For what it's worth, the L4+ debated this very question, extensively, some number of years ago. There was a lot of support for the idea that a time extension isn't fair to the other players - all of whom started on time, by the way - because it extends the tournament. However, that time extension is almost never actually used, because they only have to play 1 or 2 games (ignoring odd corner cases).

Our conclusions were that it's better customer service, esp. to the opponent, to be consistent with time extensions, and that we didn't want to add “loss of time” to the punishment already being received by tardy players.

d:^D

Now let's flip this on its head and go to the extreme. If a player gets a GL for tardiness, and shows up a minute late, how do you feel about only giving them 33 minutes to play the next 2 games? If a game is 17 minutes, and that game isn't being played..why not dock that time from their match. If 50 minutes isn't a “right” then a 33 minute match should be fine in this case and no one can say they were unfairly penalized.

Yes, I can see the problem with doing that. I'm not suggesting that time actually be removed, just that they shouldn't get any extra. Essentially, I think it should be treated as though the tardiness was a game. If a player is 5 minutes late and gets a game loss, we act as though they played their game in 5 minutes.

Our conclusions were that it's better customer service, esp. to the opponent, to be consistent with time extensions, and that we didn't want to add “Loss of time” to the Punishment already being received by tardy players.

That's a good point. I suppose the time extension can be viewed as a diminishment of the game loss, giving them more time to come back.