Demand Bids

 We covered forcing bids in a previous post. Demand bids are a little bit different, but both situations demand that you make a bid. A forcing bid is a bid by your partner that requires you to bid something. A demand bid is a situation when the strength of your hand demands that you bid something. There are two primary situations when a demand bid comes up.

Opening Hands

This might seem obvious, but when everyone has passed to you and you have 13 points with distribution you must open the bidding. In the olden days, Goren would add a requirement of a "biddable suit" to open the bidding with 13 points. We don't worry about that any longer. If you have 13 points and no one else has opened the bidding, you need to bid something, even something with no good suit like this hand:

 

You aren’t happy with any of your suit holdings, but you must let your partner know that you have 13 points. Open 1 club, intending to bid 1 no trump at your next turn.

Responding to an Opening Bid

When your partner opens the bidding, you need to keep the bidding open for her if you have at least 6 points. That means that you need to respond 1 heart after partner’s 1 club opener even with a crummy hand like this:

Remember that your partner might have 20 points or more with her opening one bid. You need to give her another chance to speak unless you are extremely weak.

There is an exception if your partner opens 1NT. She has limited her strength to 17 HCP at the most. If you are satisfied with a NT contract, and you know your side doesn't have enough points for game (you have 8 or fewer HCP), you can pass.

Certain Bidding Sequences

Sometimes the strength promised by the bidding of the two partners demands that players continue bidding even though no bids are strictly forcing. An example would be:

South: 1 heart (normal opening bid, requires 13+ points)

North: 2 diamonds (2-over-1 response requires 10+ points)

South: 3 hearts (jump by opener in a suit already bid 16+ points)

North: ?

 

While South’s jump is not strictly forcing, the bids made so far indicate that the team has at least 26 points. Both players should keep bidding until a game contract is reached.