Cancellation Opinion On Scot #39

Hi All,
I have a used Scott #39 that I would like to have others weigh in on regarding the cancellation.





Front and back of stamp images above.
Many thanks.

I have not seen a black lined/grid cancel of this type on a stamp of this era, but that does not mean that it couldn't be authentic. Since it is off-cover, it is more difficult to determine authenticity.

As mentioned in the Scott catalog, since the value is much more used than unused, the stamp should be accompanied by a certificate if you intend to sell it.

orstampman,
There are many known examples of black grid cancels, I attach a "collage" of them here.
If we sell it, we would allow any buyer 60 days time to get it expertized. Since it's in my possession I don't want to introduce my bias to it. That's why I was asking what others think of the cancel, and if they see any concerns about it.

I would like to have a high degree of confidence about it before listing it. And presenting it to this forum before listing so as not to take a beating after it goes up.

Thanks revcollector brilliant.
I'm honestly on the fence, at 50/50 on this cancel.
I think we'll put it up and offer 60 day time to cert it.

I am always suspicious of cancels on this stamp; it really does need a cert.

As a seller, why wouldn't you send it off yourself? If it gets a good cert, you can sell it for a lot more and a lot more buyers will look at it. And you won't have to deal with problems if it is't genuine. I buy from ebay a lot and, I would never buy an expensive stamp like this, especially, a problematic one like this without a cert. I assume the seller knows it isn't genuine and is trying his luck in finding an unsuspecting collector who won't send off for a cert.

I fully agree with Philazilla - send for the cert yourself.

While I agree that selling it with a cert is desirable, Scott lives in Japan. Sending it in for a cert up front means extra risk and cost. It seems more efficient to send it back to the US once (when he sells it). It also negatively impacts the turn-over time for inventory (the extra shipping delays). These things put non-US dealers at a disadvantage when trying to compete with US dealers.
Don

What is the turnaround of PF and PSE for certificates? I thought this would be months, so a bit more than 60 days?

I have thought about selling stamps like this on ebay and whether or not I should get a cert before listing or letting the bidder get one if he/she wants to. If you obtain a cert on a stamp cataloging $10K, it will cost $500-600. When I research this stamp the only sale I see is;

https://www.ebay.com/itm/39-Used-Bl...047675.l2557




I think the OP's stamp is a bit better but it looks like it has a small tear. My conclusion is that it is too risky to get a cert.

Hi all,
Thanks for the feedback. My current thinking based on what everyone has said is this...
I offer the stamp on ebay with a Buy It Now price of $5,000. We include in that the cost of getting the cert, which we will reimburse to the buyer, regardless of outcome. (So you buy, you submit it, when the cert comes in, then we have an answer). You have 7 days to submit it for cert after receiving based on tracking received date (because the certs take a long time to turn around, and we don't want to add more time onto it because someone is lazy about sending it in for cert, which seems to be a common issue). We bought this at risk from a dealer we know well, but in a collection so we could diversify the risk to us over all. (i.e. there needed to be reasonably enough other value in the collection that we could recoup this based on the value we put on it at buying time, which if it is genuine, will be a great deal, and if it's not, then we still have a stamp that has a good value, but not as much as we estimated it).
When the cert comes back, we reimburse the cost. (If you put a stamp in to PF that is value $11,000 then the cost will be $500 - $600 as mentioned, but if that stamp has a bogus cancel, the real CV would be closer to $1,000 so the cost is $50 or so.)
If it doesn't cert to satisfaction, we'll refund the total amount, and the cert, so long as you send the stamp with the cert back to us.
If it certs to satisfaction, you've gotten your cert paid for, and we're happy with the value we get out of the stamp.
We are NOT trying to rip anyone off. But as Don mentioned, the issues of sending to and fro make it difficult with the timing involved, and we need to keep our inventory moving.
I'm looking for a creative solution on this stamp, that works and is fair. To date, we have never sold a stamp that wasn't genuine as we describe it. After looking at it and a number of other cancels, my bias certainly wants to say it is real. If I had specific evidence that it was not, we would just sell it as a 39 with a fake cancel. But because it's in my hands I'm not willing on this one to make that call. So looking for a way to make this fair.
Does the community think this would work?

I don't know what it will sell for on ebay but I think this is a good way to do it. I just don't like the idea of risking $500-600 and maybe not getting my money back when it sells.

I have a France stamp that cats $18,000 and I've been sitting on it for a while because of this same dilemma. In my case the stamp has 3 1/2 margins and I don't think I'd get a great price even with a cert.

KRelyea,
In those cases (like this 39 for me as well), consider what you paid for it, and if someone were to walk up to you now and say "I'll give you <some number> in cash right now" what would you minimally accept for it? Sometimes with stamps like these (and they really don't come up as a challenge that often), you have to decide whether it's better to sit on it forever, or to get some reasonable value out of it. You are right, no one will pay $18,000 CV for a 3 margin stamp, because the CV isn't for a 3 margin stamp, it's for a 4 margin, VF centered stamp. This is a mistake many people make, in overvaluing the material they have. I am of the reasonable mindset that the CV isn't what is wrong (and why so many people scream about this). It's their understanding of what the CV represents. In Scott Specialized for the US this is best represented by the "Yellow pages" where they have valued stamps in other grades, rather than just saying "CV $18,000". If it's a great visual appeal stamp, that would other wise have been VF then just knock it down 2 levels (To F). Now what is the CV? Even if you don't know, if you want to estimate what you SHOULD get for it, look at similarly valued listings in Scott, and determine the % of decrease. Take 5 or 6, get an average, and then apply that to your $18k CV. If an F on average is 50% less, now you know that $9k is more reasonable target. We know on ebay that MOST of the time we don't get CV, so now you have to figure out how much below the estimate you're willing to take. And you may be in the uncomfortable dilemma of thinking "Well, I paid $10k for this, so I want to at least get my $10k back". The problem with that is, if you've over paid, then you won't get it back. You have to either decide you're keeping that for yourself now, or you have to take the hit, and recover something for it. (Or wait for some sucker to come along... but we know that's not a reasonable approach, especially if you want to maintain long term credibility).

That is where I am with this stamp. I put a "value" on it (what I could sell it for) at the time we acquired the collection. I know that if I'm wrong about it's condition, I will lose out on this stamp. (Probably around $2k less than I expected to get for it). But I balanced that by offsetting that loss through other stamps in the collection. Losing $2k overall on the collection might still end up with me only breaking even on it, but I won't have lost money on it. If the others fetch a bit higher, I've still done ok. If these comes out to what I wanted, then I will have done well on this collection. I approach all collections this way. To date, I've only had one (small) collection that we only broke even on. The others have all at least returned some level of profit, and most we have done really well with. This stamp, it's time to get something out of it. I've been sitting on it for too long.
Sometimes, you just have to make tough decisions.
And if you're a credible dealer that way, people will know it's not a risk to them at the end of the day. That's the philosophy we operate under.

From a buyer's perspective (and to play devil's advocate) I would think many prospective buyers wouldn't pull the trigger out of worry of not being able to recoup their investment should the cert come back bad, or the cost of the cert, for that matter. What's the time limit for ebay and / or PayPal buyer protection coverage? If its greater than the time required to get a cert, then my point is moot.

Another thought: If my above point is moot, then I would offer it up soon. Given our PayPal "friends" won't be refunding any of their fees on returns starting in May, you run the risk of eating a nice chunk of PayPal fee should the cert come back bad and the stamp is, as a result, returned to you. I would, because of this risk, get the cert yourself (albeit a hassle from Japan). If it comes back good, put it aside until you accumulate a few more 'high-enders' and then maybe consign the group to an auction house?

docgfd,
I understand where you are coming from, and yes we are liable to take some greater PayPal risk if that is the case. PayPal are just making their lives worse by this policy, and people are going to stop using them. (They were a "disruptor" when they started, they seem to have lost their way now... which means it's not long before someone else swoops in and takes over. ebay no longer own PayPal, so they have no allegiance either. But that may still take a while). Believe me the PayPal/eBay combination is one of the reasons we got out of ebay, it hasn't improved in the 2 years we've been gone. Seems to have gotten a lot worse. The regulatory bodies have finally figured out that PayPal was a free-for-all, and an easy way to channel and launder money. So all these policy changes are due to the costs they are getting as a result of a more regulated market.
That has its pluses and minuses for sure.
We're willing to make the cert time as long as it needs to be, but they MUST send it in within 7 days. That's the part I don't want to continually wait for. The intention would be to essentially hold the cost in the mean time.
Now to your point, why don't we just get the cert? It's time and cost as already mentioned. If we refund because the cert doesn't come through (and in reality, we would expect a negotiated agreement to be more likely, so we wouldn't lose more from the result of sending it around yet again), I'm still looking for as low a "loss" scenario that is still a win-win for a buyer. In worst case, they now have a 39 with a cert, albeit one that says the cancel is fake, if it turns out to be the case, but its still a $1,000 stamp even with a fake cancel on it. That may detract some, but you put it up on ebay that way with a cert, and someone will still buy it for $500 - $600. (And probably brag about how they have an $11,000 stamp in their collection that they got for $500 from ebay... because collectors like to overvalue their stuff).
It is a huge disadvantage being a dealer outside the US, and I'm looking for ways to make it work. I'm sitting on half a million dollars in inventory, and I can't just keep sitting on it because I don't like ebay, or there are challenges in selling with certs. We have never had a stamp returned because it didn't cert to expectation. So... we have to be creative, take some risks sometimes that make sense.
On the point of PayPal buyer protection I believe that is tied to the timing you set on the item. We generally provide 30 days (but in reality, we have a "lifetime of the item" return policy, so long as it is unaltered from when we sent it. (We keep detailed photo records of every item, we know who bought it, and what it looked like when it went out the door). So if they damage it, all bets are off. If it was damaged in shipping, that has to be handled immediately. But overall, if you buy a stamp from us, and 2 years later decide to cert it, and it doesn't cert to expectation, we'll still refund it.
PayPal enables sending of money any time you wish... so, there is not "limitation" for an honest seller.