ebay return shipping & t206 length opinions please
 

I'm hoping a few t206heads will offer their opinion on the length of a card I recently won on ebay.

and also hope some ebay sellers will chime in with their opinion on return shipping costs.


I received the card maybe two days ago, automatically left positive feedback (which I've begun doing immediately upon receiving the card), sat down this a.m. to insert the card in my set (and replace the previous version). I noticed the new card was a good bit shorter than the old card, so I checked it against several more and sure enough it is shorter than the first dozen that I checked. I went back to check the listing to see if I missed something pointing out that the card was trimmed, then wrote the seller to tell him I'd like to return and receive a refund including the cost to return the card.


Ultimately it's not a big deal to me either way.... it is a hofer, but not a big dollar card or anything, just wanted to return a short card without any fanfare. I don't have many visual rules for cards to pass my smell test, but I don't like knowing I have a trimmed card.

You'll see the sellers response below, which made the needle on my "not-so-polite" o-meter jump a small tad and caused a bit of a frown.

So, I looked at the card once more. Honestly the edges don't show any signs I recognize of trimming, but it is no doubt short. I checked it against a dozen more t206's, all noticeably longer. The new card measures about 2-9/16" long.

Decided I'd see what happens if I start a thread for a change & maybe the responses will help out a new t206 collector


So, the questions are; does the sov460 card appear trimmed & would you say it's odd to find a factory cut card 1/16" short.?

As I'm typing this I have a gut feeling that I will find out the consensus to be "nothing unusual here" and I'll keep the card. No worries if that's the case.


Also, do you ebay sellers balk at refunding the cost of return shipping? Seems to me that generally speaking if I buy something and receive a product I didn't expect, it shouldn't cost me anything to return it. Again no biggy just wondering what folks think.


Thanks for some feedback,

Tony

the ebay listing:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/231861446924...%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

my note to the seller:


Hi There,

I just noticed that this card is about 1/8" shorter than all my other t206's and thus consider it to be trimmed. I reviewed the listing and see no mention of trimming,

Therefore I'd like to return the card for a refund including the cost to ship.

If you could forward your mailing address, I'll return the card post haste.

Thanks and have a good weekend!

Tony

and his response:
That card is not trimmed. You can send it back though if you believe that to be the case. As long as I get the same card back I have no problems with returns.

Send it to:
XXXXXXXXXXX

Also I will refund you but will not be refunding the shipping it takes for you to get it back to me.

If you are not happy with the card just return in and eat the shipping cost. The seller seemed pretty accommodating to me so no reason for your "not-so-nice" meter to do anything. Good luck and hope it works out for you.

EDIT: I know nothing about the T206 cards so didn't comment on it.

For a clear case of buyer's remorse, as a seller, I will not cover the return s/h as that is how my listings are worded ("buyer pays return s/h") and the buyer is responsible for understanding this point up front before bidding. However, when there is a mistake on my end, I will absolutely cover the return s/h.

In regards to this situation, if it is agreed this card is trimmed, I would open a request for this transaction with ebay and specifically cite the card is trimmed and "not as described" as the trimming was not mentioned. The seller will then cover the return s/h costs.

Hey Ben,

Thanks for the response. I'm neither "happy" nor "un-happy" to a degree worth worrying about.

I'm more hoping this thread will turn into an informative one regarding t206 (and maybe pre war cards in general) sizes and trimming.

also opinions of return shipping.

maybe along the way it will sway me toward "shrugging my shoulders" and keeping the card vs returning it. But that is secondary.

Have a great Saturday!

Tony

Form my less-than-an-expert point of view, if a T206 is a full 1/8th inch short I would think it is probably trimmed or severely miscut.

I am in agreement on shipping costs...my mistake I eat, their mistake they eat.

Sorry that happened to you - I would agree that it looks trimmed to me.

My question is if the seller is really liable here for the return shipping. If I were selling it, it's not worth the hassle of having an unhappy buyer so I would accept the return and pay for the return shipping. But he also listed the card as fair to poor and as a trimmed card, poor is what it is. I realize the amount of creasing makes it poor, anyway, but I would probably feel differently if the card didn't have as much creasing and he listed the card as Good or something. By calling it fair to poor, I think he technically covers himself on a trimmed card.

He certainly needs to accept the return but the description actually matches what the card is since he calls it either fair or poor, IMO.

Agree. It's an off-grade card to begin with. If you want to buy on approval, you need to at least eat the return shipping cost.

+1

Yeah, I agree with this. Ebay return policy is that buyer pays return shipping. I've only returned a few items, but I have always paid the shipping.

I think that since he called it a poor condition card, he has done everything he needed to. None of us can be sure that it is trimmed, so I wouldn't expect the seller to make a judgement call for sure one way or the other.

When I am selling a card that in my opinion has a chance to be trimmed, I mention the possibility. I think that is the ideal way to handle it, but if the card is low grade and the seller mentions that and provides a good scan, I think that is enough.

I've never even considered "poor" to mean "it could be trimmed"

Do others (beside Luke... I read your comments and consider them valid) really believe this? Comes as a bit of surprise to me.

I wasn't aware of this. If true, I'll never question that again as I'm all about written rules.

Hi Tony,

Short doesn't mean trimmed. T206 sizes vary.

It doesn't look trimmed to me, but I can't tell from a scan unless it's blatant.

If I sold a card on ebay that I made a mistake on then I would pay return shipping.

Sometimes people buy cards from me (graded or not) and they decide when they get it that they just don't want it anymore. In this situation, I would much prefer that they pay return shipping. Most don't want to of course.

I believe as a seller you can dictate in your description if you want the buyer to pay return shipping or if you'll pay for it as the seller.

Ebay rules change hourly so it's hard to keep up with.

Rob

Thanks Rob,

Believe me, the ONLY reason I wouldn't want it is if I believe it to be trimmed.
The edges don't look to be trimmed to me either. It's just sooo short compared to others.

I appreciate your input ... it means a lot.




Tony

Tony,

I didn't mean that calling a card "poor" means that the card could be trimmed. I just meant that if a seller is providing a scan and saying that the card is in poor condition, I feel like they are dealing in good faith and not trying to hide anything. That is much different to me than sellers who list a trimmed card as EX+, which seems to be happening a lot these days.

I agree with Rob that it doesn't really look trimmed to me. A scan of the front could help, but so far the corner wear looks pretty even to me. I think if I had sold that card, it wouldn't have occurred to me to call it trimmed.

I am not an expert on Sov460s, but there are some cards that tend to be cut smaller from the factory. A lot of Old Mills from the 350 series for instance can have pretty small borders, and they came that way from the factory.

You should not judge a T206 as trimmed by the length alone. And, in this case, I don't think the card is trimmed. The best way to tell is to hold the card flat at eye-level, and compare the edges. On a trimmed card, all of the edges will not look the same. You should see the remnants of striations from the factory cut on all sides on a clean unaltered card. If it's trimmed, one edge will look a bit whiter and more uniform in texture.

I used to freak out about small T206s until I learned about this grading technique in an old issue of SGC Magazine. Works like a charm!

Enjoy the card!

It's a raw card, in my opinion anyone purchasing a raw card is taking a chance. Clear from looking at the image that it's trimmed. I'd say there's no free lunch you get what you pay for and the seller says its in poor/fair condition. Someone tells me its in poor condition I think its just common sense that there are issues with the card and it being rimmed is one of the possibilities.

If you do not care one way or the other, keep the card. Not worth the stress either way in my opinion.

There is no stress,

I simply wanted some discussion on the nature of t206's regarding their variation in length from the factory (thanks Luke, Rob, and Paul for chiming in on that)

and also the "pay for return shipping" thingy. I agree with most all sentiments stated on that topic.


One thing I do feel strongly about though is: I do not believe a description of "poor" should include the possibility that it could be trimmed. Those are two totally separate items in my mind. The seller DID provide good scans which I studied prior to purchase and did not see anything that made me think it was in any way altered. However, he didn't mention the fact that it is noticeably shorter than other t206's. That can't be determined by looking at an individual card no matter how good the scans.

I do however agree with Luke (I think Luke said this) and now believe it was an honest mistake to overlook the short length and not mention it in the listing. One that I could very easily make myself.

After considering Luke Paul and Rob's responses, I no longer think it is a slam dunk based on it's length that it has been altered and I decided to keep the card.

Others have stated that it doesn't look trimmed. I tend to agree. What are you seeing that's not "clear" to us? Top border? Bottom border? On what do you base your assessment?

i don't like bottom edge from the scan. you can be nice and return stuff on your dime, but if you file a claim they usually send you a pre-printed return label.

I tend to agree with what's already been said. T206s can vary in size without being trimmed. Just because a card is labeled poor or fair does not mean it's acceptable if it ends up being altered. Absent definitive proof that it has been trimmed just pay to ship it back if you're not happy with your purchase.

The sum of the top and bottom border distance looks too short. Usually if one is short as the bottom border clearly is the top is significantly longer, not so much here. Also, it appears to me as if the top edge is not entirely straight across, looks like it dips a bit toward the left corner but that could just be the scan. In either case I feel it is at best questionable and that would cause me to stay away. Just my opinion however.

I think it looks fine, the size varies a lot with T206s so as others have said it's really about the edge and how it looks. I could tell better from a high resolution scan, 800-1200 dpi.

Besides the look of the edge itself, the edges on the front should have a slight downward curve, and the back should have a slight ridge. I was surprised to find with my own cards that those features remained even when the card was very worn. Only a few I have with FAR more wear have lost that shape to the edge. It's caused by the blade pushing its way through the cardstock. A very sharp blade usually leaves less of it, but a perfectly crisp edge is almost always trimmed.

Steve B

Steve thats interesting to me. How many sheets would they typically cut through at one time and once they were reduced to strips how did they hold the stack of strips securely to cut them to single cards? Did they use a jig with two side walls that the strips were fed through so the strips could not move from side to side and splay out when the singles were being cut?

Hi Tony - I say this in the sense that there is really nowhere to go from 'Poor'. It is the bottom of the barrel. Most definitions of a card in Poor condition cover cards that are in terrible condition and trimmed cards would be part of that, no matter what the rest of the card looks like. Any raw card that is trimmed is considered a 'Poor' card.

Grading companies have muddied things up a bit by grading trimmed cards 'Authentic'. But in terms of the grading scale for raw cards, there's not really a level below Poor. So to me, and others, I'm sure, a trimmed card is automatically a Poor one. I should add that if the card is known or even believed to be trimmed, the seller should state that. But as others have pointed out, it's not a slam dunk and some cards just measure short. Since it's not a clear cut case (unless the seller knows and isn't clarifying), I think the description was a reasonable one.

Hi Coz,

I feel that a card being altered from it's original state is a completely different set of parameters than it's condition. So, I agree that there is nowhere to go lower than poor as far as condition is concerned. However, whether or not a card is altered is a different topic vs. condition.

Oh, well. No problem that's what I hoped this thread would be good for..... shedding new light on some issues for some collectors.

Take it easy!

Altered is the bottom of the barrel...lower than poor! Only thing lower than altered is fake!