Expertizing Purchases - Hard To Beat APS Stampstore System

I was recently looking for a stamp that, to me, is difficult to identify let alone be able to detect re-perforations. While shopping for that stamp at APS Stampstore, I see that a person can have them examine the stamp and produce a certificate for it prior to sending it. If the APS examination comes back OK, you pay for the certificate in addition to the stamp. If there or problems or it is misidentified, the sale is cancelled and no fee is charged for the certificate. Outstanding system!

It gets tiresome sifting through hundreds of ebay listings (offered by both amateur and professional higher end dealers) trying to discern condition. I have noticed that most dealers will not allow the time for authentication services or reimburse for adverse opinions. Hard to beat how the APS handles this. Is anyone aware of any ebay sellers that would send a purchased stamp out for a certificate and refund your money AND not charge for certificate for adverse opinions. Maybe for very high end material but I am talking mostly of stamps in the $100 - $200.

For me it is worth the $20 fee to have a set of expert eyes to assess the purchase from an authentication standpoint. Not interested in grading, just is it what they say it is and there are no repairs/alterations. What do you think?

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

APS will certify prior to shipping if the buyer desires. However, you are still required to pay for the stamp and the certification fee up front. When the cert comes back, you will be advised of the findings. If you still want it, the stamp and cert are sent to you. If the cert comes back not as described, you have the choice of refusing the sale. In that case, you get all your money back and the seller must pay the cert fee and either modify or remove the listing at the APS store.

It has been my experience that virtually all sellers on ebay and every auction house I've dealt with will grant a return time extension to allow for the buyer's submission to a certification agency if you request it at the time you pay for the item. You do need to read each seller's posted policy regarding which certs they will accept and under what conditions. Graded and/or slabbed certs are usually not accepted.

The APS Stampstore has safe guards far above what you find elsewhere. However, as a 40 year plus APS member I am not 100% on board with how they operate. If you do a search for flat plate US coils you will find a dumpster fire that matches ebay. Misidentifications and scissor jobs are all over. If I didn't love the APS so much I would be tempted to use the buy and certify program on a few dozen of the worst offenders - just to have some fun.

Thank you for the kind words about StampStore and for being a great supporter of our services. If there are ways we can improve the service, we'd be interested in improving the service. Your reference to flat plate coils caught my attention. Have you connected with Wendy Masorti about the search issue? There may be ways for us to deliver better search results, so we'd like to explore it.

Scott

Chasa,

If you are logged in while browsing the flat plates, you can "ask a question" about any item.

I have used this many times to notify APS of misidentified material.

Apparently the issues are handled by volunteer philatelists and are resolved quickly; sometimes astonishingly quickly!

Yes, I have used the question method many times in the past 10 years and the APS operators have been fast and consistent to remove bad apples. I enjoy doing it. My first recommendation would be to ban all flat plate coils that do not have a recognized certificate. Less severe would be to have them all vetted at least casually before admittance. The 'CAUTION' warning only seems to enable clueless (or worse) sellers, sadly all APS members.

If I am after an item that meets my threshold for a certificate, either dollar value or item type, I only consider it if it already has a certificate. I see zero value in a "process" to follow. It is a time sucker that if the item fails may have caused lost opportunities. Why bother weeding though "maybes"? It makes no sense. On the other hand it is amusing that so many "misidentified items and "scissor cuts' are apparently, according to Chasa, within the American Philatelic Society store. If true that is the ultimate irony. LOL

For many of the flat plate coils, I'm not sure I would trust anyone other than the PF to authenticate them. For anything else, I would accept APS, PSAG or PSE.
Added: That said, in my limited experience with these coils the only definitely bad cert I've encountered was a 2000 PF cert. But I have seen a couple of PSE certs that I had doubts about … and heard about PSE mistakes from others.

Yes, but a major advantage that APS offers: The certs are a flat $25, not tied to catalog value, so depending on what it is you're wanting to expertize, the upfront (and total) cost for the expertizing could be a huge savings over other expertizers.





You must be limiting yourself to a small subsection of ebay sellers, as this is not my experience at all. It's all over the map as to what ebay sellers will allow for extension. Also, you are relying upon their word (and the PayPal 180-day SNAD claim window), and that's just recouping the cost of the item itself. Neither PayPal or ebay will force the seller to reimburse the expertization costs as those are external to the original transaction amount.

Also, the biggest problems with extension from any source, whether ebay seller, show dealer, or traditional auction house:

1. Who pays for the cert if it is a negative opinion? You would think the seller does, but this is not universal.

2. Who pays in the event of a declined opinion, which is technically neither positive nor negative. There is most definitely no standard treatment of this scenario, but I've seen enough declined opinions to know that it happens. From a buyer's perspective, a declined opinion is no better than a negative opinion and thus the seller should pay for the cert, but you need to explicitly ask about this scenario.

And even if the dealer or seller covers the cost of the bad cert, the buyer is still likely out $30 or $40 for postage to and from the PF. The last time I sent something to the PF it was returned by FedEx and I think it was $20 or $25 for postage.

I ended up sending a message to 8 ebay dealers that had the stamp I was looking for with 2 questions:

1) would an extension be granted for waiting for certification results
2) would the dealer pay for the certification if the stamp isn't correctly identified or has alterations.

Here's the results (keep in mind that the stamp will cost ~$100-$125):

-3 said yes to both questions
-3 said yes to first question, no to second (but all emphasized they would provide a refund)
-2 did not reply

On another note, last time I sent a stamp into PF, my stamp insurance agent (Hugh Wood) said I did not have to send it registered mail as they cover loss through regular mail. So there is some savings on that end.

I too have Hugh Woods insurance, so don't feel the need for Priority or Express Mail service (and fees), but I also want to know for sure that the shipment was indeed received and when. That tells me about when to expect its return.