[CQ-Contest] Dupes: to work or not to work

[Alan Braun]

I know this issue has been beat up before, but I had some experiences this
weekend in SS that made me rethink my own position on it. I had a number of
people (at least 4) refuse to work me because they thought I was a dupe. I
wrote down their calls and went through my log afterwards, and found nothing
in it that was even close. It seems to me that there are probably 3 reasons
why a "run" station might think someone calling him is a dupe:
1. He truly is a dupe. The S&P station either is using paper logs & does not
know he's calling someone he's worked already, or else he is ignoring his
logging software when it tells him so. (BTW, TR-log, which I use, will not
allow you to work a dupe when you are S&P mode - it erases the entry and
puts you back at square one).
2. The S&P station has busted the call on a prior QSO.
3. The run station has copied the S&P's data when S&P was actually calling
someone else on an adjacent frequency at some earlier time in the contest.
This is especially likely to happen if the S&P station is not sending the
call of the station he's working before his exchange. I was not doing so at
1st, but modified my S&P exchange midway through the contest so that I did
so from then on.

For the run station, only one of these is really a dupe. For possibilities 2
and 3, you are NOT IN THE LOG and you are at risk for penalties if you claim
the prior QSO! And there is no way for you to tell which situation pertains
at the time. So here are my suggestions:
1. When S&P'ing, ALWAYS send the call of the guy you are working along with
the exchange.
2. When running, go ahead and work the apparent dupes who call you. If you
don't, it could come back to bite you when the logs are checked!

I'm open to any other thoughts on this subject, if I'm overlooking
something. Flames will be ignored.

Alan NS0B

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Alan Braun MD, NS0B
Norwalk IA


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