A Discrepancy On A Bill Langs Listing?

I bought the following stamp from Gary Posner on ebay:



Beautiful stamp, right? It has a cert:



It grades an 85 but mentions a corner crease. . . is it an unsound stamp, but the centering is so good that it still grades an 85. . .meaning that based on the centering, it would grade a 95.

Here is Posner's listing for $175.



As discussed elsewhere, Gary Posner has had trouble with synching between HipStamp and ebay, and unfortunately Bill Langs had bought the stamp from them and Posner issued me a refund.

The stamp is on sale by Bill Langs now. . .and he's selling it for $750 and the cert disappeared.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/165-30c-18...192925541163



Someone is going to see that stamp and figure that it looks really nice and figure that they are protected since Langs will take back a stamp that gets a bad cert. It won't get a bad cert because it is genuine . . .but it isn't an XF-Sup stamp and Langs knows it. He's likely to make money on it.

I think I'm done with Langs even though he has so much material.

<edited to correct typos>

*** Moved by Staff to a more appropriate forum. ***

This is not a surprise. Bill
Lang's is known to be slightly challenged when it comes to honesty.

Not the first time and will not be the last. If you notice, Lang's has tons of great looking material that have certs that are decades old. Now why on earth would so many great stamps not have fresh certs? That being said it is far from unique to Lang's. Every single dealer that I buy from bar none has had stamps that have certs that have disappeared. Every one no matter how regarded they are. Was it all nefarious? In some cases after an explanation I was satisfied but I still did not like the practice. It always pays to do a lot of research. Usually I can find the stamp that I am looking at in a past auction or in a database if it is worth substantial money and trace its path to some extent.

The older certs should be taken with a grain of salt. This week's Siegel sale had a number of lots where recent PSE certs note reperfing but PF certs from the 1970's and 80's were clear. I am noticing that more and more as technology evolves in the expertizing field. For the most part the main problem seems to be reperfing that was not detected earlier.

One example is Siegel lot 1143, Scott 118, with 1999 and 2002 PF certs which were "clear". A 2019 PSE cert notes a corner crease. Another is Lot 1198, Scott 261, with a "clear" 1982 PF cert and a 2011 PSE cert as reperfed. Lot 1200, Scott 261A, has a clear 1987 PF cert and a 2011 PSE cert as reperfed. Lot 1208, Scott 278 has a "clear" 1975 PF cert but Siegel notes that it is reperfed. And so on. Some dealers may buy these and other stamps and not note the difference or "lose" the most recent cert.

It is always unethical to throw away a cert. Someday soon, someone will create an app that will search Siegel and other auctions including ebay by stamp image and we'll be able to more easily see the provenance of a stamp. The PF and PSE ought to implement stamp image matching technology now. It's not that hard to do.

Possibly the crease occurred after the first two certs. That's one reason why it can be good to refresh a cert on an expensive stamp anyway.

On the others, I agree that people/expert-services have probably gotten better over time at detecting re-perforation.

A little detective work can be enlightening. I own a mint Scott 218 graded 90J. It first turns up in research in the 1986 Siegel Rarities of the World Sale as part original gum with a PF cert (no year noted). It next surfaces in the 1999 Siegel Lewis Golin sale as original gum lightly hinged with a 1997 PSE cert. Next stop is the Mathew Bennett Engstrom sale where it is original gum lightly hinged with the same 1997 PSE cert. All of this I found out through research.

When I am presented with the opportunity to buy it there are two certs with it. A 2005 PF cert and a 2019 PF cert, each as OGPH. The original PF cert and the 1997 PSE cert are not with it. I was satisfied with the explanation of the person I purchased it from and sealed the deal. He is as honest as they come and the explanation regarding gum "conservation" and redistribution back in the day is just plain old reality. There are few scarce/rare classic mint stamps that have not had some "work" done whether it be to the gum or to clean them or other things. My point in telling this story is that a lot of homework is prudent if making a sizable purchase and you need to be working with a present day dealer that you and others trust implicitly and who will make it right if something goes wrong.

And then you have people that will simply toss a bad cert and sell the stamp based upon the out of date cert.

Some thoughts:

Certs should have an expired date because technology and the knowledge base continuously grow.

If somebody is peddling lots of stamps that are in the many hundreds or thousands of dollar range and all have outdated certs you need to ask yourself why they were not updated and you need to consider the possibility that they were updated but the outcome was not favorable.

If you buy a stamp at auction with an older cert absolutely put it on extension. Stick to this rule.

Not to defend Langs, but based on the screenshots above, it appears that Posner suffers from the same lack of moral compass... they both listed the stamp as XF-S when the cert clearly says VF-XF.

revenuecollector, are you saying that there is only one lawful grading system? Could we please have the reference for that?

I consider certs from before 2000 to be worthless. Stamps sold with certs from the 80s or before without updated ones are more suspect than stamps with no cert at all - especially among dealers who trade in higher-value stamps.

As has been mentioned before, back in the 80's and before, stamps were examined by dealers. Dealers did not call most faults on other dealer's material because they did not want them called on their own. So things like reperfs got "overlooked". It's not different technology, it's a different attitude today.

Attitude or technology or both, it pays to get a fresh cert. No?

Absolutely. And at times new technology is very helpful. Just not particularly with reperfs.

I have a question about any and all C.O.A.'s........... Just exactly how detailed are they? In sports cards, they base their grade on 4 basic properties (listed in random order): 1. Centering, 2. Corners, 3. Edges, and 4. Surface. 40 points is the best grading score possible. I have a few graded cards. When the final score is tallied, the company averages out the score from each step. They encase it, type up a letter and a cert and ship it all back. The letter is quite detailed, with an explanation of how they came to their decision in each phase. Most of the certs I have received back are somewhat detailed, as well. The cert posted just seems generic compared to what I usually see in my other hobby. Is that the "NORM" from the grading company? From my experiences collecting other things, that cert posted would be a big problem with my cards. With all of the "FRAUDS" floating around, the more the burden is on us to prove it. That is just my insight as a collector in another hobby.

"I Caught Bill Langs Throwing Away A Cert."

<sarc.>what a shock!>/sarc>

BakerJ, the cert above is typical for a graded cert. Ungraded certs do not assess the quality of a stamp beyond significant faults - they just say what the stamp is, what the gum is like, and if there are any faults. Used stamps are certified for correct in-period cancellations, and if the cancellation is notable, it is described. Faults include tears, folds, thins, paper inclusions, scuffs, toning, stains, gum skips, etc. They also call out fraudulent alterations like reperforations, regums, fake cancels, trimmed perfs, fake grills, etc. Graded certs do all that, but then a numerical assessment is also applied. PSE, PF, and PSAG offer graded certs and they all follow the same guidelines (here described by PSE: http://psestamp.com/pdf/2009_Gradin..._092009.pdf) There are slight differences depending on the timeframe, like PF added an "XQ" qualifier to "extra quality" stamps or PSE listed their short-lived numbering system on certs. PF also (very annoyingly) lists the catalog number of whatever the submitter guessed the stamp was, and then the text says what PF's opinion is as in "Stamp IS NOT a 64 - it is a 64a." Encased stamps have the same descriptions - as far as I can tell, these have fallen way out of favor. Sometimes I get a note back with an explanation of their opinion, but that isn't part of the cert. You can be pretty certain that a stamp is not a fraud if it has a recent clean cert, but they do make mistakes sometimes.

I wasn't meaning about the stamp or cert to be a fraud. I meant that in general terms. I have seen posts about frauds. Believe me, there are just as many frauds in the sports card world, maybe more. I just thought that the company grading your item(s) would have given details about how and why they came to their conclusion on the cert instead of leaving it kinda vague. I don't know about the process with stamps......never sent one in. I thought the process would similar for both hobbies.