Scott #393 Used....should I Try For A Cert?

Picked up this Washington coil for less than catalog, and am able to return for refund if I want. I am thinking this is most likely too good to be true/genuine. Is this worth wasting certification costs as so many coils are not genuine? The straight edges are parallel, 8.5 perfs line up well with a genuine Scott #390; however the right perfs seem to line up directly across from the left perfs. I thought that perfs on flat plate coils shouldn't line up?? The stamp height measures slightly under 25mm...a little short?? Opinions anyone?

While the perfs can occasionally (but not frequently) line up like on a rotary coil, it is definitely a warning sign.
Personally, I would have it certified provided the seller would give me the time to do so. But then I probably wouldn't have purchased it without a cert in the first place. Of all the flat plate coils that I've purchased without certs, I can only recall a single 386 pair as having been deemed genuine upon certification. Not a very good track record. Am also a bit envious as I'm looking for the same stamp. I have a certified mint pair but no single, mint or otherwise.

Is it always wiser to purchase coils in pairs if possible?

There appears to be a slight vertical offset of the perfs judging at the top (perfs on the left slightly higher than on the right), plausible enough to believe that it could be genuine. If it were me, I'd probably get the cert to be certain.

Looks good to my hobbyist eye, I'd send it in.
Don

The cert will cost almost as much as the full cv of the stamp.

photo61guy....stamp looks 100% legit from perf standpoint....now...none of us have seen it dipped for faults.
Stamp catalogs same used as mint....thus the harded to find used examples.

I hate to be the contrarian, but the perfs on the right look funky to me. Some of the perf holes look to be too elliptical (or more accurately, too half-elliptical), especially the 2nd and 3rd from the bottom. The top hole on the right also has an odd shape. The true perforating process makes slightly elliptical holes, but these seem too much so.

For giggles, you might want to look VERY closely (like, microscope-close) at the left perfs where the cancel is. If there is some cancelling ink on the inside of any of the perfs, I would think that would be a good argument that the perfs are genuine. If you were to blow up the stamp a zillion times and look at it from the left, edge on, so that the thickness of the paper is 10 stories tall, it would look like a 10 story tall zig-zaggy wall. If you see any cancelling ink on that wall, I think that would be a good sign. Honestly, though, the only way to be sure would be to send it in for a cert.

After 3.5 months, opinion from APS is that it is genuine.

congratulations.

Great news. Always good to hear when a cert comes back positive, especially with these coils.