tournament fishermen, what do you concider late?

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I fished a local "open" buddy bass tournament put on by a neighboring club this weekend. The fishing was terrible but something happened at the weigh in that I thought posed a good question. Tournament time was from safe light till 3pm, me and my partner only managed to boat 1 fish ( I had 2 good ones shake loose at the boat but thats another story). Anyway skip to the weigh in. The winners had 3 fish with a 7lb total, one other person weighed a fish but we were above him with by about 5 oz. The scales were put up, winners and 2nd place was declared then there is a holler from the boat ramp. by this time it's close to 3:15-3:20 Two other fishermen had just came in and had fish to weigh. The scales were unpacked re-zeroed and they were declared 2nd place winners, which knocked me and my partner out of a check.

Now, the point of my post is not to call anyone out and say we were robbed, and the check was hardly enough to get ones feelings hurt about (it would have just been enough to cover expenses for the day and mabye a meal.) but, I was fishing with members of a neighboring club, had never fished with them before, and didn't want to be labeled as "that guy". I wasn't sure of their rules for late weigh in's for open tournaments but I know their club rules and there was supposed to be a penalty enforced (if it was an official club tournament.)

There are probably some people that fished that tournament that will read this post, again i'm not trying to cause a stink, and will probably fish with them again. It just brought up a question in my mind " how late is Late, and at what point do you say something about it?" My club has similar rules for every minute your late your docked weight, but in all honesty we don't have a set definition of late, are you late if your in sight of the boat ramp, or your boat is'nt trailered, or your not in line at the scales?

So lets here it, how late is late, and when do you say something about it?