Tempo Breaks in the Play
The game of bridge has many kinds of rules. There are the basic rules of the game such as dealer makes the first call, or that you must follow suit if you can. There are also rules about the manor in which the game is played. Today's article discusses breaks in tempo in the play.
It is best practice for declarer to take some time after the dummy is faced to make a general plan for the play of the hand and to allow defenders time to consider the defense. It is courteous for both declarer and defenders to announce that they are thinking about the whole hand before playing to the first trick. After four cards have been played to a trick, declarer or a defender may leave his card face up to give himself more time for thought.
The ideal is that every card is played in the same tempo, but that is not always possible. Breaks in tempo provide information to everyone at the table that a problem exists. Players may take inferences from opponents breaks in tempo, at their own risk. Players may not break tempo when playing which could indicate a problem when they don't have a significant problem when it might mislead an opponent.
Breaks in tempo to mislead opponents are known as coffee housing and are serious rules violations. Examples of coffee housing are breaks in tempo with a singleton or only little cards when declarer leads towards a KJ in dummy. If such a break occurs, the director should be called and probably a recorder memo should be filed. Coffee housing may be fine in other games, but it has no place in bridge. The Director may adjust the result in this situation (Law 73D2).