Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Most scammers will not pay for the item, hoping that the seller will ship first. Obviously a savvy seller does not ship on "approval". I have found that 99.5% of the people buying on the internet are honest. Protect yourself with appropriate postal paperwork, communication and observation, and you should be fine against those scammers that sneak through.
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OK, i'll respond. I have had no problems at all with any part of Western Europe with the exception of Italy, where I suspect it's the postal system, not the philatelists. I have a 100% success rate with western Europe, with that single exception. Eastern Europe has been nearly as good, but my trades and sales have been much fewer, so my track record is from a smaller sample.
I have had several packets FROM India rifled, but only once was anything taken, and then only a single cover, which I suspect was the result of careless repacking. Otherwise, I have had complete success sending to, receiving from, India and Pakistan.
I have had mostly trouble from China; a few things have worked out, and I have had good dealings with David Hong, if you're looking for a partner. Otherwise, my success rate is less than 50/50 and I've abandoned the country because of it. I think the people lovely there, but for some reason, the scalliwags inhabit the philatelic market.
Canada is slow as a slug, but I think the problem resides on both sides of the border.
We also receive a lot of internatinal mail here from the Middle East, and I haven't found a country yet that was a problem, although the entire region is in a state of flux and past performance might no longer be a guide to the future.
Anyway, these are my personal anecdotes and may not reflect others' experience; moreover, I'm not a dealer, so I have very limited experience and most of the stuff is generally small potatoes.
David
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I expect your results will match your expectations, KG5, and I believe your expectations are your difficulty.
Honesty is where you find it, and it is found everywhere; so is dishonesty, malfeasance, et al. (I would wager you do not sell stamps to politicians in Australia, Canada, USA, ------add a country of your choosing.) I respectfully suggest we leave the tar brush in its pot, or risk defaming everyone, everywhere.
Sellers have a different perspective of postage-stamp transactions than have postage-stamp hobbyists. Personally-speaking: over more than sixty years of stamp-collecting, I have conducted several thousand stamp transactions of one kind or another, with people from all over the world, and from the majority of countries in the world. I can count the number of my unpleasant dealings on two hands and I am not the exception. My disappointments have been inconsequential compared to the benefits and enjoyment I derive from the hobby of stamp-collecting.
Stamporama promotes stamp-collecting as a hobby, it may be the incorrect forum for resolving your issues. I qualify my preceding sentence by stating unequivocally that I believe in free speech and I read your and other commentary, whatever the topic, with great interest if not agreement.
John Derry
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Some sellers have emailed me a scan of the envelope they are about to send me, with my address on it and postage attached. It's much cheaper than registered post or postal insurance, provided you have a scanner.
Personally, however, I don't consider it that much proof of sending a real article. If they were systematically trying to scam people, they could easily soak off the stamps, paste them on another letter, and continue the scam, or they could be clever enough to photoshop the postage onto the envelope believably.
However, it's something you might like to agree on with your partner before buying/selling/exchanging.
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You wrote:
"The condition the economies are in, in some countries make for desperate people that are scamming to survive."
Personally I think that if one is really desperate, starting up a scam in order to get stamps without paying for them would be the last thing to do. Stamps, especially old ones, have no nutritional value and taste poorly. Trying to take things from the supermarket without paying seems far more logical in that case. And if you need to get rich fast, stamps are not the best option.
Apart from that, the problem is not that some countries are being hurt by the financial crisis. In my opinion it is a problem with postal services. A problem that existed way before this financial mayhem started. I found out the hard way that sending letters to South America, Italy, Greece or South-East Asia was risky. I have never had any problems sending to other European countries, Canada, Australia or New Zealand and a few with letters to the USA.
Jan-Simon
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07:19:07am
I also find that putting very plain stamps or even postage meters on letters to "problem" countries helps. If you put a myriad of pretty commemoratives as we philatelist tend to do, the envelope sticks out like a sour thumb for some postal worker that there is something interesting in the there.
Bob
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09:52:25am
Quote;
" ... I also find that putting very plain stamps or even postage meters on letters to "problem" countries helps. If you put a myriad of pretty commemoratives as we philatelist tend to do, the envelope sticks out like a sour thumb for some postal worker that there is something interesting in the there. ..."
As to fancy stamps, I have seen several envelopes to me arrive with the stamps obviously pulled off. Having seen the intense poverty that so many people in India and Bangladesh live in I can understand some poor guy stripping a stamp off and selling it to a packet maker for lunch money (for a week !).
One thing that has worked with mail to the India and Malaysia zone was to put stamp trades inside a greeting card sized envelope and write "Have a Happy Holiday" on the outside. It seemed to work regardless of the absence of a timely holiday.
I agree with Jan's list of problem areas also but would add that some time ago I did have some stamp traders in Eastern Europe who claimed they never got some trades. However that was easily ten or fifteen years ago when the area behind the then fallen "Iron Curtain" may have been in turmoil.
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By default, I appear to be an unwitting contrarian in view of some of the preceding commentary about mailing stamps safely, securely.
To ensure undamaged, fail-safe delivery when posting stamps, I always use commemorative postage, label the package "fragile" and annotate it, "for a stamp collector". The photograph is but an example: destined for an invalided recipient in Slovenia, and almost $40.00 Canadian in postage (it would have been cheaper to send by courier) I cancelled the postage personally, covered it with a clear-plastic protector, and the package arrived with postage, plus over 5,000 stamps, promptly and undamaged. Similarly, so did the stamps he sent to me. Let me repeat that this is my every-time experience. I believe postal employees want my business. Whenever I identify myself or the recipient of my mail as a postage-stamp collector, postal employees indulge me.
I have mailed letters and packages to myself and others from many parts of the world; have always purchased commemoratives; requested hand or personal cancels (never been refused); and always these mailings arrive undamaged. I am too old to be naïve.
Despite the constant slagging I read from Americans on this website concerning the US postal system, my many experiences have all been positive and from almost every state! On a couple of occasions, postal employees have even produced hammer-cancels (which I understand are no longer authorized for use) to postmark my letters and packages. A few generations back, it was not uncommon to read or hear of letters being delivered in the USA with the postage being taped in cash on the envelope, and not even removed! No, I am not making this up, although it may have been more than a few generations ago.
I defy any reader to demonstrate how negativism will improve the transmittal of postage stamps (no negative-number mathematics, please.)
John Derry
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America has very reciprical agreements with other countries regarding registered letters; even fewer about insurance. It is essential to check before sending what your own country and the destination country will do on registered and insured mail. If nothing, why bother, espeically as it's often perceived as extra choice morsels by those with sticky fingers.
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11:34:12am
In my seldom humble opinion, much of the premium services that incur extra charges are a waste of time.
Here in Florida a friend sold used cars, most of which were financed through one or another out of state banks or mortgage companies. He would do all the paper work, run the credit etc., and get approval by FAX.
Then to get paid, he had to send all the signed and noterized paperwork to the money people. The sooner he did that, the sooner they would cut a check so,of course, he wanted to use "EXPRESS" and later Priority Mail envelopes.
After watching this procedure for some time I arranged a test with a couple of his contacts. I included a stamped, addressed return envelope in the "EXPRESS" cardboard envelope provided by USPS. A polite note reminded the recipient of our discussion to mark the outside of the received envelopes with the date and time it was delivered and return it to us.
I also sent a regular first class envelope to the same person at the same address from the same Post Office at the same time.
The result was that in most cases the regular mail and Priority Mail arrived at, or nearly at, the same time, despite the promise of "EXPRESS" delivery and the then eight or nine dollars fee. And the last time I did that the fee was at $14.00.
It certainly didn't seem to me that the fee was worth the expense. A few times the plain white envelope arrived in the regular mail delivery beating the Express delivery by several hours. Well, at least the Express delivery was by a special courier from the local PO later in the day and not th next day.
A second result was that I managed to acquire quite a few $8.75,, $9.35, $10.75, $11.75 and on up to the very attractive $14.00 Olympic Eagle, postally used Express Mail stamps. A few were mangled in someway but over all I enjoyed the experiment.
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I have been buying and selling stamps online for some 15 years, and overall my negative experiences have been very few.
Parts of South America and Africa (where I almost NEVER send anything, in the first place) are sometimes a bit dodgy. To these places-- and to parts of the new nations of the former Soviet Union, as well as parts of Asia-- I generally AVOID putting collectible stamps on the envelope, opting instead for an "anonymous" meter imprint. And generally, stuff does NOT disappear. My experience has been less with dishonest buyers and sellers, than with dishonest delivery systems... packages that look "unusual and interesting" (i.e. with 43 different stamps on them) attract attention and are more likely to "disappear."
Maybe that's sad for the collector at the other end, but at least he/she gets the stamps purchased.
~Peter
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I frequently buy on eBay, but I'm not a seller (except for one non-philatelic item years ago), so I'm not familiar with the eBay rules that you refer to. Would you please elucidate?
This concerns me, because as a buyer I have been frustrated by sellers in the U.S. (and not just on eBay) who won't sell to Canadians. (I can't even buy some ebooks from the Kindle Store because the titles aren't available to Canadians, but I understand that this is a matter of copyright, not financial risk.)
This concerns me too because in our capitalistic world, international trade in any commodity is one glue that has the potential of making and keeping "friends" them together rather than separating them into warring camps, of which we already have too many.
As a buyer, I am willing to take on considerable risk in order to obtain what I wish to buy. I will pay registered mail costs on expensive items if I can afford it, and I always pay in a secure manner, either with PayPal or a bank draft in U.S. dollars. I have received stamps and covers from many countries in the world, and had only one problem that I recall, a cover that never arrived from a seller with a good reputation. Not a lot of cost was involved, and I got a refund. The cover itself was unique and might have ended up in the bottom of the Atlantic — a jet transport carrying mail disappeared over the Atlantic at just about the time the cover was in transit. On another occasion, I was scammed by a seller who obviously had no intention of sending anything, but I got most of my money back through PayPal.
Roy Lingen (owner of Buckacover.com and the dealer who generously gives Stamporama space on his server) recently "blacklisted" several countries because of consistent problems with delivery. It would be interesting to learn the specifics of his decision.
Bob
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Buyers who complain about shipping costs are wrong. They know what the cost is since it is listed in the item listing. If they didn't like the shipping costs, then they either should not have made the purchase or discussed it with the seller BEFORE making the purchase. They have no reason to complain or taint feedback after making the purchase. The seller was upfront what the costs were, and the buyer knew. If the seller hid the costs or the costs were confusing to the buyer, then the buyer should have not made the purchase or, again, discussed it with the seller BEFORE making the purchase.
With the internet comes a large number of venues in which to peddle one's wares. If one location isn't working out, there's always another that one can move or expand to. It goes to the old joke, "Doctor, for years it has hurt when I do this." The doctor responds, "Well quit doing it."
I rarely sell stamps on eBay as the fees do not offer much chance for ending a sale in the positive. I do sell other items there, but not too often. For stamps, I use selling venues that are more oriented to stamps, giving me a better clientele, although not everyone is honest, the percentage of running across "bad apples" is greatly diminished. When one is encountered, that person is banned, not the person's country.
As a seller, I find 20% to 30% of my sales are outside the USA. Personally I like the sellers who don't sell outside of or to the USA, because that means less competition for me, and more dollars in my pocket. I do find that my "outside" sales increase whenever the value of the US dollar decreases.
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KG5, as you say, Common Sense has flown the coop. As a buyer, I...
• Willingly accept the cost of shipping, assuming it is truly a cost (taking into account "handling" charges), and
• Do NOT assume that the seller has any responsibility beyond placing the item into the hands of postal or other delivery services.
I can see no reason why any seller should have to do more than provide a receipt showing that an item was shipped. What a world...
Bob
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When I first got back into stamp collecting a few years back I bought a few lots from ebay and stampwants and didn't have any real problems. I have bought over 2000 lots on the Stamporama Auctions and have only had two problems. Once I bought a lot from India, the envelope arrived successfully in a timely manner but it had been sliced open and the stamps were gone. The only other problem that I have had was from a person in China who got in and defrauded us a while back. So two unsuccessful purchases in over 2000 is not bad. I have actually been really surprised at how reliable and how quick some postal services are. I bought a few lots from one of our members in the Ukraine and I received the stamps here in Minnesota in just a few days.
Regards ... Tim
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Tim:
I've had only one bad experience in 10+ years (China).
Far too many success stories including one member who uses old envelopes to mail stamps in, by the time they go through the USPS and Canada post, the seams have given way and on two occasions the envelopes were totally open on three sides with the contents intact!
I suppose the plusses in this hobby far outweigh the few sculkers.
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Hi All
I can also say I have had only one bad experience in all my years of dealing on Ebay .Recently sent a page of MUH Indian stamps to India ( talk about selling snow to Eskimos).These were packed between to pieces of card along with the invoice and a glassine with a couple of extras in, when the buyer received it all that was in the envelope was the invoice and the glassine.
I did used to have an exchange partner also in India ,but after two lots went missing I had to call a halt to it.
Trouble is with Ebay on the buyers side all the time sellers are always the losers.
Brian
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My ebay experiences have been almost perfect in over 2000 transactions. I was warned by a fellow collector in Sri Lanka that mails does get reviewed (postal authority??) and things can easily go missing. It is a shame, because I believe there many honest people in places where, shall we say, the administrations in charge are not held accountable.
I think if you send low value merchandise, you stand a better chance of getting it through. If not, you didn;t lose much, but it is frustrating for traders.
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When I sell on eBay, most of my offerings are stamps from Denmark, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. Since a full 80-85% of the winning bids (and almost 100% of items over US $25.00) come from those countries, there's NO WAY I could refuse to ship outside the US (where I live).
My eBay account is almost 15 years old, and I have had maybe 2-3 losses in some 2500-odd transactions... going primarily to these countries.
KG5, I'm not discounting your experience, and perhaps I'd think differently, if 95% of my sales were domestic.
~Peter
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I mentioned this thread to my son. He's not a collector, but he's certainly a thinker. He sees the fact that mail is obviously no longer as secure as it was in the relatively recent past (depending on its origin and destination) as a sign of regression in international relations on both the large scale and the small.
Several years ago I read a book by Eric Hobsbawm titled The Age of Extremes: The Short Twentieth Century, 1914–1991. He characterized pretty much every global event of the 20th Century as a disaster. From the First World War onwards, he wrote, there were no winners of any war, only losers. And those wars, he argued, retarded progress in all areas of social and economic progress. I can't help but agree.
The Second World War brought about the end of political imperialism for the most part; while I would never tout imperialism as a good thing, has hardly been replaced by anything better. Communism failed, but it would be hard to argue that what replaced it has worked very well. Capitalism may have improved the lives of many people, and individual political freedoms may be greater for many people as well, but the lives of countless millions of others are demonstrably worse in all areas than the lives of their grandparents, and it's not because they don't have iPhones.
One of the things that has always appealed to me about stamp collecting is that stamps (and postal history) reflect their historical contexts in ways that few other artifacts achieve. The problems that stamp dealers are now having in the international marketplace is simply another lesson offered by our hobby.
Bob
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Dear Bob,
Although your main point about wars being a negative influence on many area that touch our lives is absolutely correct, it could be argued that advances in science, medicine and communication have all increased precisely because of war. Or am I missing something here?
Dan C.
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Maybe I can contextualize this a little bit.
My grandmother kept in touch with her family in Latvia after fleeing the country during the war. She always sent a few dollars for birthdays and Christmas to her family to help them along in a very crappy state-controlled monopoly. Officially, the Soviet rouble was worth more than a Canadian Dollar. Unofficially, on the black market, one dollar got you 100 roubles. In a country where my electrical engineer cousin made about 500 roubles a month, $20 translated into 2000 roubles on the black market. Mail theft was always a problem. It wasn't triggered by anything more than a Canadian stamp on the envelope. It got to the point where we sent our Christmas money in October, just to avoid the rampant theft around Christmas; or we would send mail to one relative, to pass cards on to others because we knew her postal carrier wasn't stealing mail. It's better in an independent Latvia; but old habits die hard. One cousin of mine gets all of her cards sent to another cousin because the ones sent to her home address usually don't make it there.
Sometimes the temptation to feed your family or make a buck/rouble/rupee off your neighbour is just to great a temptation for a mere mortal, stuck in a horrible economic system, is just too much to resist. I'm not saying it is right by any means; but the reality of the world's weaker economies is something we shouldn't ignore.
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Hi Just thought I would add my twopenneth from across the pond.
I have been selling for some time as a private seller (1200+ feedback) in eBay and besides selling to most parts of the world, the only time I have a problem was in an item sent to a fellow Brit. Seems on that particular item that the GB mail service failed miserably - maybe because it was a higher priced item. Have tried listing in SOR with a little success but think postal prices have perhaps kept members from bidding on my items so I tend to stick to eBay.
I have bought regularly in eBay from Europe, Australia, Canada and Malaysia and had no problems with non delivery - in fact I have just had a five day turnaround of stamps from Canada. I also have sold/bought with Italian customers and have not had any instances of non-receipt, maybe more good luck than judgement. Cannot comment on other countries as I have not tempted anyone with goodies for them.
I purchase on a monthly basis from one SOR member and in all the time we have been carrying out these transactions have never had a problem in items not being delivered.
Can I just ask that maybe those who have had bad experiences keep offering buying oportunities and that they don't take it out on us living across the various oceans that keep us apart. Especially in SOR as in my humble opinion it would be against the ethos of SOR
This is not meant to offend and apologies in advance to anyone who takes this the wrong way - these are just the thoughts of a humble Brit
Best regards to all SOR members and thanks to all involved with the new look Discussion board - its great.
Stuart
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Stuart! A humble Brit? I think not. Remember lad the world owes us Brits for all that's good,such as income tax, nuclear testing in Australia and Kylie Minogue.
Remember you are British and be proud mate.
Tim2...... Not to be confused with that other fella who isn't British and therefore not eligible
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Ughhh...Kylie Minogue....now THAT was a plot! HAD to be!
Randy
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Tim, in your list of the many fine things that you English have graciously given the world, you forgot to mention "Toad in the Hole". :-)
Tim.
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some will explain this gift, right?
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David, perchance it is Wizard speak? What think ye?
Dan C.
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Nothing that mysterious...
It's sausages or leftover stewing beef baked in Yorkshire pudding. Comfort food, right Tim?
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Ah, comfort food. That makes me feel better.
I thought it an ingenious enema, but worried about the warts...
...and pitied the toad
David
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Food-Consuming members:
...and finish your fine dining with spotted dick or flan.
John Derry
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Hi Andrew,
So "toad in the hole" reached Canada then?
Regards ... Tim.
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Sorry but got to be Syrup sponge and custard for afters :-)
Alternatively if syrup sponge off the menu then a close second is sticky toffee pudding - yummeee
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All I can say is "Thank God for the Duke of York Pub in Toronto." It is the UofT's alternate evening campus. I still go there today (after graduating in 1989), although their pub fare has become way too modern day British - curries and the like. That does NOT mix with Smithwicks, Strongbow or Guiness, let me tell you... LOL. I was there last Wednesday (through early Thursday morning) and had a fresh made lamb burger on a bun with mint sauce. It is a place where everyone knows my name (at leastr Sammy the Manager does...).
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08:26:05am
I have been selling stamps, model railroad and many other different items to people throughout the world through the mail since 1978. The only country where I have had buyers claim that they have not received the stamps they bought was the United States. I have had one instance with the Russian Post Office losing packages (or was it the USA post office/USA customs department, but the Russian buyers who have paid for their items have had no complaint. In the case of the lost package, it was to a friend of mine, so I know it was not a false claim. My son, who also sells internationally has had problems with buyers from Israel claiming that they have not received their items. With the receipts that we keep, PayPal has denied those buyers' claims.
Most scammers will not pay for the item, hoping that the seller will ship first. Obviously a savvy seller does not ship on "approval". I have found that 99.5% of the people buying on the internet are honest. Protect yourself with appropriate postal paperwork, communication and observation, and you should be fine against those scammers that sneak through.
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
OK, i'll respond. I have had no problems at all with any part of Western Europe with the exception of Italy, where I suspect it's the postal system, not the philatelists. I have a 100% success rate with western Europe, with that single exception. Eastern Europe has been nearly as good, but my trades and sales have been much fewer, so my track record is from a smaller sample.
I have had several packets FROM India rifled, but only once was anything taken, and then only a single cover, which I suspect was the result of careless repacking. Otherwise, I have had complete success sending to, receiving from, India and Pakistan.
I have had mostly trouble from China; a few things have worked out, and I have had good dealings with David Hong, if you're looking for a partner. Otherwise, my success rate is less than 50/50 and I've abandoned the country because of it. I think the people lovely there, but for some reason, the scalliwags inhabit the philatelic market.
Canada is slow as a slug, but I think the problem resides on both sides of the border.
We also receive a lot of internatinal mail here from the Middle East, and I haven't found a country yet that was a problem, although the entire region is in a state of flux and past performance might no longer be a guide to the future.
Anyway, these are my personal anecdotes and may not reflect others' experience; moreover, I'm not a dealer, so I have very limited experience and most of the stuff is generally small potatoes.
David
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The past is a foreign country, they do things different there.
18 Jan 2012
10:26:04pm
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
I expect your results will match your expectations, KG5, and I believe your expectations are your difficulty.
Honesty is where you find it, and it is found everywhere; so is dishonesty, malfeasance, et al. (I would wager you do not sell stamps to politicians in Australia, Canada, USA, ------add a country of your choosing.) I respectfully suggest we leave the tar brush in its pot, or risk defaming everyone, everywhere.
Sellers have a different perspective of postage-stamp transactions than have postage-stamp hobbyists. Personally-speaking: over more than sixty years of stamp-collecting, I have conducted several thousand stamp transactions of one kind or another, with people from all over the world, and from the majority of countries in the world. I can count the number of my unpleasant dealings on two hands and I am not the exception. My disappointments have been inconsequential compared to the benefits and enjoyment I derive from the hobby of stamp-collecting.
Stamporama promotes stamp-collecting as a hobby, it may be the incorrect forum for resolving your issues. I qualify my preceding sentence by stating unequivocally that I believe in free speech and I read your and other commentary, whatever the topic, with great interest if not agreement.
John Derry
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Some sellers have emailed me a scan of the envelope they are about to send me, with my address on it and postage attached. It's much cheaper than registered post or postal insurance, provided you have a scanner.
Personally, however, I don't consider it that much proof of sending a real article. If they were systematically trying to scam people, they could easily soak off the stamps, paste them on another letter, and continue the scam, or they could be clever enough to photoshop the postage onto the envelope believably.
However, it's something you might like to agree on with your partner before buying/selling/exchanging.
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
You wrote:
"The condition the economies are in, in some countries make for desperate people that are scamming to survive."
Personally I think that if one is really desperate, starting up a scam in order to get stamps without paying for them would be the last thing to do. Stamps, especially old ones, have no nutritional value and taste poorly. Trying to take things from the supermarket without paying seems far more logical in that case. And if you need to get rich fast, stamps are not the best option.
Apart from that, the problem is not that some countries are being hurt by the financial crisis. In my opinion it is a problem with postal services. A problem that existed way before this financial mayhem started. I found out the hard way that sending letters to South America, Italy, Greece or South-East Asia was risky. I have never had any problems sending to other European countries, Canada, Australia or New Zealand and a few with letters to the USA.
Jan-Simon
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Immediate Past President - West Essex Philatelic Society www.wepsonline.org
19 Jan 2012
07:19:07am
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
I also find that putting very plain stamps or even postage meters on letters to "problem" countries helps. If you put a myriad of pretty commemoratives as we philatelist tend to do, the envelope sticks out like a sour thumb for some postal worker that there is something interesting in the there.
Bob
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Silence in the face of adversity is the father of complicity and collusion, the first cousins of conspiracy..
19 Jan 2012
09:52:25am
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Quote;
" ... I also find that putting very plain stamps or even postage meters on letters to "problem" countries helps. If you put a myriad of pretty commemoratives as we philatelist tend to do, the envelope sticks out like a sour thumb for some postal worker that there is something interesting in the there. ..."
As to fancy stamps, I have seen several envelopes to me arrive with the stamps obviously pulled off. Having seen the intense poverty that so many people in India and Bangladesh live in I can understand some poor guy stripping a stamp off and selling it to a packet maker for lunch money (for a week !).
One thing that has worked with mail to the India and Malaysia zone was to put stamp trades inside a greeting card sized envelope and write "Have a Happy Holiday" on the outside. It seemed to work regardless of the absence of a timely holiday.
I agree with Jan's list of problem areas also but would add that some time ago I did have some stamp traders in Eastern Europe who claimed they never got some trades. However that was easily ten or fifteen years ago when the area behind the then fallen "Iron Curtain" may have been in turmoil.
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The past is a foreign country, they do things different there.
19 Jan 2012
08:25:20pm
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
By default, I appear to be an unwitting contrarian in view of some of the preceding commentary about mailing stamps safely, securely.
To ensure undamaged, fail-safe delivery when posting stamps, I always use commemorative postage, label the package "fragile" and annotate it, "for a stamp collector". The photograph is but an example: destined for an invalided recipient in Slovenia, and almost $40.00 Canadian in postage (it would have been cheaper to send by courier) I cancelled the postage personally, covered it with a clear-plastic protector, and the package arrived with postage, plus over 5,000 stamps, promptly and undamaged. Similarly, so did the stamps he sent to me. Let me repeat that this is my every-time experience. I believe postal employees want my business. Whenever I identify myself or the recipient of my mail as a postage-stamp collector, postal employees indulge me.
I have mailed letters and packages to myself and others from many parts of the world; have always purchased commemoratives; requested hand or personal cancels (never been refused); and always these mailings arrive undamaged. I am too old to be naïve.
Despite the constant slagging I read from Americans on this website concerning the US postal system, my many experiences have all been positive and from almost every state! On a couple of occasions, postal employees have even produced hammer-cancels (which I understand are no longer authorized for use) to postmark my letters and packages. A few generations back, it was not uncommon to read or hear of letters being delivered in the USA with the postage being taped in cash on the envelope, and not even removed! No, I am not making this up, although it may have been more than a few generations ago.
I defy any reader to demonstrate how negativism will improve the transmittal of postage stamps (no negative-number mathematics, please.)
John Derry
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
America has very reciprical agreements with other countries regarding registered letters; even fewer about insurance. It is essential to check before sending what your own country and the destination country will do on registered and insured mail. If nothing, why bother, espeically as it's often perceived as extra choice morsels by those with sticky fingers.
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Silence in the face of adversity is the father of complicity and collusion, the first cousins of conspiracy..
21 Jan 2012
11:34:12am
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
In my seldom humble opinion, much of the premium services that incur extra charges are a waste of time.
Here in Florida a friend sold used cars, most of which were financed through one or another out of state banks or mortgage companies. He would do all the paper work, run the credit etc., and get approval by FAX.
Then to get paid, he had to send all the signed and noterized paperwork to the money people. The sooner he did that, the sooner they would cut a check so,of course, he wanted to use "EXPRESS" and later Priority Mail envelopes.
After watching this procedure for some time I arranged a test with a couple of his contacts. I included a stamped, addressed return envelope in the "EXPRESS" cardboard envelope provided by USPS. A polite note reminded the recipient of our discussion to mark the outside of the received envelopes with the date and time it was delivered and return it to us.
I also sent a regular first class envelope to the same person at the same address from the same Post Office at the same time.
The result was that in most cases the regular mail and Priority Mail arrived at, or nearly at, the same time, despite the promise of "EXPRESS" delivery and the then eight or nine dollars fee. And the last time I did that the fee was at $14.00.
It certainly didn't seem to me that the fee was worth the expense. A few times the plain white envelope arrived in the regular mail delivery beating the Express delivery by several hours. Well, at least the Express delivery was by a special courier from the local PO later in the day and not th next day.
A second result was that I managed to acquire quite a few $8.75,, $9.35, $10.75, $11.75 and on up to the very attractive $14.00 Olympic Eagle, postally used Express Mail stamps. A few were mangled in someway but over all I enjoyed the experiment.
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
I have been buying and selling stamps online for some 15 years, and overall my negative experiences have been very few.
Parts of South America and Africa (where I almost NEVER send anything, in the first place) are sometimes a bit dodgy. To these places-- and to parts of the new nations of the former Soviet Union, as well as parts of Asia-- I generally AVOID putting collectible stamps on the envelope, opting instead for an "anonymous" meter imprint. And generally, stuff does NOT disappear. My experience has been less with dishonest buyers and sellers, than with dishonest delivery systems... packages that look "unusual and interesting" (i.e. with 43 different stamps on them) attract attention and are more likely to "disappear."
Maybe that's sad for the collector at the other end, but at least he/she gets the stamps purchased.
~Peter
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
I frequently buy on eBay, but I'm not a seller (except for one non-philatelic item years ago), so I'm not familiar with the eBay rules that you refer to. Would you please elucidate?
This concerns me, because as a buyer I have been frustrated by sellers in the U.S. (and not just on eBay) who won't sell to Canadians. (I can't even buy some ebooks from the Kindle Store because the titles aren't available to Canadians, but I understand that this is a matter of copyright, not financial risk.)
This concerns me too because in our capitalistic world, international trade in any commodity is one glue that has the potential of making and keeping "friends" them together rather than separating them into warring camps, of which we already have too many.
As a buyer, I am willing to take on considerable risk in order to obtain what I wish to buy. I will pay registered mail costs on expensive items if I can afford it, and I always pay in a secure manner, either with PayPal or a bank draft in U.S. dollars. I have received stamps and covers from many countries in the world, and had only one problem that I recall, a cover that never arrived from a seller with a good reputation. Not a lot of cost was involved, and I got a refund. The cover itself was unique and might have ended up in the bottom of the Atlantic — a jet transport carrying mail disappeared over the Atlantic at just about the time the cover was in transit. On another occasion, I was scammed by a seller who obviously had no intention of sending anything, but I got most of my money back through PayPal.
Roy Lingen (owner of Buckacover.com and the dealer who generously gives Stamporama space on his server) recently "blacklisted" several countries because of consistent problems with delivery. It would be interesting to learn the specifics of his decision.
Bob
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10:10:52am
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Buyers who complain about shipping costs are wrong. They know what the cost is since it is listed in the item listing. If they didn't like the shipping costs, then they either should not have made the purchase or discussed it with the seller BEFORE making the purchase. They have no reason to complain or taint feedback after making the purchase. The seller was upfront what the costs were, and the buyer knew. If the seller hid the costs or the costs were confusing to the buyer, then the buyer should have not made the purchase or, again, discussed it with the seller BEFORE making the purchase.
With the internet comes a large number of venues in which to peddle one's wares. If one location isn't working out, there's always another that one can move or expand to. It goes to the old joke, "Doctor, for years it has hurt when I do this." The doctor responds, "Well quit doing it."
I rarely sell stamps on eBay as the fees do not offer much chance for ending a sale in the positive. I do sell other items there, but not too often. For stamps, I use selling venues that are more oriented to stamps, giving me a better clientele, although not everyone is honest, the percentage of running across "bad apples" is greatly diminished. When one is encountered, that person is banned, not the person's country.
As a seller, I find 20% to 30% of my sales are outside the USA. Personally I like the sellers who don't sell outside of or to the USA, because that means less competition for me, and more dollars in my pocket. I do find that my "outside" sales increase whenever the value of the US dollar decreases.
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
KG5, as you say, Common Sense has flown the coop. As a buyer, I...
• Willingly accept the cost of shipping, assuming it is truly a cost (taking into account "handling" charges), and
• Do NOT assume that the seller has any responsibility beyond placing the item into the hands of postal or other delivery services.
I can see no reason why any seller should have to do more than provide a receipt showing that an item was shipped. What a world...
Bob
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
When I first got back into stamp collecting a few years back I bought a few lots from ebay and stampwants and didn't have any real problems. I have bought over 2000 lots on the Stamporama Auctions and have only had two problems. Once I bought a lot from India, the envelope arrived successfully in a timely manner but it had been sliced open and the stamps were gone. The only other problem that I have had was from a person in China who got in and defrauded us a while back. So two unsuccessful purchases in over 2000 is not bad. I have actually been really surprised at how reliable and how quick some postal services are. I bought a few lots from one of our members in the Ukraine and I received the stamps here in Minnesota in just a few days.
Regards ... Tim
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Tim:
I've had only one bad experience in 10+ years (China).
Far too many success stories including one member who uses old envelopes to mail stamps in, by the time they go through the USPS and Canada post, the seams have given way and on two occasions the envelopes were totally open on three sides with the contents intact!
I suppose the plusses in this hobby far outweigh the few sculkers.
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Auctions
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Hi All
I can also say I have had only one bad experience in all my years of dealing on Ebay .Recently sent a page of MUH Indian stamps to India ( talk about selling snow to Eskimos).These were packed between to pieces of card along with the invoice and a glassine with a couple of extras in, when the buyer received it all that was in the envelope was the invoice and the glassine.
I did used to have an exchange partner also in India ,but after two lots went missing I had to call a halt to it.
Trouble is with Ebay on the buyers side all the time sellers are always the losers.
Brian
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08:17:43pm
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
My ebay experiences have been almost perfect in over 2000 transactions. I was warned by a fellow collector in Sri Lanka that mails does get reviewed (postal authority??) and things can easily go missing. It is a shame, because I believe there many honest people in places where, shall we say, the administrations in charge are not held accountable.
I think if you send low value merchandise, you stand a better chance of getting it through. If not, you didn;t lose much, but it is frustrating for traders.
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
When I sell on eBay, most of my offerings are stamps from Denmark, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. Since a full 80-85% of the winning bids (and almost 100% of items over US $25.00) come from those countries, there's NO WAY I could refuse to ship outside the US (where I live).
My eBay account is almost 15 years old, and I have had maybe 2-3 losses in some 2500-odd transactions... going primarily to these countries.
KG5, I'm not discounting your experience, and perhaps I'd think differently, if 95% of my sales were domestic.
~Peter
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
I mentioned this thread to my son. He's not a collector, but he's certainly a thinker. He sees the fact that mail is obviously no longer as secure as it was in the relatively recent past (depending on its origin and destination) as a sign of regression in international relations on both the large scale and the small.
Several years ago I read a book by Eric Hobsbawm titled The Age of Extremes: The Short Twentieth Century, 1914–1991. He characterized pretty much every global event of the 20th Century as a disaster. From the First World War onwards, he wrote, there were no winners of any war, only losers. And those wars, he argued, retarded progress in all areas of social and economic progress. I can't help but agree.
The Second World War brought about the end of political imperialism for the most part; while I would never tout imperialism as a good thing, has hardly been replaced by anything better. Communism failed, but it would be hard to argue that what replaced it has worked very well. Capitalism may have improved the lives of many people, and individual political freedoms may be greater for many people as well, but the lives of countless millions of others are demonstrably worse in all areas than the lives of their grandparents, and it's not because they don't have iPhones.
One of the things that has always appealed to me about stamp collecting is that stamps (and postal history) reflect their historical contexts in ways that few other artifacts achieve. The problems that stamp dealers are now having in the international marketplace is simply another lesson offered by our hobby.
Bob
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Dear Bob,
Although your main point about wars being a negative influence on many area that touch our lives is absolutely correct, it could be argued that advances in science, medicine and communication have all increased precisely because of war. Or am I missing something here?
Dan C.
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Maybe I can contextualize this a little bit.
My grandmother kept in touch with her family in Latvia after fleeing the country during the war. She always sent a few dollars for birthdays and Christmas to her family to help them along in a very crappy state-controlled monopoly. Officially, the Soviet rouble was worth more than a Canadian Dollar. Unofficially, on the black market, one dollar got you 100 roubles. In a country where my electrical engineer cousin made about 500 roubles a month, $20 translated into 2000 roubles on the black market. Mail theft was always a problem. It wasn't triggered by anything more than a Canadian stamp on the envelope. It got to the point where we sent our Christmas money in October, just to avoid the rampant theft around Christmas; or we would send mail to one relative, to pass cards on to others because we knew her postal carrier wasn't stealing mail. It's better in an independent Latvia; but old habits die hard. One cousin of mine gets all of her cards sent to another cousin because the ones sent to her home address usually don't make it there.
Sometimes the temptation to feed your family or make a buck/rouble/rupee off your neighbour is just to great a temptation for a mere mortal, stuck in a horrible economic system, is just too much to resist. I'm not saying it is right by any means; but the reality of the world's weaker economies is something we shouldn't ignore.
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06:52:22am
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Hi Just thought I would add my twopenneth from across the pond.
I have been selling for some time as a private seller (1200+ feedback) in eBay and besides selling to most parts of the world, the only time I have a problem was in an item sent to a fellow Brit. Seems on that particular item that the GB mail service failed miserably - maybe because it was a higher priced item. Have tried listing in SOR with a little success but think postal prices have perhaps kept members from bidding on my items so I tend to stick to eBay.
I have bought regularly in eBay from Europe, Australia, Canada and Malaysia and had no problems with non delivery - in fact I have just had a five day turnaround of stamps from Canada. I also have sold/bought with Italian customers and have not had any instances of non-receipt, maybe more good luck than judgement. Cannot comment on other countries as I have not tempted anyone with goodies for them.
I purchase on a monthly basis from one SOR member and in all the time we have been carrying out these transactions have never had a problem in items not being delivered.
Can I just ask that maybe those who have had bad experiences keep offering buying oportunities and that they don't take it out on us living across the various oceans that keep us apart. Especially in SOR as in my humble opinion it would be against the ethos of SOR
This is not meant to offend and apologies in advance to anyone who takes this the wrong way - these are just the thoughts of a humble Brit
Best regards to all SOR members and thanks to all involved with the new look Discussion board - its great.
Stuart
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Stuart! A humble Brit? I think not. Remember lad the world owes us Brits for all that's good,such as income tax, nuclear testing in Australia and Kylie Minogue.
Remember you are British and be proud mate.
Tim2...... Not to be confused with that other fella who isn't British and therefore not eligible
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Ughhh...Kylie Minogue....now THAT was a plot! HAD to be!
Randy
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Tim, in your list of the many fine things that you English have graciously given the world, you forgot to mention "Toad in the Hole". :-)
Tim.
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
some will explain this gift, right?
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
David, perchance it is Wizard speak? What think ye?
Dan C.
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Nothing that mysterious...
It's sausages or leftover stewing beef baked in Yorkshire pudding. Comfort food, right Tim?
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Ah, comfort food. That makes me feel better.
I thought it an ingenious enema, but worried about the warts...
...and pitied the toad
David
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The past is a foreign country, they do things different there.
12 Feb 2012
10:42:40pm
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Food-Consuming members:
...and finish your fine dining with spotted dick or flan.
John Derry
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Hi Andrew,
So "toad in the hole" reached Canada then?
Regards ... Tim.
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11:46:52am
re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
Sorry but got to be Syrup sponge and custard for afters :-)
Alternatively if syrup sponge off the menu then a close second is sticky toffee pudding - yummeee
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re: Anecdotal information about stamp dealers
All I can say is "Thank God for the Duke of York Pub in Toronto." It is the UofT's alternate evening campus. I still go there today (after graduating in 1989), although their pub fare has become way too modern day British - curries and the like. That does NOT mix with Smithwicks, Strongbow or Guiness, let me tell you... LOL. I was there last Wednesday (through early Thursday morning) and had a fresh made lamb burger on a bun with mint sauce. It is a place where everyone knows my name (at leastr Sammy the Manager does...).
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