Should change of call be allowed?

[Sue]

Only one pair is bidding. 1S, 3S, 4C, pass. The player who passed then called the director when they suddenly realised the bid was actually 4C and not 4S. One of the opponents commented that they thought the bid looked like 4S. There was no comment that unauthorised info was given by their partner eg facial expressions etc. Apparently the C was not clearly written. The director allowed the player to change their call - 4S.
How would you rule?
Thank you.

[Gidi]

Hi Sue
It has to be your decision on the day.
Law 25A2 says that a change is allowed if the unintended bid was "because of a mechanical error or a slip of the tongue". This presumably refers to oral bidding and bidding boxes respectively.

A change is not allowed if the call is because of "loss of concentration".

So as director, you need to determine if it was because of loss of concentration. How do you do that? Ask the player (away from the table), but unless they say explicitly "I lost concentration", it's up to you to decide. In our club we educate the players not to say "I lost concentration" if they want to change an unintended call.

What if it was because of misreading the bid, or another reason? The Law is silent about it.

But other than the Law, I believe that we need to think about the consequences. Would the game / session be better if you disallow the change and force NS to play in a stupid contract? Is it fair that NS get a bottom board, even if North was in a dream world for a split second? Is it fair to the other EW pairs that the EW on this table get a top because North was distracted? I think that the answers to all these questions is NO. for this reason, unless the player admits to losing concentration, I would tend to allow a change. In my opinion, this would maintain the integrity of the session.

[SusieQ]

Hi Gigi,
I wasn't thinking that law 25 applies. The bid was definitely intended but that player asked to change their bid after realising their own mistake because they had misread partner's poor writing. Perhaps Law 21A applies and it would be good to have this confirmed.
Regards
Sue

[Gidi]

Hi Sue
As director, I will decide according to how I read the bid.