Do Auction Houses Falsely Report Sales?

A good rule of thumb on auction bidding, told to me by Jeff Purser, is ... if you really want the lot, use an agent but if it's a "nice to have item" go ahead and give the bid to the house. It is common to find that when giving the bid to the house you secure the lot at your maximum bid or one increment below it. My classic story is a bid of $200 on a lot only to find it knocked down to me at $2000. The house admitted an error and offered to sell it to me at the $200 bid. I was pleased to get the stamp and didn't even suggest that they offer it to the $1900 underbidder.

Quote "4idgaf,

was the receipt and the prices realised in the same currency.

It seems to me that the $ 7,000 was in US $ and the $ 10,000 in Australian $ after the extras had been added on.

US$ 7,000 is about A$ 8,100 and a 20% premium on top of that would make it US$ 8,400 and postage, insurance packing would add maybe another $100 making it US$ 8,500 which is about A$ 9,800,

Pagoda"


Pagoda,

Everything $AUD

Same sale, same date.

No names disclosed for fear or identifying the purchaser who has no knowledge of this question I am asking.

Quote "No major Stamp Auction House is going to sell an item for $ 7.000 and list it on their prices realised at $ 10,000. The vendor would see the figure on the prices realised and would receive his payment less commission based on that price,

Pagoda"

Except if the auction house was the vendor, which I highly suspect.

Good source? Absolutely. However, and I say this based on personal experience, one being a VERY expensive lesson learned early on before I knew better: closely examine every single item you buy from him, under high magnification, and then go over it again.

Lots of fake imperfs and part perfs, and on cancel items, be very wary of undisclosed flaws. Once, when I complained about several unlisted faults, the response was "cancel collectors are not really concerned with faults to the stamp." Bovine excrement! They most certainly are, especially when they're paying a premium fot that cancel...

4idgaf,

If the estimate was $10,000 and the realisation was the starting price $ 7,000 then most probably a typo, the data entry operator entered the estimate instead of the selling price, nothing sinister,

Pagoda

Pagoda,

I will send the link via PM, please do not disclose to anyone.


John

64idgaf,

sorry, never received any messages,

Pagoda

I one time won some auctions from a house mentioned above. The funny thing, it was on SAN live. All my bids were one bid below the selling posted selling price. I figured, that I had lost items. Two weeks later, I get an invoice in the mail for payment. I promptly pay the invoice, the items are sent, I question them in terms of gum quality, as they were MNH. Some had creases and bends not mentioned in the descriptions. There policy is complete customer satisfaction. They tell me to send them back for a full refund, which I promptly do. They refund the money, and now I have been banned from any further auction bidding with them. I would like to thank them for doing me that favor.

"ALL auction houses, "honest" ones or not, use "House Numbers" (several)--bidder numbers not assigned to any buyer present, by phone or internet, that the auctioneer will use to announce "sold to #xxx" when an item(s) fail to reach the price level wanted"

While it is possible that all antique auction houses have that practice, it is simply not true that all stamp auction houses do that.

When stamp auction houses have an item that does not reach the reserve, they usually just say the item "went to the book" since it might or might not be an actual bid. On an honest house site or on SAN the item will usually say "closed" if it does not sell. Of course some houses never post the winning bids, so there is no way to know anything at all.

Scott Trepel, when at Christies and now at Siegel, says "Pass" when the lot did not meet the reserve price. I could write a book in this thread since we ran a public auction firm for a quarter of a century, but I won't. I *am* interested in following the thread. I think it's very interesting.

But here's a little-known fact that may surprise many readers, but the Uniform Commercial Code (which last I looked was law in every state but Louisiana, I believe) REQUIRES that public auction firms protect sellers from unreasonably low bidding, which is another way of saying that they MUST have fair reserves. Don't believe it? Look it up. It was still the law last time I checked - which admittedly hasn't been for a few years! But do not confuse this with a house or firm that is merely selling their own material. This law is intended to protect real consignors.

Bill Weiss,

I was looking at the Terms of Sale of an Auction House yesterday and it stated,

" No lot can be rejected if the buyer or his agent has inspected the lot prior to auction, irrespective of whether or not any item/s within the lot has been through inadverdence incorrectly described ".

Have you come across many houses using these or similar terms,

Pagoda

Yes indeed. In fact, that is a pretty standard Term of Sale in virtually every public auction that I am aware of. We also had it in our terms. The logic behind it is to discourage people who view the items from making unfair returns. In theory, by viewing the item, they should be able to see anything that bothers them and then act accordingly - if something bothers them, they should not bid. However, this term does not preclude the buyer from seeking third party certification, so in that respect, there could be undisclosed faults that the viewer could not see at the time of viewing, and by allowing certification, the buyer is still protected. Also, no honest auction firm will disallow a return if the buyer returns an item that has a fault that was not described by them. In such cases, unless the buyer is a chronic returner, they will allow the returns.

The whole idea is for the auction firm to expedite the sale of the consigned material, so they have a right to impose rules. If the buyers feel a rule is unfair, they have the right to protest by not bidding. They do not have the right to try to change or circumvent the terms of sale.

64idgaf,

thanks,

got your message,

it seems that the Auction House accepted a figure below the reserve but stated that the realisation was the reserve figure. I have never come across it before but as that Auction House is no longer in business I doubt it would happen again. They never had, as far as I know any self owned material in their sales,

Pagoda

Bill,

so, it is in the rules but cannot always be enforced,

re.

" In theory, by viewing the item, they should be able to see anything that bothers them and then act accordingly ".

I don't know about you but I cannot tell visually the difference between a perforated 12 and a perforated 11 1/2 without a perforation gauge.

Pagoda

No offense intended, but if in fact you honestly can't tell the difference, then why would you even consider bidding? But bottom line, if the house described it as perf 12.5 and it turns out it's perf 12, an honest house would give you your money back. But......how will you discover that they were wrong if you can't tell?