What is the courtesy pass?
The courtesy pass is the optional last exchange of the Charleston, between the two players sitting across from each other. Each pair may trade zero, one, two or three tiles. The player who wants fewer sets the number, so if either player wants none, no tiles cross at all.
Answered by Prim. Last reviewed 2026-09-18.
When it happens, and with whom
The courtesy pass comes after the first Charleston, or after the second Charleston if the table played one. Either way it is the final exchange before East makes the first discard. Nothing comes after it.
It happens only across the table. You trade with the player opposite you and with nobody else, and the other two players at the table are a separate pair making a separate decision. They may pass three while you pass none, and that is exactly as it should be.
How the number is settled
You and the player across each say how many tiles you are willing to trade, from zero to three. The smaller number wins. If you offer three and they offer one, one tile goes each way. If either of you says none, the pass is over before it starts.
Say the number and only the number. What you are hoping to receive, or what you are about to send, is nobody's business, and announcing it tells the whole table what you are building. Choose your tiles, place them face down, and exchange them together.
What may and may not go across
A Joker may never be passed, on the courtesy pass or on any other pass of the Charleston. If one goes across by mistake it is handed back, and a different tile goes in its place so the count stays what the two of you agreed.
Flowers may be passed. Whether you should is a question of strategy rather than rule, and many players hold them. The blind pass does not come into it here either. The blind pass belongs to the last pass of each Charleston, and the courtesy pass is an agreed trade, so you choose every tile you send.
Saying no is never rude
The name makes the pass sound like a kindness you owe, and newer players sometimes feel they must say three. They do not. Declining the courtesy pass is a legitimate choice, exactly as declining the second Charleston is, and no one at a well run table will think less of you for it.
The honest reason to decline is a rack that is already working. If every tile you hold has a job, there is nothing to offer, and trading away a tile you need for one you might need is no bargain. The honest reason to accept is a rack still carrying two or three strangers that suit none of your likely lines.
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