We had a member here refuse to take back a card that was outed as altered even though the buyer offered to return it in the same slab he purchased it in. It happens.

They buyer bought a GAI graded card at a discount due to the GAI holder. However, it WAS graded. Now the card is NOT in the graded holder and the seller is losing out on thousands. I'm sorry, but once the buyer cracked it out, it is his. This opens up a whole new can of worms. I would be leery of selling ANY graded card on Ebay if the outcome stands.

Exactly. And here is my opinion before my rant below. "Buyer Beware" became "Buyers Remorse"; he took a gamble and lost, and now he wants his money back after altering of the purchase. The seller is not Costco or Home Depot, where you can return almost anything.

Not sure how you can determine intent of the seller was to sell an altered card, or sell a GAI graded card.

And we all are assuming that GAI is incorrect and PSA is correct. Maybe the opposite is true. Not saying it is, I am simply taking a contrarian approach. Forgive me, but I may have read somewhere on this site about the odd mistake PSA makes.

Finally, I have to say a lot of what is going on here frustrates me about some people on this site.

A new guy with 21 previous posts comes on here, tells his story about how the product he sold that was returned altered, and in certainly less valuable state. He is reaching out to see if he is nuts, or what should be the protocol. Regardless of the holder, he sold a product.

What he gets back is (ballpark) 50% understanding him, and 50% accusing him of trying to pull a fast one. The truth is we truly don't know what his motives are, and we truly don't know what the buyers motives are (myself included). It's all conjecture. Then, after being grilled, as a new poster he is trying to play by the rules and is unsure whether he should post the buyers eBay ID. He gets crucified for that too, like he's hiding something.

Frankly some of the replies from the conspiracy theorists to the newbie are shameful. Likely nobody knows this guy at all, yet yet many of us are incredibly judgmental. If I were in his position, I'd probably go radio silent too, and not read or post here again.

I'll probably get crucified too for this post, but I am OK with my position. I'm old and comfortable with that.

So, does this mean that all the buyers of cards in PRO slabs can return them because a TPG determined that they were altered?

Question 1:Why would any card be in a GAI holder? Never really legit.

Question 2: Why would you ever try to sell a high value card in anything but PSA or SGC?

It was clearly already sent to PSA for a cross over, and failed.

I do not blame the buyer for returning it. It was known to be trimmed.

Just my two cents.

The seller is not losing out on thousands because it isn't in a GAI holder. He likely lost thousands when he, himself was duped when purchasing that doctored card in the first place.

And for the record, I do not blame the seller at all - I doubt he was the card doctor or the original submitter to GAI. He was probably the original victim here.


Suppose I sell you an unopened pack of 1962 Topps baseball cards that I bought at a show years ago and believe to be authentic. You open the pack for one of those YouTube videos, and discover that there are 5 cards in the pack, but they are all from different series (which would be impossible for a genuine unopened pack.)

Are you saying you have no recourse? If you come to me for a refund, can I just say, "Well, in order for you to have uncovered the deception, you had to open them, and now that they are open, the deception is not relevant, because it is no longer an unopened pack."

I'm relatively a newbie too and I'm with the seller on this one. He sold a GAI holdered card and did not get the same in return, period. A full refund is not warranted. There is always some risk to the buyer of buying any holdered card (buy the card not the holder, right?) but especially more risk with a holdered card graded from a defunct TPG like GAI. If the buyer did not like the slabbed card which you can see both sides of clearly and returned it intact then a full refund would be appropriate all day long.

I do think the seller should have shared the ebay name of this alleged scammer so that other sellers can be protected.

Regarding PWCC... No one should yet put toolifedave, the seller, in the same boat as PWCC at all. Not even close. Do we have proof that toolifedave knew his GAI Gehrig card was altered? The magnitude of known and suspected card alterations is in a different universe. There have been many posts on Net 54 and Blowout that illustrate the alleged collusion and alignment by PWCC with alleged card bleachers/trimmers like Moser of buying, cosigning, selling, re-buying, re-cosigning, submitting, manipulating/shilling and reselling of doctored cards to make huge bucks off of unsuspecting, trusting collectors and it still seems to be going on today and everyday as shared here and on Blowout. Thanks for the opportunity to rant. :D
B0b Zw.e.ng

Actually, not true, I Still have a few hundred GAI slabs from the early days, that I personally submitted. Why haven't I reviewed them? Cost for me is the major reason.

Look Closely... i answered your questions!

Dankz fir the 2 Pennies ~

First let me be clear I agree that the seller had every right to return the card.
If the card had graded 1 at PSA and was not altered then I would side with the seller. The key here is the card has been altered.
Let's say this was a slabbed Autograph in the $5,000.00 range like a Mathewson cut. And was in a JSA slab and sold on Ebay or in any Auction. Then buyer decides he would rather have a PSA slab sends it in he might even have a PSA auction letter. When it arrives it looks good so they crack it and then under a fold they notice a watermark or a copyright that dates it to 1930. Now PSA knows the item is NG and sends it back. Is the buyer stuck with purchase because the case was cracked? No of course not Alterd cards and counterfeit autos are fraudulent items. And buyers should not be expected to accept them.

Yeah talk about a Catch 22. You can return the watch if it's defective, as long as you haven't taken it out of the original packaging and used it.

Here's where I stand, if you believe that the seller knew the card was altered because it was in a GAI graded slab, then the buyer should have also known that it was altered when he choose to purchase it in the GAI graded slab and therefore should never have purchased in the first place.

Unless the seller specifically gives you their opinion of the card, when you buy a card in any slab, whether it is PSA, SGC, GAI, PRO, GEM, or Bob's Backyard Butcher shop, you are buying the card with that authenticator's opinion. The seller is under no obligation to trust one authenticator over another. While no one else may agree, the seller may trust PRO/GAI/GEM/BOB's over PSA/SGC. By cracking the card out and returning it, the buyer has now forced their preference of authenticator on the seller and the seller can no longer sell the card as they originally did.

If the card would have crossed as a PSA 7, would the buyer have sent the seller 5K in appreciation? Certainly not, I’m in the camp you crack it out it’s yours! Nothing to lose only gain. Total 100% BS!

Same result if you open a wax pack?

to me common sense suggests
 

it was all on the buyer once he cracked it out. As was mentioned you buy the card as guaranteed by the grading company when slabbed. Additionally I believe the case and card were deemed authentic and unaltered so even stretching the argument out a little - ostensibly only the grade is subjective. The buyer altered a part of the original item.

If it's graded by GAI, evidently so.


Jeremy W@goner.

What if the card would have come back as a counterfeit , would you guys still be on the sellers side ?

This guy was basically buying a lottery ticket hoping it would pay off. He paid what a PSA 5 of that card would normally cost, and hoped to get it into a PSA 7 holder making a quick three grand. When that didn't happen he wanted his money back. Sorry, but the gamble didn't pay off. Except in this case the loser is the guy that sold him the ticket!

The altered ticket.

Sounds like the majority in this discussion believe if an altered card can fool a TPG and receive a number then anyone who buys it is stuck without recourse. I would have hoped everyone would support the buyer's right to have a refund should an "outed" card be identified and returned.

i agree. Otherwise basically a buyer is saying he will only buy it if the card will sell more for what he bought for it. no free lunch

Oh, they do, if it's an unpopular seller.

Since GAI is out of business, what about if it was in GTX or whatever holder. Can you break that one out

I don't know the OP and have had no interaction with him that I am aware of, but come on!! The guy in question buys the card (obviously looking to flip it for a big profit) and fails in his come to God, crack-out moment and the OP is supposed to be responsible for the return?? The card isn't in the same state it was in when it was sold. Plus, everyone knows GAI isn't a very (if at all) viable grading company. The fact it's in that holder to begin with tells most of us all we need to know.

If I was the potential buyer, I would've asked the seller two things:
1. Why isn't the card in a PSA/SGC/BVG holder?
2. If I crack it out and it's found to be fake or altered, will you offer me a return?

The actual buyer, as far as we know, didn't hedge his bets at all. He probably just saw dollar signs and went for it, knowing he was able to do so because of ebay's SOP.

How do you know it's altered? Because PSA says so? Yeah, they're pretty good at determining that.

So why is it supposedly such a huge loss to the seller, that his card is no longer in that GAI holder?

Because it was sold IN the holder. Now it's OUT of said holder. People can disagree about GAI all they want, but it's beside the point. The card status has changed between the sale and the return.

This is what I don't understand. If the holder is essentially worthless, because nobody values a GAI grade, why is no longer having the card in the worthless holder a great loss? It makes no logical sense.

Does intent always matter?
 

Card is in an old PSA 7 slab but seller knows it’s over graded. Buyer cracks and submits to SGC and it comes back a 5. Is that worthy of a return? I still think if you crack it out you own it unless it comes to light that the seller altered the card or purposely enhanced the card.

In the PWCC example didn’t they accept consignments from known fraudsters and card doctors? To me this is apples and oranges.

This is a big point. What's to stop people from attempting this?

I can't believe people really think it's OK to break a card out of a holder and try to return it. I get it, it's a GAI holder but this is crazy. Buyer should have attempted a cross over IN THE HOLDER. If they didn't want any bias, then that's a risk THEY take by removing it, period.

Next up will be people cracking out PSA/SGC cards and attempting returns because the card graded ALT/AUTH.

The only value that GAI holder had was the misinformation on it, which could've been used to foist a doctored card onto the next unsuspecting buyer.

In other words, the only value it could have had in round 2 was to deceive. So the seller has now been deprived of any ability to overrepresent the card (not that he did the first time, I will assume he was innocent). I'm not sure I feel badly about that.

A guy with over 11k feedback is unsuspecting?????


Wow just wow.

Dean B, Thank you and you get it

You think a buyer who suspects the card is doctored is going to spend $5k on it?

Wow, just wow.

He took a gamble on the card so he could triple his money. It didn’t work out in his favor. So did he suspect it? Maybe not. Did he think it was a gamble worth taking??? I vote yes.

Now let's examine it from the seller's POV. If the seller thought he had an unaltered NM card, why didn't he try to get it into an SGC or PSA holder? I would ask Dave directly, but I've already done so multiple times.

I can’t answer for Dave but would a satisfactory answer be - he bought the card a long time ago and later it was revealed that GAI graded cards have issues. Instead of taking the gamble he’ll auction it off as is even if it might be worth 3X the value in another holder. The new buyer doesn’t mind the gamble and drops $5K on the card. The gamble doesn’t pay off.

If the card crosses at a PSA 7 Dave isn’t going to get more money from the buyer. And I’m sure this happens with GAI cards. They aren’t all bad but they come with inherent risk. I’d assume someone with 11k feedback would know this. So like others have said this opens up a can of worms for every GAI card that is sold. It’s a free gamble for a buyer.

Plus this point as well - with the 100’s of high end cards coming up altered from PSA what makes them the end all be all authority on altered cards?

To me all the conjecture is beside the point. The buyer (by all circumstantial evidence an educated one if you insist on some conjecture!) bought a card from a TPG of ill-repute. For no reason other than hoping to hide information from a different TPG he cracked the card before submitting it. There is NO NEED to crack a card for cross-over and by doing so he has, in my opinion, violated any good faith bargaining position with the seller. He takes advantage of ebay's insanely liberal return policy and returns an item that is materially different from the one he received.

If the ONLY way to cross something over was to crack it I might feel differently. For the people comparing this situation to PWCC where they were active participants in massive fraud, I don't see it without some more damning evidence than what we have so far.

I have bought GAI First Graded cards to flip. I will concede Peter's point that I bought them to resubmit and I have a GAI first graded T206 in my possession right now that isn't going for cross-over because there's no way it's not trimmed. Ethically I don't feel right passing the card along even WITH disclosure, but legally I can't imagine someone being able to make a material change to a piece of property and then being allowed to return it with the seller forced to refund. I can't think of a great analogy because I can't think of any other type of sale where this would be an option!

So -- you sell me a wax pack already authenticated. It looks OK from the outside. I open it and it's an obvious fake, as in Mark's hypo. No return?

If I thought a GAI 7 Gehrig was legit and fairly graded, and it was worth 3x in a PSA or SGC holder, it's a no brainer I would take the gamble. It's not rational to leave that much money on the table.

Unless you can prove I am a bad actor I don't think you can make a material change to the item. Again if someone comes up with a smoking gun that puts the seller into a similar category as PWCC then that's a different story.

Plus, how do we prove it was a fake? Take your word for it that the cards were mixed series? Then you merrily return a bunch of NM commons that you had laying around while grading the Mantle you ACTUALLY pulled.

Again there's a difference between legal and ethical here, but I feel the buyer acted unethically as well since again (and again, and again) there is no need to crack a card to get a new grade. He did it only for a perceived advantage knowing full well the risk he was taking, or actually NOT taking since Ebay says "hey, whatever you want Mr. Buyer.

What's your legal opinion on the situation Peter?

Would you crack it?

If I believed in it yes; I think the chances of PSA or SGC crossing a GAI graded card in a slab are probably not good just on principle.

You're fighting the hypothetical by injecting too many externalities. Let's just assume I could prove to your satisfaction the pack was fake. Or you were there when I opened it.

Maybe externalities, but I'm trying to keep it apples to apples. If I am there when you open it, ostensibly you are doing it with my blessing. The OP never was consulted before the card was cracked.

The other fundamental difference in the scenarios is that you almost HAVE to open the pack to find out it's no good (yes I know there are other ways to check a wax pack but a good resealer knows how to re-create them) this card DIDN'T HAVE TO BE CRACKED! Or had I mentioned that already?

For the record I have crossed cards in other company holders, as have others who have actually reported their results in threads on Net54. I tend to do about as well predicting the grades as I do with raw cards which is generally fairly well.

Oh, and you are ignoring a lot of my post :)

well
 

I subbed about 100 cards to GAI a little after they started - mostly N28 and N29 cards as well as a few cigarette packs. Quite a few were first graded. I believe that most (if not all but??) were clean and unaltered as at the time I was wary of things being done to cards (I actually was at a show once and SAW someone using a SISSOR on a card) so I looked quite closely for rolled edges coloring etc.. Not every GAI card is suspect BUT it's on the buyer if he ALTERS what was a card in a holder into what is now a card and a holder. Forget his intentions or if he knew anything about GAI or PSA or SGC or whomever - don't believe relevance.

I sold and/or cracked EVERY ONE OUT before AND after they didn't open "Monday".

In a world where TPGs acted in good faith they WOULD have to crack a card out of a holder to be sure they could cross it. There is no way they can adequately assess the edges of most cards through the slab, in my opinion.

1- it’s not OK on general principle to crack a card, submit for regrading and return when the card is “A”, or is not the grade the submitter wants. No honest person disputes this.
2- it’s not OK to sell a card in an inferior holder that has been rejected from other grading services as not being a number grade, without disclosing as much in the sale. No honest person disputes this.

The OP is only one they knows if #2 is true, to me it seems pretty obvious. If so, I’d suggest recognizing the karma in play. Reach out to the buyer and negotiate a reasonable purchase price based on a “A” grade. Many of the previous posts illustrate the reasons why he should want to put and end to this, as should the OP.

If the OP and buyer are both a bit unhappy with the result then that’s probably the best result.