Scott To Assign Minor-Letter To Imperf Singles

To be honest, Scott's existing policy should preclude the listing of any of the errors they list, since errors are printed in very small numbers and are not available for general sale.

All of these stamps should be given MAJOR catalogue numbers. I think it's going to make the Scott listing a mess. We have stamps of the past in perf and imperf varieties getting unique major catalogue numbers. But modern imperfs only get minor catalogue numbers. There's no consistency there.

Or they could do what Michel do. In case the same stamp design is issued as both perf and imperf, then the former is listed with an A subletter, whereas the latter gets a B. In case there is only a perf issue then there are no subletters. The problem is that small subletters are already assigned to booklets, blocks of four, pairs etc. - very messy, but having small & capital letters should work...

Unfortunately, the Scott Catalog for US Stamps is not always laid out that way. There are situations where a number doesn't fit in a series and Scott occasionally fits in new major issues or varieties with a capital letter suffix (example: Scott 1286, 1286A; Scott 1288, 1288B, etc.). To assign the subletters you suggest would require an entire re-numbering scheme of the Scott Catalog, which could create more confusion than it would be worth.

The Scott numbering is horrid. It's inflexible and product of the time when it was created. I think the best numbering system I have seen for stamps is MICHEL. But the one thing US collectors would not be able to get their head around is the lack of minor and major numbers.