eligible to conduct any FIDE rated tournament.

Since the Federations need to have licensed Arbiters for their first events of 2013, it is advisable to send to FIDE the lists with their Arbiters to be licensed not later than 5 December 2012, so that the Arbiters will get their license on time and before the tournament they will conduct will start.

For any questions or further information please contact the Chairman of the FIDE Arbiters’ Commission IA Panagiotis Nikolopoulos ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) or the FIDE Arbiters’ Commission ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ).

With best regards,

IA Panagiotis Nikolopoulos

Chairman

FIDE Arbiters’ Commission