Putting PSA to the test?

[mferronibc]

I am just wondering if anyone has ever reported submitting known trimmed cards to PSA to evaluate their ability to detect alterations and put their rubric of measuring, etc (if it even exists) to the test. Would be very interesting to submit say 10 cards for grading, 3 of which had been trimmed (obviously by someone who knows what they’re doing) and see if the doctored cards are identified. Conspiracies and back door payments aside, if they did pass the test so to speak wouldn’t that give a lot of us reassurance that many of our graded cards are legit rather than wondering if our whole collection is a fraud? Anyone up for trying?

[jason.1969]

That assumes all submitters get comparable treatment.

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[hcv123]

Only because I presume most people who have submitted cards to PSA have been on the up and up (NOT because PSA is good at detecting altered cards). I presume that most (not sure where between 51% and let's say (arbitrarily) 95%) PSA graded cards are not altered. That said we as collectors have a HUGE problem and no good clear solution.
I have never altered a card, but once cracked an SGC "A" (Not sure wy it was an "A") card sent it to PSA and got a PSA 4 back
I have also a few times cracked and re-subbed (I am sure others here can speak more about this) PSA graded cards with mixed results - up, down and unchanged.
I have no confidence today that whatever process they use is good enough to consistently catch altered cards.

[mferronibc]

Howard I like your optimism, I too would like to believe that most (obviously not all) of this hobby is made up of people with good intentions, especially on the scale at which I collect. I don’t ever see myself buying cards worth thousands of dollars a piece so the difference between an altered PSA 7 and raw 4 for most of what I collect is fairly marginal, I just like the feeling of the “purity” of my cards if that makes sense. But again at most I spend $150 or so on a card a few times a year - my feeling is it’s a lot less likely for the snakes in the hobby to really bother with altering these cards (mainly leaders and all star cards of HOFers) for minor gains as naive as that may be.

[bnorth]

This is a good test but the cards have to be sent in by someone that rarely submits cards. Getting in on a group sub on this forum by Bobby would also work.

Pick 10 random #s between 1 and 30. Then go to 4SCs ebay page and search for PSA 10s. Now list them from cheapest to most expensive. Now take those 10 random #s and buy the 10 cards in order on 4SCs ebay listings. Crack them out and send them in and see how many come back as PSA 10s.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by hcv123

Only because I presume most people who have submitted cards to PSA have been on the up and up (NOT because PSA is good at detecting altered cards). I presume that most (not sure where between 51% and let's say (arbitrarily) 95%) PSA graded cards are not altered. That said we as collectors have a HUGE problem and no good clear solution.
I have never altered a card, but once cracked an SGC "A" (Not sure wy it was an "A") card sent it to PSA and got a PSA 4 back
I have also a few times cracked and re-subbed (I am sure others here can speak more about this) PSA graded cards with mixed results - up, down and unchanged.
I have no confidence today that whatever process they use is good enough to consistently catch altered cards.

SGC will give an "A" grade to cards that are factory but not within what's "normal" I had one rejected for min size, that was certainly factory. And this one rejected for very rough cuts top and bottom.


So I'm not surprised one of their A cards might get through PSA.

And, just for fun, a totally factory card that wouldn't pass any TPG.