Moscow 2009
Eurovision 2009: Voting - Rules, Terms and Conditions
Where?
This year's Eurovision Song Contest will be held in Moscow, Russia.
When?
1st Semi-Final - Tue 12 May 2009, BBC Three
2nd Semi-Final - Thu 14 May 2009, BBC Three
Grand Final - Sat 16 May 2009, BBC One and BBC HD
Voting in the Eurovision Song Contest 2009
1. Once all acts have been performed, viewers will be invited to vote for their favourite act/s.
2. Voting is by telephone only. The numbers to be used will be given during the programmes. Please note that you cannot vote by email or via this website.
3. Vote lines are opened and closed as specified on the programmes. Votes received outside the specified times will not be counted, but may still be charged. Voting times may change.
4. UK-based viewers may only vote in the first semi-final and the Grand Final.
Voting in the Semi-Final
5. Although there are two semi-finals, UK viewers can only vote in the first semi on Tuesday 12th May. This applies to all five countries (UK, France, Germany, Spain and Russia) that go straight through to the finals. These five countries went into a draw to decide which of the two semi-finals they would be voting in. Please note that the UK act will not participate in the semi-finals.
6. Telephone votes from all participating countries will decide the first nine countries to go through to the Final. In addition to that, a tenth country from each semi, to be chosen based on the votes from the national juries, will go through to the Grand Final.
7. In the semi-finals, the final scores of the songs shall be determined only on the basis of the results of the televoting. 12 points shall be allocated to the song having obtained the highest number of votes from the televoting; 10 points to the song having obtained the second-highest number of votes from the televoting, 8 points to the song having obtained the third-highest number of votes from the televoting, 7 points to the next, and so on down to 1 point for the song having obtained the tenth-highest number of votes from the televoting.
Voting in the Grand Final
8. In the Grand Final, UK-based callers may NOT vote for the UK act. Any votes from the UK for the UK act will not count and the call may still be charged.
9. In the Grand Final, the final scores of the songs shall be calculated on the basis of both the results of the televoting and the results of the national juries appointed. The scores of each song in each country shall be determined as follows: 12 points shall be allocated to the song having obtained the highest combined number of votes from the televoting and from the juries; 10 points to the song having obtained the second-highest combined number of votes from the televoting and from the juries, 8 points to the song having obtained the third-highest combined number of votes from the televoting and from the juries, 7 points to the next, and so on down to 1 point for the song having obtained the tenth-highest combined number of votes from the televoting and from the juries.
10. The winner of the Grand Final shall be the song(s) which has/have obtained the highest number of points from the combined calculation of the televoting results and of the juries' scores from all participating countries.
National Jury
11. Each national jury will consist of 5 members including a chairman. The members shall be professionals within the music industry and nationals of the relevant country.
12. The members of each national jury will be presented with pre-recorded sequences of a dress rehearsal of each song. They will cast their votes prior to the live performance, based on the rehearsal viewing.
Tie
13. In the event of a tie, the Eurovision Song Contest 2009 rules prescribe the following:
"Section One: Core Elements
If the televoting results in a tie for the last qualifying position for a Semi-Final or for the first place in the Grand Final, the calculations laid down under Section Five below shall apply. Should two or more songs still tie for first place in the Grand Final, even after those calculations, the songs in question shall be declared joint winners of the ESC.
Section Five: Procedure in case of a tie
1) Should there be a tie for the last position in a Semi-Final (because two songs have received the same number of points on the basis of the televoting results) or for the first place in the Grand Final, as well as any other situation where a tie occurs, the winner shall be the song which has obtained points from the highest number of countries. If the tying songs have received points from the same number of countries, the highest number of 12-point scores shall be decisive. If the winner still cannot be determined by this procedure, the number of times ten points have been awarded shall be the deciding factor. If necessary, this method shall continue until account has been taken of the number of times one point has been awarded. In the very unlikely case that after applying the above procedure in a Semi-Final there is still a tie concerning the qualifying ranks and non-qualifying ranks, the tie shall be resolved by giving precedence to the country which was earlier in the running order for the Semi-Final in question. The same procedure shall be used to resolve any other ties.
2) Should two or more songs receive exactly the same number of calls in a given country, the results of the jury (see Annexe 3 and Appendix 4) shall be used to determine their respective ranks (i.e. the song having obtained the most votes from the jury shall be ranked highest). If these songs have received no votes from the jury, their ranks shall be determined by a draw to be held by the pan-European televoting partner under the supervision of the EBU Executive Supervisor.
3) If there is a tie in the results of the jury to choose between two or more songs which have not already qualified for the Grand Final, the song which has obtained the most points from the televoting shall be awarded the wild card to participate in the Grand Final.
4) If there is a tie between two or more songs when the combined calculation between televotes and jury votes is used to determine the final ranking of the songs in the Grand Final, the song(s) which obtained the most votes from the televotes shall be ranked highest."
Other Rules
14. Each phone vote costs 15p from a BT landline. Calls from other operators may vary and calls from mobiles will be considerably higher.
On 8 May 2009, mobile network operators provided the following call charge information:
| Premium Rate Number | Tariff | 02 | Orange | T-Mobile | Vodafone | 3 | Virgin |
| 0901 | 15p from a BT landline | 50ppc | 42.5ppc | 75ppc | 50ppc max | 70ppc | 50ppc |
ppc = pence per call
Please check with your operator for updates on call charges.
15. Voters must obtain permission from the bill payer before voting. Voters aged 12 and under should obtain parent/guardian consent before voting.
16. Make sure you carefully dial only the number of the act(s) you wish to vote for.
17. The BBC reserves the right to disqualify votes if it has reasonable grounds to suspect that there has been any deliberate attempt to rig or manipulate the voting.
18. The BBC, its sub-contractors, subsidiaries and/or agencies cannot accept any responsibility whatsoever for any technical failure or malfunction or any other problem with any telephone network or line, system, server, provider or otherwise which may result in any vote being lost or not properly registered or recorded.
19. The BBC reserves the right to cancel or suspend voting at any time if it considers it has reasonable cause to do so or if there is a technical breakdown of any kind.
20. In the unlikely event of a failure in the telephone votes for any reason the results of the national jury vote will be used. Both the televoting and the national jury voting will operate under the supervision of an independent adjudicator.
21. The Eurovision Song Contest 2009 is produced under the auspices of the European Broadcasting Union. The rules are issued by the European Broadcasting Union and are common across all participating countries. More details can be found on Eurovision.tv.
22. The voting in this programme accords with the BBC's Code of Conduct for Competitions and Voting, details of which can be found on the BBC'S Standards and Guidelines website.
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