psa qualifiers??
 

Will someone please explain to me what the point of PSA qualifiers are? I have to admit that I'm not a huge fan of grading to start with. Other than the authentication of a card I believe there is to much subjectivity and opinion involved instead of a standard. With that said,how can a card be off center and still be a 9? It literally goes against the whole fabric grading is based on! Does anyone have any input on it?

$$$$
 

It is just another money maker for them. SGC and Beckett do not do quailifiers and I suspect someday that PSA will have a big announcement that they will not do qualifiers anymore and then all those folks who want a card without qualifiers will send them back to PSA and spend more money on the cards. Churn and burn.
Thats what the grading companies should be named!

A PSA 9 O/C is not really a 9. In their registry set, a card like this would count as a PSA 7. Typically they drop 2 grades due to a qualifier. Some don't mind them, some hate them. I typically ask for no qualifiers. In this case, if I had sent the PSA 9 O/C in and asked for no qualifiers, it would come back a straight PSA 7 (on a perfect day). If you have dealt with these companies long enough, there are not many "perfect days". Very arbitrary, very inconsistent, and quite frankly could care less what we think.

Peace, Mike

The point of qualifiers is to accurately describe a major problem with the card without forcing the grader to deduct full points for that flaw. Take a card that would be a near mint 7 card, but it has light writing on it on the back. SGC would grade the card a 1.5 Fair most likely, BGS might grade it a 2 or 3. PSA would give it a 7 (MK) and would count as a 5 Excellent card in their Set Registries. If the card was in an auction raw, would it sell closers to a Fair card price or an Ex price? PSA would say they'really more likely to be priced around Ex cards, not Fair cards. That's the point of them. People have a lot of opinions on the subjects, you just have to search this board or Collector's Universe board, or Blowout. I think PSA gets it more right on this than SGC does.

I definitely agree that sgc is more strict with there grades,I recently sent some in to them to be graded and was awe stricken at the results. The worse part is the cards I sent in were vintage and I didn't expect higher grade,I only wanted to authenticate them. Even then I was shocked! I used to love sgc but they've turned their backs on their loyal customers by raising rates. I honestly think that card grading past authentication is ruining the hobby. People send in cards right out the pack now and charge more money to sale when in todays market 95% of cards are mint. When I was a kid there were only two things I checked for when buying a card to decide the condition,straight sharp corners and no creasing. Now they consider surface,color and centering and other variables you can't see just to charge more money!!!!

Qualifiers are grading for the flea market crowd.

"This one is mint except for that huge crease"
"This other one is near mint except for the glasses and moustache"


Steve B

Really?? Are you on drugs??

You are really whacked out...Good luck....

Hey Pal, you need to step down as there may be one person that believes your bullshit...That would be one too many....

LOL, I completely agree.

I was more thinking used car salesman though.
" That Corvette is mint, except the huge hole in the left front fender"
" That Porsche is mint, except the blown engine"

It is the way PSA polishes a turd.

Just got mine back from PSA

It's a PSA 10 ST, OC, MC, MK, PD, FOS. :D

They exist for people like myself. Printing/Manufacturing flaws did not equate into a grade when I was buying. It was post factory flaws that mattered so it is nice to know when a card is Mint other than centering rather than being lumped in with all the 2's.