1. The suggested bid  is 3 Clubs..............Seven of you bid 3NT but Ray and Dave bid 3C well done.      

An ideal situation for ‘fourth suit forcing’.   Partner could be 6-4 or 5-5 in the majors……..The correct final contract could be 4S, 6S, 4H, 6H, 5D, 6D, 3NT……Therefore, no need to make a complete guess with 3NT when you can consult partner by use of the fourth suit, asking him for further definition of his hand. (You have three hearts he may have five.)

Example:  If partner holds  S KJxxx   H AQ10xx   D Kx   Cx  you won’t score many match points making 8 tricks in 3 NT when everyone else is making 12 tricks in Hearts!  (Partner would bid 3 Hearts over 3 Clubs, but would surely pass over your 3NT).

2) The suggested bid is 1H..........Seven of you made this bid, (Susan, Ray, Mary,Dave, Vernon, David and Pat) well done ...others tried Double. 

This is simple, yet many players have a belief that you should double here if you have ‘an opening bid’ or some support for all the suits. With a weak hand you need at least four cards in two of the unbid suits. After you bid 1 Heart, if either opponent bids 2 clubs now you can double, giving a perfect picture of your hand

And above all, overcall in the suit you want partner to lead!!  

  3) The suggested bid is PASS....Well done Susan and Dave,the rest all bid 2NT.

Partner has 6+ hearts and fewer than 8/9 points (since she didn’t respond 2 Hearts the first time).  A typical hand might be S x   H K10xxxx  D Kxxx  C xx .   Partner has heard you say that you have 5+ Spades and 4+ clubs and is telling you that she thinks 2 Hearts is, nevertheless, the best spot, and the way she has bid is the only way to get there.

You have no reason whatsoever to over-rule her, and the heart Jack is good support.

There is no reason to double for take-out when you have a balanced hand.  Partner is unlikely to be able to bid No Trumps himself;  he is likely to hold 7/8 points; East won’t have AQJxxxx of clubs and an entry’; if partner has an unbalanced hand with 5 or 6 of a major he can still bid his suit.

Even when partner has something like S AQJxx  H xxx  Dxxx  Cxx he won’t know whether to bid 3S or 4S opposite your double, ( 3NT is the right contract). Your bid might be different if you play a different defence to pre-empts.

  5) The suggested bid is 2 Spades.......................Only one person chose this bid, well done Dave. Six of you bid 2C, one bid 2H and one Passed.

If partner bids 1S  over 1C they will hold 5+ Spades about 75% of the time (and, incidentally, if she only has 4 Spades she will have at least 3 clubs!).  Therefore, if you raise Spades, you will have at least 7 between you, and probably 8+, whereas if you rebid 2 Clubs (Ugh!)….that’s where you’ll play when partner holds S  KJxxx  H xxx  D Kxxx  C x  .

(You don’t, of course, have a good enough hand to reverse into 2 Hearts).

Experienced players will do all they can to avoid rebidding 5 card minor suits.  

6) The suggested bid is 2 Clubs (UCB) but not many of you would use this as it is a "cue bid"..................Well done Vernon for bidding 2C, everyone else bid either 2S or 3S.

This bid is known as an ‘Unassuming Cue Bid’ (UCB), this shows a hand with good support and asks for more information about partner’s overcall. 

If partner has overcalled on S  KQ10xx  H  xx  D  Qxxx  C  xx  (a very minimum overcall)  he will bid 2S, and you will pass.  If he has S  KQ10xx  H  xx  D  Axxx   C  xx  (a moderate overcall) he will bid 2D, you will raise to 3 Spades, and he will pass.  If he has S  KQ10xx  H  xx  D  AQxx   Cxx  (a goodish overcall) he will bid 4 Spades over your raise to 3.

I do not personally use this bid so I would bid 3S on this hand and partner would go to 4S if he had a good overcall, but again it depends how weak your partners overcall at the one level might be. Note that every time you add "frills" to your bidding system you have to remember them and so does your partner!

7) The suggested bid is 3 Spades (full marks also for 4 Spades or 3 diamonds if you play ‘fit-jumps’). Three of you chose one of the suggested bids (Mike, Mary and Dave) others tried 2S, 2D, 2NT and Pass.

This is a very different situation from 6.  You should seize the opportunity to steal opponents’ bidding space, and raise as high as you dare; the text book bid (at love all) is probably 3S (One level higher than you would bid without the Double) but it is more than likely that opponents have game (or even slam) ‘on’, in which case a bold 4S bid will give them a headache.

8) The suggested bid is 4 Clubs.......................This is another "cue bid" which few of you use so most chose to bid 3H except for one 

   who tried 4H. (Well done Dave for bidding 4C)

Good bidders regularly harness this type of bid (which clearly cannot have any kind of natural meaning) to express fair values but uncertainty about the best contract.  Like problems (1) and (6) it avoids guessing by consulting further with partner – (one of the key elements of  good partnership bidding.)  In this situation it will promise both majors and ask partner (who may only have 3 cards in one of the majors) to choose the suit - either 4 Hearts or 4 Spades.  A cue bid of the opponents suit is a powerful tool to find out more information about your partners hand.