PF Certified Booklet - Water Soaked?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1964-USA-Sc....m1438.l2649 br /

This appears to be a water soaked booklet with panes without gum. I wonderwhy they wanted a certificate for such a damaged item. Now, I know certain panes with certain slogans run a bit more but no need for a cert.

Even if it were the scarcer variety, if it was waterlogged and without gum, why would anyone submit this to the PF? For that matter, why would anyone want to buy it?

The submitter could have sent it unprotected, and there was a rainstorm somewhere along the way. Kids, if you drink, don't mail. That still doesn't explain sending this in.

Not every one who submits to an expertizing service is as knowledgeable as we would like to believe. The PF or PSE or APS might be the only place they could find and a proper triage was not done by the expertizing organization. Sometimes things get submitted by knowledgeable dealers as the only way to convince a consignor that their item has minimal value.

There are two aspects: 1. The person that got the PF and 2. who would try to sell ebay.

The catalog value of BKC18 is not just "a bit more" than the catalog value of BKC19; it is a lot more. $325 vs. $11. And the difference is not in the slogans, but in the background color of the cover on the left side "behind" the stylized postman. The background of BKC18 is "pink" and the background of BKC19 is "white." It is obvious to me looking at the image on the cert that this is not a "pink" BKC18. Whatever damaged the panes looks to have "yellowed" the "white" background.

I have no thoughts about whether the booklet was damaged in sending it to PF other than to say that if was undamaged at the time it was sent, it was a waste of effort because the difference between BKC19 and BKC18 is so obvious. I collect these -- I think I have all airmail booklets except BKC14 (very scarce, CV $3500) and BKC17 ($CV 500), and I do have trouble being certain about the difference between a BKC15 and a BKC18, which is in the tagging.

The only airmail booklet that ever should need a cert is BKC14. If a collector is uncertain about BKC15 vs. BKC18, just buy from a trusted dealer (i.e., be very careful with "BKC18's" on ebay). If one cannot tell the difference between a BKC19 and a BKC18, one probably should not be collecting airmail booklets.

As to the seller, I took a quick look at their other offerings. Just a guess, but it looks to me like someone who is not a serious philatelist who buys up collections at estates and does just a enough research to rationally price the items they are selling. Here, though, was an epic fail, in that an undamaged BKC19 is only worth about half of the $9.99 they are asking for this "certified genuine damaged BKC19."