Thatās nuts. Even if you hate cgc the arbitrage opportunity is excellent
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Like PFM mentioned, what I find ridiculous about your upcharges, @kinggr , is the lack of consistency. There are plenty of cards in your sub that might justify an upcharge (the Charizard star, Mew star, Crystal Lugia to name a few) but they only targeted the obvious ones, like the Dark Charizardāwhich amounted to almost half of the new amount alone. Iām seriously not at all a fan of this new system and find the ethics pretty troubling
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I agree, as I stated in my original post, I stated concern that the entire sub would be upcharged. I consider myself lucky with the way PSA handled my submission. The inconsistency is definitely a problem PSA needs to address for company objectives. They need tighter tolerances so to speak, to eliminate the consumerās guessing game.
That being said, the consumers, us find this as a loophole and take advantage of it. I graded my FRLG Charizard for a mere $7.50 because of PSAās lack of consistency. It goes both ways.
I was recently upcharged for ~7 cards out of a 12 card submission, so it does seem like PSA is ramping up on their efforts here (I was previously only upcharged once out of 1000+ cards submitted). Iām not looking forward to how much Iāll be paying in upcharge fees in the future.
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Welp. I submitted 113 cards last month. My first ever submission. And it has the very obvious shadowlesss zard, toise and saur that will get flagged. And once something is flagged I guess theyāll look at the sub more closely and upcharge a bunch of things. Iām just dreading thinking the amount of upcharge Iāll have to pay and on how many cards
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Iām ok with different tiers based on value but it should be a maximum of like 3 levels. Maybe $1-999 then $1000-$9999 and $10,000+.
Not a fan of PSA nickel and diming their customers because their card is a few hundred more than declared when they have no clue what grade theyāre going to get. Thereās currently massive delays. That should be the priority not upcharging people.
I sent 55 cards bulk. Iāll update you guys in 6 months or however long it takes what my up charges look like.
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What raw chancey card costs $23k???
Maybe it was signed by Princess Diana.
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It was this Chansey, a 1-of-1 original art trophy.
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People should pay what the card is worth at the time of submission. I was told to submit at $10 each for bulk. I paid $75 for 2 cards, $50 for another 2 cards before the price hike. I got the cards back almost immediately and other 2 back in 2 weeks. It was worth it because I didnāt have to wait one year (honestly would have killed my interest quite a bit). Funny thing is after the grades came back the cards I paid $50 each for are worth more than the $75 ones.
At the time I paid for about 43 cards worth over $100 each at $20 each. Now in a recent submission - I had to pay I believe $50 for the same type of submission per card because they are worth over $200.
So you can end up with a loss for a poor card (which can happen) and now they want 25% charge on a card technically worth $200.
I think this helps for more serious collectors as people have been spamming the system paying $10 for each card. It will make people think twice because at $50 a card the price adds up quite a bit.
The type of cards people are submitting seem to be all worth more than $200 each. Looking at youtube, these people seem to submitting at least 50 cards (3rd party grading services). Many of them potentially worth over $1,000 which is now priced at $75. Next thing you know the bill is $3,000. This should clear the system quite a bit in the future along with their added facilities.
Iām not on psa side. I think itās unfair to all of us to hit us with the upcharge but like it or not they are the āgo toā grading company.
But I see it as paying taxesā¦the more taxes you pay itās because you are making more money.
I have a psa graded 6 first Ed charizard the will easily after reviewed will make the next grade (7)ā¦psa 6 is 13800ā¦psa 7 is 35000. I donāt know how much the upcharge will be but even if itās 5000ā¦ I may be silly Iāll be happy to pay it. Maybe Iām missing something if so please correct me. Also I sent my 15 vouchers to grade my first Ed holosā¦ they hit me with 8 extra charges because 8 of them hit psa 9 including Blastoise and venusaur. I couldnāt pay them fast enoughā¦best thing about this: my vouchers were not used and
Im using those vouchers to grade more cardsā¦free of chargeā¦maybe im looking at it wrong. But overcharge to me means your cards are worth a lot more than you thought.
Hate to pay it but Iāll get even when later I sell my cards.
Iām not flipping Iām grading and will hold on to my cards for a few years.
The overcharged me hundreds but the value of the cards went up thousandsā¦specially venusaur and Blastoise.
Not being antagonistā¦just making a positive comment.
Thank you
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No one likes taxes, especially unnecessary made up ones.
UPcharge is so wrong in this case.
They offer a service which is grading and putting it in a plastic cover.
That job is the same for a 1 dollar card as for a 1000 dollar card.
Perhaps a few dollars for insurance but that should be it.
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And if you canāt afford a huge up charge?
Itās like forcing you to sell your house so you can pay your taxes.
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Yep, thatās exactly my problem with it.
Hard to justify spending thousands in upcharges to grade childhood cards that you have no intention of selling. I think people forget that cards are put into slabs for all sorts of reasons (beyond just monetary) and I feel like this concept has been completely lost these days.
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Charging $500 to grade a dark charizard, when I graded the very same card for $7.50 last year, the card hasnt got any harder to grade in that year, they havnt had to change anything in their system of grading, nothing has changed.
That card I have kept for my collection as it was my card, If I did it now I couldnāt warrant paying that to put my card in a plastic case, simply unless It was for selling.
They have just created a tax. If there was a change in shipping insurance because the card is now valued more, sure that makes sense. Or if they somehow proved the higher the value the more care they took with it.
If you take a sports car for a valet, they will likely charge a little more for handling it than a ford fiesta as they actually have to do things differently.
It also just drives forward the rocketing value in pokemon cards, If I wanted to have a descent personal collection graded with these types of cards, it could now costs $5000-$10000. It literally only becomes okay if you say, yes but I can factor that into the price when I sell them straight away.
I know collectors markets tend to require people with money, and yes I can afford to be involved with these cards but to someone wanting to dabble with getting into grading with psa, maybe they have some nice cards, I would be massively put off by the possibility of such a tax. I think Ive heard everyone say oh I dont mind paying that $300 upcharge is simply because they plan on flipping it for more money.
Its like adding micro transactions into a game, money, money, money but destroys the game in the process and still cant provide a service.
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I could have missed the answer in a previous post but Iām curious what happens if you refuse to pay the up charge? Or worse, actually canāt afford to pay it at the time? Are they threatening to keep your cards? How long? Is that even legal? I donāt believe itās ethical but thatās a separate question.
Anyone submitting in order to simply grade their collection and has no intent to sell could possibly be put into a pretty big bind. I imagine that could get emotional pretty quick.
I think a better alternative is for them to refuse to increase the insurance level above the originally submitted service level maximums and then send your cards to you and call it good. Itās not like they used the manpower and logistics to run the cards in question through at a higher service level in anticipation of an up charge. They did the lower level service, took the longer timeframe to complete it, and simply have the final shipping left to do. I believe the upcharge should be optional to receive the higher insurance and coverage during return shipping. If the person submitting has the means to and desires to then they will pay the upcharge and get the cards insured. If they cannot or choose not to, then the cards are shipped back with only the original level max values for insurance and the submitter signs acceptance of the risk.
I just donāt understand how they can charge for a service they did not actually do.
Yes, I understand it to be a deterrent for people submitting high value items in bulk. I do not agree with that concept either but I canāt wrap my head around why they would care as long as they are paid appropriately in the beginning for the service level that they execute and that they are absolved of any liability above that which the submitter chose to pay for in the first place.
Maybe Iām missing something or reading into it incorrectly. Iāve been wrong a time or two in my lifeā¦
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Besides shipping insurance, I can think of one other justification for PSA upcharging. They supposedly have a policy of correcting for their own mistakes with financial compensation.
For example, suppose they grade a card PSA 10, which puts it at a value of $1000. Letās say the submitter paid only $10 to have this card graded at a slow bulk service level. There was no upcharge. Now suppose 5 years later someone buys the card from this person. The card went up in value, so the new owner pays $5000 to get it. They notice that the card has a small dent in it which is barely perceptible. Nonetheless, by PSAās own standards the card deserves a PSA 6. So the new owner sends the card to PSA for review. PSA acknowledges their mistake (they missed the dent) and they bump the grade down to PSA 6. For this example letās say at this point (5 years after the card was first graded by PSA) a PSA 6 is worth $1000. Technically PSA ought to compensate the new owner and pay them the difference between the PSA 6 and 10 values: $4000. From what Iāve heard, PSA tends to avoid doing so, theyāll try to pay far less. Still, even if they somehow only paid $400 for their mistake, thatās still way more than the $10 paid for the initial grading!
So that might be part of why they are upcharging. Itās an insurance against their own mistakes, which they can and do make. However, this only justifies the concept of upcharging, not the actual amounts. Should they really be charging as much as they are? Probably not, but they know they can get away with it, and they are a business, and thatās unfortunately all that matters.
I 100% agree with what you all have been saying in this threadā¦ Here are my thoughts:
1-Itās unfair that they up-charge you AFTER a service that youāve already paid BASED ON CURRENT MARKET VALUE (which you didnāt even know at the time of submitting***). As others have pointed out, maybe, at the time of receiving the up-charge, your economy has changed and you cannot afford to pay this extra fee. ESPECIALLY when there are such long delays from what Iāve heard (8 months? Ok, what could happen in 8 monthsā¦? A GLOBAL PANDEMIC MAYBE? Oh! But I have to pay for a service that I thought that I already had paid, of course).
2-This policy is adding a third dimension to the hobby when talking about investing long term. If I grade my cards when their value has dropped, Iāll spend less on the grading costs. Therefore, I can then wait for the prices to go up again and, voilĆ , Iāve made much more money than I would have if I had graded them at any other time. So now, basically, you donāt only need to worry about the price of your cards over time, but also the cost of grading, which would fluctuate with the market and makes no sense to me.
3-PSA or any grading company should be an OBJECTIVE independent third-party authenticator. Youāre not paying for ANY grade in particular. Youāre paying for the service of authentication, grading (whichever the result) and protection with the slab. The service should be independent from the grade, as youāre not paying for them to write the grade you want. Iām sorry, but if they need more money because of insurance with shipping (Iāve read that argument in some posts), they should rethink their business model. Maybe their service should be a little higher to be able to hire insurance. Since they are the most established grading company, I think people would understand this as they receive most of the high-end items. But charging you after the service based on market value? Absolutely no.
4-This up-charge ālogicā is very closely linked to the idea that "having your card encased in a PSA slab adds your card value, so you should be HAPPY to pay more for your pristine 10)ā¦ Well, not everyone in the hobby is trying to sell anything. There are some people that are only here to collect the cards they enjoy. How are those people going to justify that extra money spent to grade their cards? I myself was considering grading for the authentication part of the service. I only wanted to have my cards certified that they are official, that was all.
5-Finally, Iād like to share my thoughts on the increases of prices in relation to PSA up-charges. I think that this factor is usually overlooked when talking about the current market. Iāve read and heard on multiple sources that one of the BIG reasons for this increase are Logan Paul, Gary Vee, etc. And Iām sorry, but I actually think that the up-charges in PSA are far more influential in the market today than those influencers. If I know that a raw card is going to have such high hidden costs (PSA service and/or middleman + up-charges + potentially import taxes in the case of international collectors such as my case), I automatically become more willing to spend a few extra bucks on a PSA card on ebay that is already graded, than buying that raw card.
So I see four solutions here:
1-PSA operates as other grading companies and thatās the end of this nonsense.
2-PSA reviews their business model and raises their prices for the service in order to assure that they can hire shipping insurance.
3-People grade with other companies.
4-People go back to binders and toploaders, which seems the option Iām going to choose for the moment.
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Disappointing that they arenāt honouring the value at the time of submission, especially since the longer they take the more they can charge us. Since I done it 3rd party from the UK I guess I have no way to argue it.
Seems like an inefficient and slightly greedy system that needs simplified for everyoneās benefit. Looking at the net value from a financial perspective it is better to pay $75 to have a card that is now worth $1k than to pay $7.50 to have one that is worth $100, but from a collecting perspective not good at all.
I sent in 179 cards with lots of duplicates so my solution will just be to sell off some of them to pay for the extra fees. Grading cards is still like printing money, but I wonder how it will affect the margin in 6-12 months time when hundreds of thousands of submissions are back with many going on the market
1 Like