[Pilot172000]

Originally Posted by steve B

PSA could handle fake cards more clearly.

To say that no company would take on the liability of being wrong about a fake is silly, since that's exactly what expertizers - the equivalent of grading companies for stamps - do regularly.

If I send in a stamp I've identified as an rare expensive one, and I'm wrong, they send it back with a certificate describing it as what it actually is.

Their pricing is a minimum, or a percentage of the catalog value. If I think it's one worth say 100 thousand, and it's not, they only charge the minimum or the price for what it is.

If I send in an outright fake whether it was made by a famous forger, or by me just before sending it in, it comes back with a cert saying it's a fake. I think in the case of one done by someone famous like Sperati or Fournier, they state that as well.

Altered stamps are described as altered, usually with the alteration described, so you get an indication if the alteration is a repair, which in some cases is ok but worth a lot less, or an alteration that's likely fraudulent. (Adding some paper to replace a missing piece is sort of ok, drawing in or removing part of the design is NOT. )

In a few really complex situations the cert will say "we decline to render an opinion" Which can mean a lot of things. Anywhere from the thing is too beat up or heavily cancelled to properly identify it, to a stamp that may be real, but is extremely unusual in some way, enough that more than one expert can't be sure, or that the experts disagree.


And they can and do sometimes figure out later that something they thought was good isn't. And with enough evidence they'll recertify whatever it is as fake or as something else.

PSA could do that easily. Either slab the reprints as reprints and give them a number grade, or slab as fake if it's not a commercially produced reprint.


Steve B

I do agree that PSA could tweak their system. Slabbing them as reprints would be interesting yet risky just like rendering something completely fake. Could you imagine the hoards of Reprints getting sent in to PSA for that little red tag at the top of the holder?