PSE And Reperfing Calls

Talk about timing. I awoke this AM to a new cert from PSE for a US Scott 313 that I had submitted. The stamp was purchased at auction from one of the big auction houses during the Summer. It came with two clear certs, one a 1982 PF cert and one a 2012 PSAG cert, both as unused original gum and no faults noted. The new PSE cert states that the stamp is regummed with four repaired perf tips. I firmly believe that analytic technology is the reason why these things are now being picked up.

We are starting to see more and more of this type of thing as stamps are resubmitted and we should expect the trend to continue as the supply of more valuable issues undergoes reexamination. It could be a bumpy ride.

I think some people are trying too hard to explain this. Condition matters more now than ever. Everybody is paying more attention, what wasn't ordinarily noted or detected 20 years ago is now a serious fault.

The perf tips don't matter much in my eyes but the regumming not picked up as recently as 7 years ago is notable.

Let's not forget that standards and the people involved change over time. My favorite example, courtesy of Frank Bachenheimer is below. Same stamp, 4 certs from 1980 to 2008. Four completely different opinions.

The sequence of the certs is upper left, lower left, upper right, lower right.

I love the reperfing moving from none at all to the left to the right and then back to none at all.

You may have to open the image in a new window to see it full size and be able to read the text.

Standards, people and technology.

Archerg—agree completely with your "witch hunt " comment. Not that reperfing and fakery does not occur but as I previously stated an examiners bias can sway an otherwise objective examination one way or another. Again this is human nature.

To my knowledge, no expertizer was more vocal or outspoken that Bill Weiss—God rest his soul. Bill made it quite clear that he felt the vast majority of 19th century stamps were flawed and he appeared to try to find those flaws, no matter how insignificant or trivial. One characteristic of Weiss certs to me is the much more liberal use of the words "tiny", "very tiny" and "minute" to describe items' flaws compared to PSE and PF. I am not saying whose philosophy is right or wrong just making an observation.

Dealers were still doing 1982 PF certs, so a well done regum would probably not have been mentioned, for the reason I gave above. Assuming that one trusts PSE on regums.

How about the 2012 PSAG cert? Were dealers doing those?

With all due respect, I think you are kidding yourselves if you think you know what the motive of an expertizer might be or that one expertizer (dealer) would be in collusion to not call a fault on a stamp from one of his dealer colleagues. If stamp expertizing is like any other industry where there is healthy competition, the attitude of one company or organization is to assume that you are better than them etc by finding fault with the other guy's product or service. Aside from your own personal thoughts or suspicions can you point to one legitimate resource proving that expertizers of the past operates the way you think they did or a document from PF, PSEor APEX outlining what they would or would not call in years past?

I also do not buy your idea that technology has made opinions more accurate to the degree you think it has. The above discordant certs clearly show that really isn't the case.In fact, the only thing these certs agree on is the ID of the stamp. Not that I in any way believe as has been frequently stated, without any documented proof, that the only thing that old time expertizers focused on was the stamp ID, seeing the discordance above, if that were the case, could you really blame them?

Back in the early 80's there was little competition, that's a big part of why PSE was founded. The history of expertising back in those days and before is well known to many.

PSAG is J. Randall Shoemaker, who originally founded PSE. We don't know who else looked at it. It might be fun to get a new PF cert and see whether they agree or disagree with PSE at this point.

Rev collector: your suggestion points out the "game" very well. Although you would think that the PF would first look in its files and discover they have already certified that stamp. Very much the same game is played with coins cracking into a slab and resubmitting an already certified coin hoping it will get a higher grade, non detailed opinion or even better to see if a coin previously certified by ICG or ANACS can crossover to a slab with a higher reputed company NGC or PCGS). Your statement about the early years of expertizing suggests you have inside information and yet I believe you have stated on prior threads that you have actually never served on any of the expert committees officially. Why don't you share what you know instead of making general references? Your assumption that the "early days of expertizing are well known to many" may not be accurate.

I have discussed the subject over time with several well known people with 40 or 50 years in the industry; I know that what I have written here is accurate. I have no intention of getting more specific about it, people can choose to believe what I wrote or not. The PF would certainly note the prior cert. For all we know at this moment, those first two opinions might be the correct ones. Obviously a different set of people at the PF would be looking at it this time. Again, in part it comes down to whose opinion one trusts more for this specific item and this specific question.

I find RevenueCollector's post sobering, with a side of angst.