Shenanigans At Kelliher?

Stallzer, the prices shown on SAN for non-live events typically represent the highest bids garnered *ON SAN*. Bids received through other channels (phone, fax, mail, email, other platforms) aren't represented. This isn't new. That's always been the case.

Additionally, any prices shown after closing for these types of sales aren't actual selling prices as auction houses generally do not go back and update realizations on SAN after the fact. If you want true prices realized for these sales, go to the auction house's website. Some auction houses may not publish prices realized for non-live events.

Lastly, you're taking the term "sale" too literally. Both Siegel and Schuyler Rumsey call their auctions "sales", as do many auction houses. Look at some of the auction catalogs; it's printed right on there. The term "sale" in the traditional philatelic world does not mean fixed-price selling of items.

I completely understand. I don't have to agree with their terms and they won't be changing them anytime soon to please me. Whether it is a sale or an auction I wish the SAN platform was able to get updates from Kelleher to provide live bids from other input sources than SAN but it is what it is. Knowing all this just makes it easier in the future
if the situation arises again. I like Kelleher and tend to follow their auctions and sales more than others and I still won a lot that I wanted and even got it for a bargain.

"Aren't the auction houses supposed to tally all their mail bids prior to the auction going live, with live bidding being the bottom line for what lots are hammered down at?"

Exactly

I don't know if this will work but: Next time there is something from one of these non-live sales/auctions that you really want, why not go to SAN, see where the bidding is, CALL Kelleher (like you might do for a phone bid) and find out where the bidding is relative to what you see online? Sounds like a pain in the keister, but if you REALLY want it, it would be worth the trouble I would think.

And while you are on the phone you can leave your bid with Kelleher directly since it all ends up in the same stewpot.

The more I reread this thread the more it strikes me that for "left" bidding you need to decide what the max is that you are willing to pay and bid that. It is pointless to keep upping your bid in an endless response to somebody else's bid. A cycle of mutual destruction. Also, it is possible that you may lose and just because you lose does not indicate "shenanigans".

True but this one I can chalk up as not knowing the ins and outs of their "sales". I just prefer the SAN layout better than Kelleher's but next time if I run into this I know where to find the answer.

I have bid on kelleher's non-live auctions, and I usually have to go to their website to see what the actual going bid is. I don't think they update SAN often enough to get the idea of what the high bid is. I also wait until 8:58 pm on their website to put in my max bid. I don't need to worry about getting into bidding wars then. Some of the other auction houses that don't run live auctions on SAN usually state that the bid on SAN may not reflect the real bid. They also usually close their SAN bidding an hour or 2 before they actually do the live auction.

I refuse to bid with any house that closes SAN bids before their live auction even starts. That defeats the purpose of using SAN.

I have no idea how Kelleher does business with their mail sales these days, but the people running Kelleher, used to run Nutmeg Auctions years ago.

At Nutmeg, for a mail sale, after it closed, they would conduct a small private (not announced publicly to my knowledge) live auction that they would hold for a few agents and interested dealers. This is after the mail sale closed. It was an odd thing, which one kind of had to know about. I found out about it, because I used a real agent at the time, and he informed me.

With all mail sales, you pretty much have to be careful. If you place a large max bid, you definitely run the risk of paying that amount. You are trusting the seller to be fully honest with regard to how they handle bids.

Some interesting things are found when Googling Nutmeg.

https://cookcountyrecord.com/storie...n-collection
https://www.leagle.com/decision/infdco20100324786
https://virtualstampclub.com/bogusfdc.html

Coogle is no stranger to these types of articles. I was first made aware of such things in the mid-1980's. Feel free to Google Coogle (I've always wanted to write that...), or Zelanak, and there's a long history there. Don't take my word for this.

That's an issue. Thanks for enlightening me, I had no clue these things happen in these "sales". BTW, the piece that I lost out on (You can appreciate this) was 41L1L with imprint capture.

stallzer - I saw that. You have a good eye - very nice item.