Thought I Was Stealing, But I Was Taken...nystamps

I'm a novice stamp collector. I'm also relatively poor so I cannot afford to make many mistakes. My attitude is quite simple. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. NYStamps fooled me once. They won't fool me again.

Returning a comment to a few from this thread:

Kurt, you may have taken me wrong...I wasn't complaining at all. Just thought it was a good story to tell. I've found a few nice one's from NYStamps-- several Type Va's and an unused 20 that turned out to be a 23.

I've made a few bad purchases, and I haven't returned this one yet- actually thought about keeping it, but will probably return it.

Doc, it was definitely described as a #26, but still altered, but I don't have any problem returning it.

I feel the same about NYStamps as most-- let the buyer beware. But at the same time, I don't think they're a risk when it comes to a purchase, because you can return to them.

Definitely risky for a new collector who is learning, because they are very poor at correctly ID'ing their stamps, and a lot of their mint stamps look reperfed.

StampCollector1960-- Why not? I bought an unused #25 for $27 about a year ago.......and a few 25A's as 26's. These misidentified items are out there from time to time, and if I don't buy them, someone else will! :)

Thanks for all the responses.....Ray

I am not a US collector. What is catalog value of a 26? What is value of a 26A? If my understanding is correct, it was listed as a 26, you thought it was a 26A, but it turned out to be a 26 altered to look like a 26A? If so, what did the seller do wrong? He was right, you were trying to score a bargain assuming he was wrong, but you ended up with what the seller said it was.

What the seller did wrong was not specifically disclosing the alteration in writing. This seller *never* discloses such things in writing; they let the buyer figure it out from the pictures and/or the actual stamp when they receive it. For better or worse, that's how they do business. If one knows this ahead of time, is willing to take the risk, and bids accordingly, it's not a huge problem. The problem is that a lot of buyers out there assume the best and end up getting the worst in the form of altered and faked stamps. Knowledgeable collectors can often spot these things from the pictures, novices usually can't.

If you assume the worst with them upfront, you'll often get good deals on good stamps and won't be disappointed too often. If you assume the best and give them the benefit of the doubt on questionable items, it's only a matter of time before you get burned.

What you are saying if you think you are outsmarting them by spotting a 26A when they said it is a 26 (still not clear how big a difference that is), you are taking a risk and could get burned. But, it sounds like if you bid on it as a 26, you would have been fine?

No - if you read Ray's post above, the problem is the alteration to the stamp, which doesn't make it fine.

Just to pile on this vender, last week they had 10 listings for Rhodesian stamps all of which had forged cancels and all sold to unsuspecting buyers. In my opinion, if you are going to sell single stamps is important that you at least try to verify the stamps you are selling are legitimate. A quick check using the free online Rhodesian forgery database would have verified these faked cancels. Assuming that NYStamps isn't being malicious or intentional; we are left with they simply aren't paying attention.

Given this, I would strongly recommend that anyone who has ever bought anything from these folks verify what it was sold as. Dip everything to look for 'expert repairs', send out any higher value stamp for a cert.
Don

Bingo! I don't think for a second that they have their own workshop of people altering stamps to make them more valuable. They almost certainly work in assembly-line fashion, very quickly, with different people identifying stamps, taking photos, uploading the listing, etc. I don't think that they spend any more time examining a stamp than is necessary to assign a Scott# to it - then it goes on to the photographer and then to whoever uploads the listing. You will sometimes find their listings grossly misidentified (wrong country, wrong category, wrong Scott#, etc) in ways that work against them, but they never go back and fix it. They're all about churning through the maximum amount of material with the minimum amount of effort.

My comments above are merely intended as a description of the way they do business and is not meant to excuse practices that can result in defrauded buyers. I reiterate that my advice when dealing with this seller is to proceed with caution and assume the worst if there's a possibility of faked/forged/altered/damaged/repaired items. Do not give them the benefit of the doubt if something looks questionable.

I wholeheartedly agree. I think their business model is to throw as much stuff out the door as possible without much attention to accuracy or customer service.

They are one of only two companies that I've ever given negatives to on eBay. (The other was an elderly seller who, I later found out had passed away and his estate didn't know what to do. )

I purchased a high-end Irish stamp from them, SC 38. It's determined by a 0.05mm measurement. The stamp I received was a SC 14. Ok, mistakes happen. What ticked me off was that there was absolutely no response to my inquiries. I finally had to get my money back via eBay.

Dan

You would be hard pressed to find a collector of about anything that hasnt at one time in their life bought something and then realized " I shouldnt have bought that."

I don't do business NYStamps. They got me once too.


-IBFS

While I do not defend their throw as much up as possible in as little time as possible without disclosure of faults or much if any effort to verify proper identification, I've never heard of an online Rhodesian forgery database, and I doubt they have either.

Eyeonwall
Here is the link http://www.cjrstamps.com/forgeries-database.html This site has a Reference database and a forgeries database.

NYStamps is aware of this site, they have been told about it before.

In their defense, they will occasionally improve their listings when notified of mistakes. It appears that they will do this if notified before any bids have been placed but the majority of time they do not make any updates.
Don

Like Art and Dan, I likewise don't think they are malicious. They are however too busy to care about details and figure the easiest way to handle things is to accept anything back that buyers don't want. Frankly, this is similar to the approach taken by Lots of other dealers who move large volumes of stamps.

This is excellent advise.
Tom