The long awaited PSA half grade!

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Posted By: barrysloate

Joe- it's complicated, and the grading services know they could lose customers under certain circumstances. I think they need to protect themselves legally.

But I do agree with you that even trimming can be subjective. I once sent in a T222 to be graded and it came back trimmed. I waited a few months, sent it back to the same company, and got a numerical grade.

There is no definitive answer to any of this. However, in the case of a counterfeit card, the term subjective may no longer apply.

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Posted By: Steve

Joe has a standing offer that anyone can call him to discuss this and any issue regarding the .5 change.


I suggest someone here call him and ask him point blank regarding cards sent in during this resubmit if they are now found to be counterfiet and or altered.


Maybe Leon could act as a spokesperson?


Just a thought.


Steve

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Posted By: Bottom of the Ninth

Kevin,

For the most part I am not sure that PSA really cares what you or anyone else says about their cards once they have been encapsulated. In whatever way they feel they have met their obligation to grade and authenticate, until properly challenged, their opinion reigns supreme amongst those who buy their slabs. They do whatever it is they do to justify encapsulating a card regardless of what you or I might think.

I don't think the grading process we pay for permits enough time or expertise to evaluate a card with great accuracy as to alterations. It is true that there are those that are obvious however not all alterations can be detected looking at a card for a few seconds. I have plenty of cards encapsulated that were altered and just as many rejected that I knew to be 100% legit. The more time you spend evaluating the more accurate the results. That is why I said alterations are subjective, for the most part.

Greg

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Posted By: Kevin Saucier

"I don't think the grading process we pay for permits enough time or expertise to evaluate a card with great accuracy as to alterations. It is true that there are those that are obvious however not all alterations can be detected looking at a card for a few seconds. I have plenty of cards encapsulated that were altered and just as many rejected that I knew to be 100% legit. The more time you spend evaluating the more accurate the results. That is why I said alterations are subjective, for the most part."



Yep agreed!


Barry I think you are right, it may be a complicated issue. That's the reason I tossed it out there. Personally, I can't see them returning a card proved to have been doctored...shown in steps with pics and details. I'd be curious on how it would be handled though.

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Posted By: SC

"Cards on regrade or reholder service: SGC has the right to reevaluate the card and assign a newly established grade if SGC believes the card was originally misgraded. If the grade change results in a loss of value of the card, SGC will compensate the customer based upon market value as solely determined by SGC."

Anyone want to guess this (and similar language) was put in after the Rosen/SGC legal debacle?

Any (smart) company is going to have their terms and regulations written as tightly as possible by lawyers looking to cover every possibility. This guards against someone obtaining an overgraded/altered card, and holding the grading company hostage for damages far above what reasonable people would consider an appropriate adjustment. I've sold cards back to both PSA & SGC & Beckett - they basically all paid me what I'd paid for the card, less a reasonable amount if I was getting the card back.

I do know I've heard from many that PSA has reholdered or unholdered cards without compensation...of course, with the WIWAG situation, it provides an interesting out that is difficult to argue, if they claim they never graded the card in the first place.

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Posted By: leon

You really need to be careful on your postings. I agree with JK here. You can't have a debate very well while being anonymous. You said:

"Joe D., simply put, you're wrong"


To me that is enough to not be allowed to be anonymous. Email me if you have an issue. Anymore serious back and forth discussions, or saying folks are wrong, and you will need to put your name out here...nothing personal...best regards

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Posted By: David Davis

Who says that PSA's BBB rating is a "D". It is "BB", which is a perfectly acceptable business rating. Even if it was a D, what would have caused it? I would venture to say that lag time on receiving cards is probably the biggest cause of complaints, plus their poor customer service. Frustrating and even wrong as that may be, they don't keep people's submissions, crease their cards, or other mailicious activity that would remove consumer confidence. There are other grading services available if you do not like PSA.

For the people or companies that have a vested interest in PSA cards, whether collector or dealer, 10 or 30,000 cards, you have to decide what to do.

If I had to decide (meaning that I had significant money invested in PSA graded cards), if my cards were graded between 1 and 7, and wouldn't jump by at least 4 figures with a bump, I wouldn't consider resubmitting it.

For PSA 8's, (and I wish I had Jim Crandell's collection right now), I would take a random sampling of let's say, 100 cards. Based on how many came back as an 8.5, I would decide my next action. While obviously according to PSA starting a few days ago, there is a difference between a PSA 8 and a PSA 9, it will be hard to figure out which ones to submit.

According to PSA, centering will be the main factor, but of course, not the only factor in determining the half grade bump.

What a cash cow for PSA! They will now be paid to review their own subjective work, and have made the conditions subjective enough that practically anything already in the high end range could get a bump. If most people can't tell the difference between an 8 or a 9 (how many times have people wondered how their card could not get a 9 when it came back an 8) then determining a half grade will be even tougher.

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Posted By: JK

Joe - the difference is that a crossover comes from another service - hence you provide a minimum grade. If it tops that grade, they crack it, if not, they dont.

A regrade is completely different. Your asking that they look at and review your card again. You do so with the understanding that the card could go up or down per their stated submission terms. I suppose if you sent a regrade in and asked that it stay in the same slab if it doesnt upgrade, they might very well refuse to grade it and simply send it back. I dont think you get to dictate the submission terms - if you dont like their submission terms, then they dont have to and likely will not accept your submission.

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Posted By: JimB

Given that they just added the half grades after grading 11 million cards, why is it such a big deal that people be able to submit their cards to see if they are worthy of a half grade bump? PSA is not saying we mis-graded 5 million cards. They are saying that some may be strong for the grade and deserve the half grade bump. Things don't have to be complicated all the time.
jimB

edited for spelling.

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Posted By: Matt

"Given that they just added the half grades after grading 11 million cards, why is it such a big deal that people be able to submit their cards to see if they are worthy of a half grade bump? PSA is not saying we mis-graded 5 million cards. They are saying that some may be strong for the grade and deserve the half grade bump. Things don't have to be complicated all the time.
jimB"

Jim - you're missing the point; no one here is arguing that people shouldn't be allowed to submit cards for re-evaluation. The issue is PSA's guarantee of equal or higher grade. Isn't it likely some cards are now worthy of a half grade demotion? What about the cards in those 11 million that were mistakenly graded the first time?

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

I am with JimB on this one. PSA is not offering to re-evaluate all the cards that are already in holders (although I suppose they would if you asked them to), they are simply offering to refine the numerical grades they have already assigned to particular cards, in order to recognize those that are in the high end of their assigned grade (because of particularly good centering or whatever). As Jim pointed out before, if you have a card graded '7', then it was originally deemed to be in the 7.00-7.99 range. If it is just a whisker shy of getting an '8', then why not label it a 7.5 NM+? On the other hand if it barely qualifies for a '7', I don't see any reason for them to say, "well on second thought it really should have been a high end '6', so we are dropping it to a 6.5." I really don't see a problem with that.

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Posted By: Matt

"As Jim pointed out before, if you have a card graded '7', then it was originally deemed to be in the 7.00-7.99 range."

Really? A 6.9 wasn't given to a 7 as it was closer to a 7 then a 6?

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

Matt -- yes, a card has to meet all the minimum standards of a 7 to get a 7. The range would be 7.0 to 7.9, not 6.5 to 7.5. A 6.9 was formerly given a 6 (but now it can get a 6.5).

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Posted By: Matt

Eric - there's no way for us to know that conclusively, but as the grading scale is somewhat subjective, I highly doubt a 6.9 was previously given a 6. Furthermore, we both can agree that out of the millions of cards graded, some mistakes were made and cards graded out higher then they should have.

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

Matt -- well, we have seen the cases where a card with NM 7 corners and VG 3 scuffing on the back is awarded an EX 5, so there may be some 'averaging' going on in the grading process; you do have a point there. But that is not how the system is supposed to work; again a card in theory should meet all of the requirements for a particular grade in order to get it. And yes I agree there are overgraded, and perhaps even altered, cards currently residing in holders. I'm sure PSA would be happy to re-evaluate these cards, if that is what you want; for example you can crack one out and send it in raw and see what you get this time. Or you can submit it in the holder, and if they agree with you that it is overgraded, they may buy it back, but I wouldn't count on it.

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

Can you imagine some of the 'graders' at PSA looking at a card, scratching their heads, and suddenly thinking, "Gee, this looks like a 6.9!"

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

Jeff -- obviously it is unrealistic to assume that PSA graders can distinguish card quality in 0.1 grade increments. The point is, if a card just misses being a '7' because of a ding to one corner or something, even though everything else meets the NM standards, it shouldn't get a 7, it should get a 6 (or perhaps now, a 6.5 EX-MT+). At least that's how I think of it.

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Posted By: Joe D.

"Jim - you're missing the point; no one here is arguing that people shouldn't be allowed to submit cards for re-evaluation. The issue is PSA's guarantee of equal or higher grade. Isn't it likely some cards are now worthy of a half grade demotion?"


grading is subjective. Depending on who looks at your cards at ANY GRADING COMPANY you will see a range of grades for the same card. Talking about possible half grade demotions is just ridiculous.

This is not meant to be a gamble for the customers. This is not a grand atonement of sins. PSA is just checking to see if your card deserves a 1/2 point bump or not.


Josh:
"A regrade is completely different. Your asking that they look at and review your card again. You do so with the understanding that the card could go up or down per their stated submission terms."

I have asked SGC to reconsider the grades of a bunch of cards. Never once did a card come back with a grade demotion. Possibly the likelihood of me sending in an overgraded card for a bump is very low to begin with. But an additional element is that SGC has much better business policies than that. If I may go back to the context of all of my statements... and Matt's post illustrates it best. It seems people here want everyone who sends in a card to receive a brand new grade whatever it may be. That is not what SGC would do, and that is not what PSA should do. A 1/2 point demotion? cmon.

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Posted By: Chuck Ross

As Jeff implied, the idea of using an objective numerical scale with fine gradations in this arena doesn't seem to make sense unless you can publish a rubric that defines exactly what each gradation means. How exactly does an 8.5 differ from an 8.0 (not to mention how a 6.9 differs from a 7.1)? Certain qualitative aspects of a card (centering, corners, etc) can be "quantified" to some extent. But based on what I read on this chat board about the overall capabilities of PSA graders, with this new scale the company seems to be advertising powers of observation that they do not have.

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Posted By: Matt

"This is not meant to be a gamble for the customers. This is not a grand atonement of sins. PSA is just checking to see if your card deserves a 1/2 point bump or not."

I understand what it is meant to be - a PSA money grab. I just disagree.

Most surprising in this whole thread to me is JimC, because he has acknowledged that PSA is doing this simply to squeeze more money out of their customers, as he has explained the reason for the "equals/greater than" policy is because otherwise most people wouldn't submit everything. Yet, he is submitting himself to it anyway. Usually, the sheep going to the slaughter, if they find out what happens at the end of the line, don't go along...

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Posted By: barrysloate

Throughout this discussion the policy of buying back an overgraded or altered card has been tossed out. Does anybody know how the grading company determines what is fair compensation? Because I'm willing to bet the two sides could be really far apart on just what each feels the damages are.

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Posted By: Joe D.

Matt:
"I understand what it is meant to be - a PSA money grab. I just disagree."

we just disagree. and thats cool. I do agree this has very much to do with improving PSAs money grab. It just also happens to improve their overall product IMO.


Barry:
"Does anybody know how the grading company determines what is fair compensation?"
I don't know. But I have confidence that if it happened to be SGC... they would be more than fair. Thats not a knock on PSA - I just don't know those guys as well. If PSA was smart, they would be more than fair as well. So they overpay for a card - it really won't matter much to the bottom line. The bad press would mean a whole lot more.

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Posted By: Matt

Joe - "we just disagree. and thats cool. I do agree this has very much to do with improving PSAs money grab. It just also happens to improve their overall product IMO."

There are two parts to what PSA has done here - one is the adoption of the half grading system - I agree this improves their overall product; two is the greater than/equals policy which I disagree with . Do you believe that said policy improves their overall product or do you disagree with that policy as well?

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

Matt -- with their greater than/equals policy, PSA is assuming that they got the whole number grade correct the first time. They are simply offering to refine these whole grades with half grade bumps where they think it is appropriate. The question of whether they got it right the first time is a different issue. That is where their buy back policy might come into play, if a card is clearly overgraded. My understanding is PSA does have a buy back policy, but that they are more stingy in compensating anyone for overgraded cards than SGC is.

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Posted By: Matt

Eric - if they are re-evaluating the card to see if it's worthy of a 6.5 instead of a 6, you're suggesting they wouldn't notice they gave it a 6 when it deserved a 5.5 or an A? I don't see how you can make that distinction in practice.

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

Matt -- I understand what you're saying, but it still makes sense to me for them to only assign up-grades in this case. When I send a card in to be re-holdered, because the holder is scratched or cracked, they don't re-inspect the card for proper grading, they just re-encapsulate it with the same grade and send it back. So re-holdering is a relatively cheap service. With the new half grade system, they aren't going to be taking the time to re-inspect card edges for evidence of alteration and so forth, they are just going to be looking for superior qualities such as nice centering or surface gloss or whatever, adding the half grade where appropriate, and sending the card back to the submitter. That is why getting a half grade bump review will be presumably less expensive than having a card re-authenticated and re-graded anew (or 'de novo', as Jeff would say).

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Posted By: Joe D.

matt:
"I agree this improves their overall product; two is the greater than/equals policy which I disagree with . Do you believe that said policy improves their overall product or do you disagree with that policy as well?"

Matt - I don't know if greater/than equals by itself helps their overall product, but demotions would definitely hurt their overall product. It would shake the confidence and support their customers have in their product. It is an unnecessary punishment that serves no purpose as I see the margin of error for any grader is more than 1/2 point on the scale.

Quite frankly, I think a 5.5 can get a 6.5 and a 6.5 can get a 5.5 from any grading company. I've seen overgrades and undergrades. The grading companies themselves know this. I have been told by a grading company that I got 'lucky' and a 'strong grade' was given by the grader. They didn't look to confiscate the card.

Everyone (including a grader) knows or should know - you need to look at the card, not just the number on the flip! No matter how many points they have in the scale, grading will always be subjective. I guarantee there will be 4.5s that look like 5.5s and when they go to auction, they will get more bids than other 4.5s

What you are suggesting is that PSA starts over.... scrap everything they have done before and start anew. I see this as ridiculous. And more to the point on this board - I see it as another "bash PSA" type statement (i.e., "they stunk before and they need to start anew")

I agree with others on this board... the people who could be up in arms about this are top registry people. They have a place in the registry (that they care about) that can now be challenged for no other reason than a change in policy. Most likely - everyone from second place down will see this as their chance to move up (everyone has an ego). I couldn't care less about the registry. I do like to upgrade my cards... but things like eye appeal and ink vibrancy, ink registration mean a heck of a lot more to me than a technical grade.


I will add - and have yet to hear anyone comment on this:
I think that if SGC were to add these half grades:
2.5, 3.5, 4.5, 6.5 - it would be a product improvement.

SGC does not offer these half grades. If they decide to at some point... I would think it would be perfectly reasonable for them to accept 2s, 3s, 4s, and 6s for possible greater than/equals bumps to their new system.

I bet this board would have much less of a problem with SGC offering a greater than equal bump review if they had a grade scale change - because the assumption is SGC hasn't made the mistakes that PSA has made.

So again, thats what it comes down to. People just want PSA to start anew - because this board has its own negative bias of PSA grading.

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

oops, apparently I'm wrong about the pricing thing. Going back and looking at the PSA announcement, it looks like they will be charging their regular fees for the half grade reviews (at the service level that applies to the current market value of the card as originally graded, not what it would be if it does in fact receive a bump). They do say however that "Since the cards are already graded by PSA, this process should be even easier than with ungraded cards." So again I think, for better or for worse, they are assuming that they do not need to, and will not, re-evaluate the card's authenticity and whole grade that was originally assigned.

edited to add: PSA currently has a service called "Reviews" (along with "Grading" and "Crossovers"), which they say is "For cards/tickets previously graded by PSA that you feel might be worthy of a higher grade. Submit in holders." Presumably they would never downgrade a card submitted for such a review either. You would either get a new holder with a higher whole number grade, or you would get your original card back with the same grade. The new half grade review system will presumably be just a special case of the existing Review service.

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Posted By: Steve Clark

Matt/Eric,

I offered up this response in relation to determining a breakpoint between whole and half grades:

PSA 9 centering can go up to 65/35.

PSA 8 centering can go up to 70/30.

PSA 7 centering can go up to 75/25.

I suppose the assumtion would be that if the cards in each of the grades exhibit the corners for the grade, then the centering determines that half-grade. Using 50/50 as the base, then it would break out as such:

PSA 7.5: 50/50-65/35
PSA 7.0: 65/35-75/25

PSA 8.5: 50/50-60/40
PSA 8.0: 60/40-70/30

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

Steve -- that seems reasonable to me, in terms of centering standards that could be applied to determine half grade bumps. Going from a minimum of 70/30 to 60/40 (for 8 to 8.5) or from 75/25 to 65/35 (for 7 to 7.5) is about a 15% improvement in each case. PSA is actually saying a little less than that (5% to 10% improvement) would be required. (I have always felt that PSA and the other grading companies are too liberal in their centering standards by the way.) Anyhow, here is what PSA states on their web site about this:

Cards that exhibit high-end qualities within each particular grade, between PSA Good 2 and PSA Mint 9, may achieve a half-point increase. While PSA graders will evaluate all of the attributes possessed by a card in order to determine if the card may be eligible, there will be a clear focus on centering.

Generally speaking, a card must exhibit centering that is 5-10% better, at minimum, than the lowest % allowed within a particular grade. It is important to note that there may be cases where the overall strength of the card, such as the quality of the corners and print, will give the card the edge it needs despite the fact that it may exhibit only marginal centering for the grade. This is especially true for cards that find themselves within the bottom half of the PSA 1-10 scale.

Finally, keep in mind that qualifiers will not apply to grades that achieve the half-point increase since, by definition; these cards have to exhibit high-end qualities within the grade in order to warrant consideration. For example, there will not be cards graded PSA NM-MT-Plus 8.5 OC or PSA EX-MT-Plus 6.5 PD since the half-point is reserved for high-end cards within each grade.

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Posted By: JimB

Let's imagine the opposite scenario. PSA announces the half grades but says that if any of the owners of the 11 million cards you paid to have accurately graded want to have those cards evaluated for a bump because you feel they are high end for the grade, you must take the risk that we will determine that we overgraded your card last time and you must accept a bump down with compensation to be determined by PSA. That scenario would go over like a ton of bricks here.

Not only would that be unfair to customers, how much resentment do you think that would generate? The only way the first eleven million cards could be evaluated for the half grade bump is if I want to risk a bump down. That is crazy.

PSA and all grading companies pride themselves on the accuracy of their grading. Sure, maybe they would agree that 1 out of 1,000 might be overgrade, but I am sure from PSA's perspective, it is not the epidemic some on here are suggesting. If they were to regularly start downgrading cards and compensating for it, they would quickly go out of business.

For that one card in a thousand, they are always free to call the owner and discuss it with them. But that does not mean they should write in their new policy that they are looking for downgrades. Be realistic!

But I think if that is the way they rolled out half grades, we would have equal or greater criticism from the masses here. A certain group of people here are going to be upset no matter what PSA does.
JimB

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Posted By: JimB

To me, the only major complaint is the cost. The rates for bump evaluation should be lower than a regular submission since they do not need to look for authenticity or alteration.
JimB

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Posted By: Matt

Jim - I can honestly say, had they rolled out the half grades and offered to re-evaluate cards previously submitted with no guarantee of "equal or grater then" I would not have an issue and from what I've read, most here3 would agree with that. I am not an "anti-PSA" guy - I just think this policy is bad for the industry and was only done to squeeze extra money out of loyal customers.

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Posted By: leon

I think we are pretty good friends so I think I can ask you this question. I will first say I don't blame PSA for doing what they did as a business move. They are trying to perfume a pig though, and that's a tough job.....


Do you feel that this move on PSA's part was more about the money than helping the hobby, or do you think they are really being altruistic here?

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Posted By: JimB

Leon,
For PSA, I have no doubt that it was primarily about the money. And my major complaint with the way they are handling it is that they are charging too much for the service. But it would be not only an idiotic business move to state a policy of evaluation like people are suggesting here since they would get far few submissions, but it would also undermine their whole raison d'etre since it would be an admission that they regularly overgraded in the past. Adding half grades is not an admission of overgrading in the past. It is a refinement that would allow for certain high grade examples within a given grading teir to be formally recognized as high-end for that teir.
JimB

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

I agree with Jim's position on most/all of this but one minor detail: the only reason PSA did this was for $$. Nothing else.

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Posted By: leon

Jim.....I think we have disagreed a few times but I have never said you are not reasonable. I was hoping you would say what you did ....best regards...

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Posted By: Matt

JIm - "it would be an admission that they regularly overgraded in the past. Adding half grades is not an admission of overgrading in the past. It is a refinement that would allow for certain high grade examples within a given grading teir to be formally recognized as high-end for that teir."

That's some kind of kool-aid. Bumping a half grade is not an admission of undergrading but a .5 reduction IS an admission of over-grading? I think they rounded to the closest grade previously and now, with .5 grades, they can round to the closest .5; for better or worse.

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Posted By: JimB

Matt,
I think we have a different understanding of what they were doing before. I think a PSA 5 before half grades included any card that met the minimum requirements for a 5 and everything better up to the hypothetical 5.99. So a 5 was everything from 5.0 to 5.99. Now they have added half grades, so those at the higher end of that scale may now deserve to be in a 5.5 holder. I don't think PSA would agree with you that what was previously in a 5 holder represented everything from 4.51 to 5.49.
JimB

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Posted By: barrysloate

I'm still not completely comfortable with a policy that only rewards cards with a half grade bump and will not objectively look at resubmitted cards. You have to assume given the subjectivity of grading, for every undergraded card there's an overgraded one.

And it still doesn't address the issue that a small percentage of altered cards have gotten holdered (even if it's 1-2%, it's still a quantifiable number), and if the grader sees this on a review his hands are tied and he must leave that card as is. That's a gray area that troubles me.

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Posted By: Brad

The only reason PSA did this was for $$ Nothing else.
You can't blame them for trying!!!

SGC is the #1 grading Co. for pre war cards "Now"! Can't see why anyone would cross over to PSA even for the new' half grade, they've lost all credibility with there new grading system!

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Posted By: Steve

and if the grader sees this on a review his hands are tied and he must leave that card as is.


I'm not positive that is the case. PSA never said any such thing in the release.


Steve

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Posted By: JimB

"And it still doesn't address the issue that a small percentage of altered cards have gotten holdered"

Barry,
What makes you think they would not do anything if they saw a card they thought was altered. My guess is that in PSA's mind, the number would be extremely small - an anomoly that could be dealt with, but not something that they need to put into their new half-grade press release.
JimB

P.S. I will say it again, that I think SGC is the better of the two companies. I guess I have a tendancy to defend the underdog, which PSA certainly is around here, though not in the larger card collecting community.

Do any of you actually think that if SGC started offering more half grades they would routinely (even 5% of the time) propose to the owner that their 4 is really a 3.5 and then compensate them for the difference? I have news for you all: SGC is a for profit business as well and there is no chance in hell they would do that either.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Jim- my understanding is they will only bump a card a half grade if warranted, and make no other revisions. This thread has become too long for me to go back and reread everything, but isn't this what everyone is saying?

Also, even if the number of altered cards is extremely small, say 1 in a 1000 (I suspect it's more than that), if you are the unlikely submitter who hoped for a half grade bump, and got it back Authentic, are you comfortable with that?

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Posted By: Joe D.

"Also, even if the number of altered cards is extremely small, say 1 in a 1000 (I suspect it's more than that), if you are the unlikely submitter who hoped for a half grade bump, and got it back Authentic, are you comfortable with that?"


I know the question is to Jim - but I would like to answer.

The answer is No. I would not be comfortable with that.

What makes you think the new 'authentic' is more valid than the old grade?
Heck if anything... the old grade came when the card was raw and there was more of an opportunity to check for alteration (didn't have to look through a slab - could touch, smell, examine the card with greater ability).

And as I have pointed out in previous posts... I have had 'AUTHENTIC' overturned with mere words and supportive evidence. Why should it then go back to Authentic?


In the case of a counterfeit card - well I would guess that liklihood is closer to 1 in a million or more that a PSA grader will find it that obvious a counterfeit through the slab (and yet it go through the first time around). But even in that occasion, I would guess the submitter would be getting a call and an offer from PSA. If I had an obvious counterfeit in a slab - I would take the offer. Wouldn't anyone? We are assuming the card is an obvious counterfeit... which would mean the only person or organization on the planet that would make an offer at 'grade value' for the card would be PSA.

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Posted By: Corey R. Shanus

Why is it unfair if a card could be bumped down in addition to being bumped up? Provided PSA spelled out the rules ahead of time, nobody is being mislead. And, if done competently and impartially, nobody would end up with a grade not commensurate with the true condition of the card. Would it be unfair if you went to challenge, say, your phone bill and the phone company learned that in fact they underbilled you for something and now sought to have you pay it. You might be upset you allowed them to discover the error, but if in fact they were correct that they originally underbilled you, would you feel that you had no obligation to pay the deficiency? Or if your child went to challenge a test result with his teacher and during the regrading the teacher learned he missed five wrong answers and ended up lowering the grade. Would you be emailing the principal the process was unfair and the original grade should be reinstated? I might add that if PSA did announce that bumpdowns were fair game, in the end I don't think it would be that big a deal to the collector. True, it would force them to use a bit of discretion in deciding what cards to submit, but for the most part they would simply withhold those cards they feel are not suitable candidates for a bumpup. If they miss a few here or there, my guess is PSA still would not bump them down. Presumably such cards were not egregious overgrades (or they would never have been submitted for a bumpup) and PSA (or any other grading company for that matter) would not look to piss off their customer base with trivial downgrades.

So why then, assuming what I say is correct that downgrades are neither unfair nor likely to be given except in egregious circumstances does PSA's new half grade policy not bump down as well? IMO the answer to that one is easy, G R E E D!!!! They want as many resubmissions as possible (i.e., they want collectors to robotically ship the whole ream of plastic back to them) and, as important, they want set registry members who resubmit to reap the biggest gains possible in the standings. That will then entice other registry members who have been sitting on the sidelines to succumb to their competitive juices and submit their cards, and so on and so on....

In fact, it wouldn't surprise me that as we discuss this issue PSA is having active discussions about their next advertising campaign. It will probably be some statistical analysis showing that when PSA-registry sets are sold, each notch up in the registry standings corresponds to an x% increase in price realized.

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Posted By: barrysloate

I'm with Corey on this, even if he did misspell "misled" (sorry, I couldn't resist )

It has to be a risk/reward system. You buy a stock with the hope it will go up, but you are keenly aware it may go down. That's a chance you are willing to take when you buy that stock. Likewise, I wouldn't even care if PSA's policy is "we're easy- send us a nice well centered 7 and we'll send it back a 7.5." But they should still give the card an objective reevaluation, as best as they can.

I do agree with Joe on one thing- you could send PSA a 7 that's properly graded, and then they could incorrectly send it back to you in an Auth holder. So in that example it was submitted properly graded and it came back wrong. Absolutely, I agree that is a possibility. So what is the answer? I don't know, I don't have one.

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Posted By: JimB

At this point I think we are going in circles and should probably just agree to disagree. There are thoughtful arguments on both sides.
JimB


P.S. If anyone is inclined to answer my previous question, that would be great.

"Do any of you actually think that if SGC started offering more half grades they would routinely (even 5% of the time) propose to the owner that their 4 is really a 3.5 and then compensate them for the difference? I have news for you all: SGC is a for profit business as well and there is no chance in hell they would do that either."

At least PSA is being honest about what they are doing.

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Posted By: Steve

Barry

I have an email into Joe regarding the policy of altered /counterfiet cards now found in holders during this resubmission. I will post his answer when i get it.


Steve

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Posted By: Corey R. Shanus

My guess is that the concern Joe outlines and Barry mentions (incorrect downgrades to "authentic") is much more a theoretical problem than a practical one. Whether a card is altered is usually an objective determination, not a subjective one. So I would imagine then that in practically 100% of the times a card is downgraded to authentic, the downgrade is correct. If the issue is not clear cut (i.e., one could reasonably argue either way, making it a subjective determination), I would be shocked if a grading company would reverse itself and infuriate its customer base in the process. Yes, it could happen, and perhaps has. But no system is perfect and I feel that it is small price to pay for having a re-submission system that calls it as they see it and in good faith strives to take altered cards out of circulation.