Importance Of Stamp Certification?

The collection I've inherited are supposed to have individual certifications, which I've been killing myself to find. They were kept separately from the stamps for some reason.

How important are these "certifications"?
If I don't find them should I have them reviewed by an expert again?
Are these "certifications" registered to an individual and will they even do me any good?

Thanks again for everybody's help, it's been extremely useful!

Hello champyinz.......

Welcome to the club.....

A stamp certification is a document that declares a stamp to be identified correctly. I don't know of any certifiers/companies that place anyones' name (of ownership) on the cert. For some stamps it is almost a necessity as there are quite a few that can be difficult to identify and there are many forgeries of some.

Having stamps recertified can get expensive if you have hi-value material.....APS fees are $25.00 + 2% of catalog value per item. (for APS members.....higher for non-members)

Auctioning or selling certified items will generally attract more bidders/buyers.

Sounds like it's worth while to continue to search through all the possible places for these certificates. I'll continue to try to find a way to post some of these stamps as well. Thanks again.

It is always better to have the original certificates in hand. If the certificates are not recent, there is a good possibility that the expertizer put a very small mark on the back of the stamp using indelible ink. This will usually allow you to at least know who expertized the stamp, even if you don't have the certificate in hand.

If marked on the back of the stamp, the expertizer's mark may be as small as 1 mm, or it may be several mm; so you may need to use a magnifier to see it clearly.

However, expertizer marks have been forged, so it will be the original certificate that counts.

k