Bridge Tip # 31

When you feel you should be  splitting honors,  you should be consistent if it will help your partner and not declarer.  Say declarer is in four spades and dummy is to your right.  Declarer calls for a small heart from three little on dummy.  It is your play,  holding KQJ2 of hearts.  You should have an agreement with your partner to always play the lowest, which I prefer, denying the ten, or the highest, denying the ace, but not the queen which would leave your partner in the dark as to the possession of the other honors. Obviously, this only applies if you know your partner will need to know the information, but unless you are trying to deceive declarer it  will assist your partner to defend as well as possible if you are  consistent.  Related to this, if you have KQ doubleton of a suit, have reason to believe your partner has the ace, and are leading through declarer, you should first lead the queen followed by the king.  This alerts your partner that you only have two of the suit in case she would have to overtake for some reason.

If you  a singleton high high honor, you obviously have no choice. It is up to your partner to work out what is  the true situation.