PSA completely unethical
 

They have people waiting 9 months to get cards graded for submissions that used to take 30 days but they are going to do on site grading at the national. Nice

Agreed, sent my cards to them in October - still be "researched" 9 months later.

I do not think what they are doing is unethical

But it is not professional or considerate to their existing and waiting customer base.

The optics is bad and they should be utilizing there resources to take care of their existing back log first

I see nothing unethical unless PSA stated that they would NOT grade at the National. I expect they did not.

The National gives collectors another option. You can fly to the National and use their on-site services if you choose. It will probably be more expensive than their mail services, but it is an option.

There is no right to have your cards graded faster by entering their mail queue, unless your contract with PSA so provides.

I am not thrilled that PSA has gotten so expensive and increased its wait times. My response is not to use their services. But I think it is good for them to go to the National and give collectors an additional choice.

edited to add: If you call PSA and say you will pay “the National fee” to have your mail submission pulled from the queue, graded and delivered—and they refuse—then I will get where you are coming from.

Incredibly long wait times, losing orders, slabbing altered cards, price gouging their customers and there are still people here who defend them.

you sound like an attorney. so let suppose the power is out at your house and your local utility sends you emails stating they are doing everything possible to get the lights back on. you with me. and then you find out they are sending a team to a more affluent neighborhood to moon light and pick up some spare cash. i don't care what they do just don't send emails out telling people you care. unethical or good business. you say tomato i say tomahto.

Yes I say tomato. Tomahto is stupid.

Their business, PSA, is not essential like the power company is, it’s a high end choice service to grade with that company.

The days of this being a blue collar hobby have sadly long been over.

tomahto

Then there's this:

I hired a handyman to come out to my house Monday. He never showed. After waiting an hour and 45 minutes he finally replied to my texts with "Sorry, had problems with my truck." I asked him if he was still coming out and as of this evening, 32 hours later, no reply.

So I hired a different handy man to meet me at the house tomorrow.

You don't like PSA, for any reason, go with someone else. Simple.

And comparing having your electricity go out to not being able to get your cardboard evaluated in a timely manner is not a good analogy. Neither would comparing waiting for PSA be a good analogy to waiting for a heart transplant.

Perspective is important: PSA evaluates cardboard and ink.

of course its not essential. that being said they make statements that are patently false in terms of delivering a product. this was a public company that recently was taken private they now answer to no one and people who applied for basic services can no longer get any service.

only problem is that this handyman already has keys to your house

you are fantastic

craven

we are talking about good business practice. of course its just cardboard. so you are saying that makes it ok to be deceptive.

just cardboard (tell them that):

The Newport Beach, Calif.-based company expects revenues for the quarter ended Dec. 31 of $35.4 million, with a gross margin of 64% and operating income of approximately $10 million.

As President & CEO at COLLECTORS UNIVERSE INC, Joseph J. Orlando made $1,621,754 in total compensation. Of this total $362,500 was received as a salary, $340,750 was received as a bonus, $0 was received in stock options, $918,504 was awarded as stock and $0 came from other types of compensation. This information is according to proxy statements filed for the 2020 fiscal year.

perspective is important

I would say that Joe Orlando is closer to a utility than a handyman in terms of GDP

An old story......
 

Anyone who has been around awhile always knew PSA was unethical. Fact.

Many years ago, there was a 1948 Bowman Basketball low number find in an attic in Vermont. My buddy had been sending new cards to Beckett for years so he sent the find to Beckett. I did not care because they were razor sharp pack fresh. Over a couple years, I bought most in Beckett holders and slowly broke them out and sent to PSA. EVERY card graded with PSA and was usually within a half grade. Sometimes lower, sometimes higher in the new PSA slabs.

Here's the story.....at the end I got tired of breaking them out so I sent PSA my last 4 BVG 8's. Waited patiently and they popped one day! "did not meet min grade" which I had put down as 8 since they had been very consistent. I was mad. I called PSA and had them "admin hold the cards for re-checking".

2 days later they called, told me the head grader reviewed them, and sent them back to me. I basically paid about $160 at the time for PSA to look at my cards and tell me they were not 8s and they sent them back in the Beckett 8 holders!!!! $160 for NOTHING!

I was livid, broke all 4 out and resubmitted! Yes PSA is such a genius at getting our money twice. Take a guess what all 4 cards graded out as?

BINGO. PSA 8, PSA 8, PSA 8, PSA 8

Absolutely unethical and incompetent!

I knew they were 8s. Beckett knew they were 8s....... PSA had to get 2 rounds of cash to tell me that they were 8s!

UGH!

Mike

PS I have the 6th ranked Registry Set and the 3rd highest GPA due to this find. Highest grades were 9s. I only did it for the Registry! I wish SGC still had a registry! ugh

Attachment 469988. Attachment 469989

Attachment 469990. Attachment 469991

Mark17 or whoever you are if its just "cardboard and ink" why is it so expensive to evaluate and why should you have 64% profit margin to do such "simpleton" work as you say. these people are worthy of criticism as are we all. then again i am a "simpleton" from pittsburgh

you are wrong John. If Amazon did not deliver your "stuff" when they said they would you would be an "unhappy John"

His name is under his id.

if i had reservations at a "high end restaurant" and they said we are busy go to "burger king" i guess you would say ok

thanks Leon (peasant / forum owner)

depends....
 

Depends how hungry I was...... you ever had a Whopper with Cheese with Heavy everything on it?

Messy but Yummy! :)

Mike

Mike I am originally from NY so its White Castle

Nice....
 

I literally almost bought frozen White Castle Burgers last night at local grocery store in VT. I like them but they go through me quickly if you know what I mean! :)

Mike

Attachment 469994

dont waylay me PSA is horrible but if White Castle graded cards that would slide right thru and be fairly inexpensive (pun)

I agree. Not unethical…but pretty shitty of them.

I now wish White Castle had made a tender offer for PSA

I work in IT and this is a simple logical choice:

1. Do business with PSA
2. Don't do business with PSA

What so many people here do is choose #1, and then complain ad nauseam, in thread after thread after thread, about how bad and over-priced and slow PSA is. Hasn't that horse been beaten to death yet?

I collect GU jerseys but if cards were my thing, I'd be into raw, or would've switched over to Beckett or SGC long ago. If I continued to use PSA, with all the problems so thoroughly and repetitively enumerated here, I would accept the reality of the situation rather than complain as I hand them more cash.

It reminds me of the guy who bangs his head against the wall and complains that it hurts.

make no mistake i will never go with psa again i just have cards that are stranded there and the fact that they are claiming to do their best but offering specials to the highest bidder is disingenuous and again its just cardboard and i have little in the game but they are making millions on "cardboard"

And given your experience, I would make that same decision. I found a different handy man, you will find a different grading company or choose to collect raw cards. We will both be fine.

agreed although while castle fried clams at 2 am on fordham road beats burger king

PSA brings the highest resale prices. People who don't care about resale will choose other TPG. People who want the highest return on investment will choose PSA and complain. If someone else started a registry that could compete against PSA, that would change the market!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

Right. So if someone does their own personal cost-benefit analysis, is aware of all the PSA related problems and frustrations, and concludes the upside outweighs the downside, why complain about the downside? It's their choice to do business with them.

I really do wish someone would start a cross-TPG registry for those people who are into that. I also hope other TPGs will enter the market with quality services. Competition is good.

Tim you are clearly missing the point. PSA just needs to be clear 1. our service sucks unless you are willing to pay top dollar 2. we are shameless and will make any statement to make it appear we care about service 3. we don't care about service

that should be their mission statement

they should not be offering any services until they get through the glut of submissions that they accepted knowing full well they were not going to be able to deliver

you can argue all your dog eat dog comments you want but most people on this board just seem to enjoy this as a hobby and then you have PSA that wants to monetize every opportunity and deliver crappy service

for gods sake i collect track and field cards i must have rocks in my head

They go through everyone quickly. That is why they sell so many. :cool:

Mark, I agree with you, and I'll add that of all the questionable things PSA does that throw sand in my gearbox, having longer than expected wait times at a time when they've been so busy they had to stop taking new submissions doesn't make my list.

If anyone can feel your pain, it is me. Not many people can say that PSA has lost one of their orders. I can. I try to give people the benefit of the doubt and will reserve judgement for how they handle my situation. Right now, it isn't looking favorable.

PSA sucks...they have proven since day 1(with the grading of Gretzky Wagner) they're not capable of accurately assessing cards. They have reinforced this over the years with their inconsistent and ever changing grading standards.

The folks over at Blowout forums have exposed this over and over...time and time again.

At what point does it become an issue of PSA's fanboys/customer base are greedy and only care about the all mighty dollar...kinda like PSA.

With most business models...if a business operated the way PSA does...they'd be out of business lickety split...not thriving and making money hand over fist.

Not to even mention the ridiculous cost/wait times?


So who's to blame here???

I've had it, never again will I send them a card.

I'm not missing the point. I don't grade my cards. I am one of those collectors who collect for the enjoyment, like you. But I'm not naive either. I started collecting during the junk wax era 30 years ago when I was six, and I've known full well since elementary school that every facet of card collecting is based on economics. Beckett monthly publication. Dead on centered, mint, gem mint, eye appeal. Hot List / Cold List. LCS. Card shows. The National. Those are all terms of dog eat dog competition. And everyone on this board recognizes that. Some of us, like you and me, just choose not to get caught up in it. But all people on this board realize that this hobby is clearly the definition of capitalism, and has been since all of us were children. Except maybe TedZ who appears to be as old as Santa Claus.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

PSA is making millions on cardboard .
So are the people that sell their High Grade PSA cards.
Have you seen the latest Auction Prices.

That is the reason why they have so many submissions.
I collect Pre War but even all of the new stuff is getting record prices.
Glad that I bought mine before the latest surge.

PS . I agree that the long wait time is not what you sign on for based on the
Submission that you agreed on and that PSA should give something back to its customers like free subs but with the success they are having I don’t see it.
Also You will have to pay a heavy price to have cards graded at the National.

John P

I don't know why anyone should be surprised by this. Bottom line is you have a choice to use PSA or not it's as simple as that.

+1

I agree Tim.
And PSA isn't doing anything unethical. It's business. Are they screwing a lot of customers over, absolutely. But it doesn't matter to them, or their customers apparently, as the more people submit the more money they and PSA make. It's not rocket science. I applaud them for taking advantage of the situation and just shake my head at the comments from those that can't wait to submit and complain too.
My prediction is yet another grading company comes to fruition soon. You heard it here first. :)
Why wouldn't someone enter the market with the chaos and money involved?
.

Ebay, I hear.

If I do another group sub with them, I have no one to blame but myself. Of course, if they make this right with me, I would be tempted. Leon nailed it. You hate to use anyone else, because PSA cards are getting a premium. If this isn't the proverbial "catch 22", I don't know what is......

Nobody goes there any more, it's too crowded. :cool:

PSA has had my submission of about 50 really nice vintage post-war Hof'ers since May of 2020. The cards now appear to be in grading, but who knows? This will be my last submission to PSA.

Your sanity is worth something too, not just the cards.

Here is praying that the package doesn't wind up missing.

Thank you Conor. I am at my wits end thinking about this.

Nice cards!

A few months ago I decided to complete this whole set in high grade. However, I didn't care if the cards had print lines on them or if they were off-centered. I had no idea how challenging it was going to be! A lot of raw examples that I purchased online from various sellers had light creases in them. A couple were under-sized as well. And finding the high numbers in good shape is a nightmare! They're expensive and many of them are hand-cut too. Do you have any high numbers? The Mikan is the big one, but there are a lot of other stars in the high number series as well.

That horse isn't dead. Apparently, it's a Timex watch.

I think from now on onsite grading is probably the only opportunity I'll take advantage of to get my cards graded. So, may there be more!

I think I'll just keep ALL my cards as they are...raw.

You guys are a bunch of investment brokers and speculators, not card collectors in the hobby. Stop, stop pretending.

I disagree. If PSA had said, back during their hiatus from accepting new submissions, "When we restart, we'll be accepting in-person submissions at the National that will jump the line of any current/new submissions" I would agree with you.

They didn't.

Accepting money to let latecomers jump the line when not giving that opportunity to those already in line is unethical.

They're not "jumping the line." It's no different than submitting at a higher level through the mail. The higher level submissions always came before bulks, etc. That's never been a secret, it's outright stated on the forms.

This is literally what "jumping the line" means, Scott.

Jumping the line implies something unfair. Everyone has the same opportunity to pay the same rates and get the same treatment. As far as I know nobody gets special line-jumping privileges because they are a snappy dresser. So if it's a known practice, and applied equitably, to me it's not line jumping. If this has always been the practice, acting outraged because it's still the practice seems a little silly.

This doesn’t make them unethical. So tired of people
Not understanding the process so they spout stupidity. In the holder their assessment was that it was not definitely worthy of crossing so they rejected it. Common sense would tell
A rational thinking person that it’s harder to see an entire card in a holder and since they can’t put it back in the other companies holder they have to error on the side of caution and only cross if positive it will cross. This isn’t unethical but smart business. It’s not their responsibility to cover for your laziness and it’s not their fault you don’t understand the process fully. But hey it’s net 54 so a good anti PSA conspiracy sounds like par for the course.

Really? So somebody that's already submitted can call up PSA and get the same day treatment they're giving people at the National? No? Exactly.

Laugh of the day.....
 

Glyn,

That was pretty funny. I needed that! lol

LMAO!

Mike

PS I apologize. Maybe you have never had the thrill of seeing pack fresh cards pre-1950. I have and I still own most of them. The 4 cards I sent were the last of the 1948s. Most had already graded 8s or 9s so PSA was well aware of this "find". I literally sent them in small batches because I was afraid the post office would lose them! The cards I sent in BVG holders were BLAZERS. Hellen Keller would have given them 8.5s on feel alone (sorry Helen :). That was uncalled for.
I understand because you have not seen the cards. They were dripping original 1948s. Sharp corners, pristine look to them. They almost appear oversized due to so many other 1948s being slabbed when I can clearly see "alterations" on alot of them that are out there. For PSA to not slab them showed me their true colors. I knew they were going to grade as 8s raw but it was almost a litmus test. You say I was lazy for not breaking 4 cards out of holders? That really made me laugh. You have a nice day Mr. Parson.
Peace, Mike

Thanks!
 

Thanks!~ The high numbers are tough as you know. I sought to find ones that were off the charts eye appeal and overpaid at times but I'm happy now. I am missing less than 10 high numbers. All of mine are 8s or higher. No Mikan :( Not sure I'll ever see that in my collection in an 8 or higher unless there is another find! Here are a few I own! The Jeanette would be a 9 if centered. Absolute sharp factory fresh corners much like most of my low numbers from the low number "find". Please note also how these almost fill the PSA gasket. Full sized and fresh! Love the colors also on the set! Thanks and congrats on your completion! What grade is your Mikan?

Attachment 470132 Attachment 470133

Attachment 470134 Attachment 470135

Some more.....
 

Here are a few more of my high numbers......the Knorek is so big it would not fit in the standard 1948 holder so they put in penny sleeve and slabbed it in a regular sized holder!

Mike

Attachment 470136 Attachment 470137

Attachment 470138 Attachment 470139

When those cards were submitted the policies were all the same as they are now, and wait times were already rough.

That being said I HAVE actually called PSA and upgraded a submission to speed it up, so, yeah, kinda.

Money talks and Bull Shit Walks. If you have the money you can pretty much do it, everyone has a price, you most likely would too.

True.....although at what price is it worth it? I am currently dealing with that quandry.

Mike,

Sweet cards!

I wanted to complete the set, but I didn't! I ran into too many problems buying them and got fed-up! I don't have the Mikan card. Finding one with strong corners is going to cost a lot, and it'll probably be trimmed too! :D Like you pointed out, many of these cards came out of the factory over-sized and I'm pretty sure that some high-grade examples out there went through guys like Gary Moser! :eek:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/37365748279...oAAOSwHHtg-aD2

PSA should not have graded this card. If you see any of them missing color, then they were post-factory cut. If you look at the scan, then you can see how rough the top and bottom edges are, and that's not normal. Only the left and right edges are supposed to be rough, while the top and bottom are supposed to be smooth. You really gotta' know your shit when you buy these cards or you're gonna' run into so many problems, you know what I'm saying?

I still chuckle about the title of this thread.

Most people use PSA because their expectancy value is higher than their grading fees, discounted for inflation and risks of loss. Taking a highly simplified example, if you have a raw card worth $1000 and you think there is a 50% chance it will be worth $2000 after grading and a 50% chance it will be worth $1000 after grading, your expectancy value is $1500 less grading fees, inflation (while you wait) and risks of loss. Let's say inflation and risks of loss total $200, reducing your expectancy value to $1300. You will still pay up to $300 in grading fees (maybe somewhat less if you are risk averse, as most of us are) because your expectancy value will still be greater than the value of your ungraded card.

I am sure there are collectors who have legitimate moral concerns about PSA but this is how many people, myself included (and probably PSA) view the situation.

In sum, it's fine to complain about how PSA has "screwed" collectors, but that sentiment needs to be balanced against the value that PSA has created for collectors.

And, no, I am not on PSA's "payroll." I have met Joe Orlando and David Hall but neither one ever offered me a dime. I do, however, have cards that are worth a lot more because they are in PSA holders.

And your point is what? Mr. Chuckle. As I said I collect track and field cards (hardly an investment decision) I just wanted some nice cards encapsulated. No cards here that I am boasting are worth 50K. So yes they are screwing the average person who does not make a living buying and selling (investing) in cardboard.

My name is not "Mr. Chuckle." Please do not engage in ad hominem. It just makes you look bad. If you are not happy with PSA , I suggest that you use other grading services.

Edited to add: I think it's cool that you collect track and field cards. I love 20th century American ephemera from T206 to Warhol paintings. Good luck with your collecting pursuits.

regardless of how i look. PSA is a down the line company and if the economy fell apart tomorrow they would be done and all the cards on this board would not be worth the heat they would generate if lit on fire. PSA should be grateful for the business. so posit whatever you want. PSA should do their job. end of story

I agree that PSA should "do their job." And I think they do. They make very serious mistakes, like grading the T206 Doyle (N.Y. Nat'l) Polar Bear which I pointed out to David Hall personally (although after they had already corrected the error and made amends). But they try to get it right--even though they blow it sometimes. If the economy falls apart tomorrow, I think all of the cards on this board will still be worth far more than the heat they would generate if lit on fire. So I will keep mine. Light yours on fire if you want.

they do not do their job. unless their job is fantasy. they have left the average collector behind. they got caught up or created the REA auction frenzy. this is another form of crypto currency. inflated values with no true underlying value. in fact they have left vintage cards behind. can a Tom Brady autographed card really be worth $1 million dollars. Come on now. there are people who do real work in this world. this will end in tears.

They are still a small company $35m in a quarter is really peanuts for most businesses as is $10m operating income and the profit margin is nothing wild either. The premium the cards get over SGC which grades every bit as tough but has a much less checkered background is mind boggling to me.