Exposing A Dishonest Seller And Having Trouble.

I know this is about an ancient coin lot but the primary focus happens to be around ebay.
Therefore, I've moved it to the more appropriate forum.

The thing with ebay is they dont police fair market value. As long as the description isn't stating lies like claiming the coin is a Marc Antony one when it clearly isn't or he isn't shill bidding up with how auctions they wont really intervene unless its fake. If people want to bid something up and overpay for something ebay wont get in the way.

His over exaggeration descriptions painting a picture of the coin being used at the Colloseium before being buried by soldiers while irrelevant doesn't really seem to be against any rules. You can keep an eye on his listings and make sure he doesn't start stating flat out lies or claiming coins are something they arent and report them for being improperly categorized or listed more than once, but other than that theres not a lot you can do about it on ebay.

As far as he goes you could say something to him if its really bothering you which is probably your best chance of impacting how he lists. Other than that you can cut him off from selling him more coins so you at least arent contributing to something you disagree with.

thanks for the link basebal21 - those really helpful pages on ebay are always difficult to find. and he will definitely not receive any further bulk coins from me :)
jdmern - have you reported it to ebay? if so, have they done anything?

impadamvs- While I think the seller breaking the coin out and describing it as being of a higher grade to be unethical, that is not fraud... As dave pointed out, it is the buyer who decides the final price, or in this case, decides whether to 'buy it now'. On a regular basis, I see a lot more clear cut cases that come closer to fraud than simply breaking out a nice looking details coin and selling it raw

I do not think that anyone is trying to excuse sleazy practices and many here have reported fraudulent listings. The problem lies with those who are uneducated AND do not take the time to GET educated. While I feel for them, they are part of the problem because the sleaze would not have a business model without them. The best we can do is educate, report where appropriate and move on. And for those who ARE sleazy, karma is a...well you know.

Superdave, you couldn't have put it better. Along the same lines, I'll be the first one to admit that one of my favorite coins in my collection I purchased as a slabbed details coin that had beautiful toning. I've looked at this coin under all kinds of magnification and can't for the life of me imagine how it was graded as cleaned. At the same time, I've purchased coins slabbed that once I received in hand, could tell they should have been graded as details. Even though I know that, would it then be unethical for me to NOT break them out?

Fraud = acting with or having the intent to deceive.

Just because it doesn't violate a specific ebay policy does not mean it isn't fraudulent - even legally!

Cracking a slab, then upgrading the grading and failing to mention it was deemed cleaned by a TPG. If that isn't fraud then what is? I don't care that TPG's aren't always accurate, there is no doubt what this re-seller is doing and it is selling using deceit and lies.

Dismissing these &^%$-buckets by claiming it is the victims fault is what I object to. Everyone enters into a market they aren't 100% sure of at times in their life - that just is part of living. Being preyed upon in it and unethical dealing in it - no matter if it is cars, coins, cab rides, flowers, whatever, is not excusable by always saying "they should have known better"! Nope, they shouldn't have been "taken" and the unethical should not be deceiving them with fraudulent practices. You may think you are above it in coin dealings, but others shouldn't be taken either. Kids, newbies, elderly should not be victimized just because of their inexperience. Excusing away unethical sellers in any context is bad, IMO!

Can't imagine I'd ever buy a coin I thought overgraded or cleaned - that wasn't labelled as such, but if NGC or PCGS certified it I don't know that I'd have a reason to crack it. I wouldn't expect top dollar, for the grade designated, if I tried to sell it. I don't think my opinion overrides theirs, IOW. With regards to cleaning at least. Grading - I have seen plenty I think they have overgraded and undergraded, but the truth is that cracking a slab ( that cost to be graded ) typically loses "honest" value on any coin so I wouldn't do that anyway.

But I don't think that is a good comparison/question if trying to measure ones level of honesty. Those that crack slabs to UP the grade and hide that it was deemed cleaned by a TPgrading company are sleazebags looking to steal from others. There is just no other way to look at that situation. If they simply disagreed with the grade they should have re-submitted it. But that would be the honest way to go and cost them money - as it would likely come back the same again. So they crack it, up the grade in their ad and don't mention the cleaning issue when trying to sell it as something they KNOW it isn't. The people that do this aren't "looking for undergraded coins to re-sell", they are looking for suckers and victims to cheat, period!