I have mentioned before that dealers or antique dealers rarely have a real grasp of coinage and a particularly irritating idiot from the USA typifies the breed. At the time of writing - December 2008 - feast your eyes upon the many delights of item 260329469960. I have chosen two of his pictures but the listing is full of so many pictures, most of which are nothing to do with his coin, that I can only hope I have picked the correct two.
The seller, barely literate, has first chosen to hotlink to pictures from Cruzi's Coins's web site, presumably to mislead potential bidders into believing that she actually knows about sovereigns. Of course, this hotlinking is in breach of eBay's rules and I have reported her for it and no doubt, Lawrence Chard will be pleased that he is not the victim of this behaviour, as is usually the case! All this information is irrelevant. Cruzi's Coins scuppered this by changing the images.
The seller has never sold a British coin, has sold a few cheap American coins and is more of a general dealer and yet is claiming that this ordinary sovereign is a proof. I won't burden you with my exchange of emails but her latest reply is hilarious:
"it seems you wouldnt know a proof from foorp. besides trying to make that determination from pictures is rediculas. as fart as heritage, i did. no laughing. and stuck up englishmen i can do without. go back to your stones lapy. b t w, i am british and when i say stuck up flutes like you, i know from whence i speak. b tw II...there are very little baseball cards in my feedbacks, it is mostly coins, vintage artifacts and antique furnature. b t w III, fact up before you accuse, the reverse is clearly proof as it was not 'abused' by life."
In 1911, as is the norm, most proofs were frosted on raised areas against a mirror-like field but a very small number, extremely rare, were matt proofs like the 1902. The briefest glance at this coin shows it can be neither though it may be an early strike from normal dies unless you are flashbacksportsmemories and have deluded yourself into believing that the coin can only be a proof. This seller comes with a public health warning and if you are one of the current bidders - 10 December 2008 - make sure that you bid no more than you might have done for a bullion coin in reasonable conditionand let's just hope that I have chosen the correcttwo pictures. Just so you know what it should look like, I have found these images - credit to The Coin Page - and have pointed this out to the seller.
Please do look at her listing and have a laugh in these rather austere times. Enjoy her rantings, savour the treatment that Cruzi's Coins has meted out. It is also nice to know that I am upsetting idiots like her and that I am "some nit wit (sic) British ...". The auction was ended early by her - she claimed that she sold the coin, which is probably a lie - and she threatened to send her cousine (sic) Simon to meet me, "who fills a doorway". Let's hope that you were not the buyer of this coin because when you discover that the coin is not a proof, you may get to meet Simon if you dare to ask for a refund. She has also sent me a racist email.
I have also received an alert from eBay who seemed to have been fooled into believing this creep had her account hijacked - looks like my reports to eBay have hit the target and she is lying to squirm out of it, how pathetic. It seems that they removed her original listing but she has bounced right back with 260331897649 which is the same listing with the same stupid claims. I strongly recommend that nobody should consider ever buying from flashbacksportsmemories.
Finally, on 30 December 2008, the listing was cancelled and her account was closed by eBay but now she is claiming that her account was hijacked - as if. Well, let's hope that that is the end of this moron!
By the way, this twerp is a member of the ENRB and what she describes as the coinage fraud detection board, but her ignorance and stubbornness bring the organisations into disrepute.
Better Quality Fakes!
Often fakes are so poor that they are unlikely to fool most people but occasionally they are rather better and item 150315425650 is a good example. This was originally listed as 150314491010 by the seller kingm1234. He bought it from dkm880 with a maiden bid of 99.99, well below bullion,as item 320322353483 and the fact that it is a fake seems only to have fooled kingm1234. dkm880 has categorically assured kingm that the coin is genuine but has rather limited experience according to his completed listings. The differences are most obvious on the reverse.
The differences are very subtle and come down to the position of the dragon's claws, the degree of wear on the coin which would otherwise have you believe that it is genuine, the horse's reins, etc. Unfortunately eBay dehggrades photos in these guides and it makes it harder to spot the differences but all these coins can be seen as live or completed listings on 11 December 2008. I am keeping these images on my computer in case somebody wishes to examine them in detail.
kingm1234 originally put this up as a normal listing with a low starting price and after my report to eBay, that listing was removed. Today, 11 December 2008, he has put the coin up again on as a 5-day listing on eBay, with a buy it now of 154.99, hiding the bidder's user ID, as item 150315425650.I have again reported this seller and have suggested that his account be suspended for a further breach of eBay rules. He claims to have reported me for malicious emails - good luck with that one! The coin failed to sell and the seller has told me that two coin chaps looked at the coin. On 20 December 2008, I find the same coin being sold on ebid but this time the seller admitted that on the previous day, a dealer had expressed concern about the coin and that he had sent it off for checking - or perhaps to confirm the bleeding obvious! As usual, eBay did not stop the auction.
I frequently contact sellers to point out errors and sometimes to point out fakes. The overwhelming majority are grateful for the help and advice and thankfully, these fools are the exception.
Sadly eBay are prone to act in support of some crooks and anyone looking for my fourth guide will find it missing, removed by eBay without telling me and anyone dealing with a lying seller in East Sussex would do well to contact me.
I am delighted to say that I now receive at least two or three emails from readers each week, asking for advice or just thanking me for the information. Please feel free to contact me on lapidary99 at hotmail.com if you feel that I may be able to help you or if you feel that you have a new horror story to tell me.
No comments:
Post a Comment