Does PSA give favoritism to certain dealers/customers?

Johnny630 · #1 05-21-2025, 06:12 AM

How is one to know I would say it’s very anecdotal… I think it’s more of the roll of the dice. I often wondered if auction houses received lower rates for grading. I believe they probably do…

toledo_mudhen · #2 05-21-2025, 06:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Johnny630

How is one to know I would say it’s very anecdotal… I think it’s more of the roll of the dice. I often wondered if auction houses received lower rates for grading. I believe they probably do…

In a world where the only thing that matters is the number on the slab........ there are going to be lots of opportunities for certain individuals/entities to "coerce" a better number out of a grading company than the average schmoe could walk away with..............

This one has been hashed and rehashed only about a gazillion times over many years and yea there are just way to many examples of it happening for it to NOT be happening.

luciobar1980 · #3 05-21-2025, 11:00 AM

In theory, no. In practice, probably. Which is gross.

bnorth · #4 05-21-2025, 12:51 PM

Absolutely not in any way shape or form, just another urban myth. Seriously they are way too inconsistent to worry about favoritism. Who hasn't had cards that you complained about being under graded and cards seriously over graded that you sold because it deserved the grade? It is almost as silly as the raised the bar and they are now grading 2 grades below a couple years ago. LOL, I have been hearing that one for decades and if true a 3 would be the highest grade they gave out by now. I know I can easily cherry pick cards from any era that are over and under graded just like many others are doing.

Ima Pseudonym · #5 05-21-2025, 02:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bnorth

Absolutely not in any way shape or form, just another urban myth. Seriously they are way too inconsistent to worry about favoritism. Who hasn't had cards that you complained about being under graded and cards seriously over graded that you sold because it deserved the grade? It is almost as silly as the raised the bar and they are now grading 2 grades below a couple years ago. LOL, I have been hearing that one for decades and if true a 3 would be the highest grade they gave out by now. I know I can easily cherry pick cards from any era that are over and under graded just like many others are doing.

It's absolutely not an urban myth. The evidence is right in PSA's own data, where there are numerous examples where large blocks of cards being submitted by a single seller are all miraculously given perfect grades.

When a single submitter does better/gets luckier than another single submitter, an argument can be made that he just has a better eye for this thing, or he has a better rabbit's foot in his pocket. But when a single submitter does better than the rest of the world combined -- by a factor of 1000 -- then that amounts to statistically provable fraud.

It's not that the single submitter has a great eye... it's that he miraculously comes in contact with more perfect cards than the rest of the world *combined*; and that's just not logical, reasonable, or possible.

Peter_Spaeth · #6 05-21-2025, 02:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ima Pseudonym

It's absolutely not an urban myth. The evidence is right in PSA's own data, where there are numerous examples where large blocks of cards being submitted by a single seller are all miraculously given perfect grades.

When a single submitter does better/gets luckier than another single submitter, an argument can be made that he just has a better eye for this thing, or he has a better rabbit's foot in his pocket. But when a single submitter does better than the rest of the world combined -- by a factor of 1000 -- then that amounts to statistically provable fraud.

It's not that the single submitter has a great eye... it's that he miraculously comes in contact with more perfect cards than the rest of the world *combined*; and that's just not logical, reasonable, or possible.

To be fair, part of that may be the use of the minimum grade -- the cards that don't qualify may not get a cert. number.

raulus · #7 05-21-2025, 03:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

To be fair, part of that may be the use of the minimum grade -- the cards that don't qualify may not get a cert. number.

I’m pretty sure they still get assigned a cert during the grading process. The cert just doesn’t show up in the database because it never gets activated. So you would have some gaps in the certs if you tried to check out a bunch of certs all in a row, if some of them did not meet the min grade specified.

Ima Pseudonym · #8 05-22-2025, 11:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

To be fair, part of that may be the use of the minimum grade -- the cards that don't qualify may not get a cert. number.

I find it very difficult to conceive of people putting a "minimum grade 10" on their card, unless they know they're going to get 10s. Why would they pay for all the grading fees when 98% of "mint looking" cards traditionally don't receive a 10? And why WOULDN'T they want a 9? The card would be way more valuable in a 9 than it would ever be raw. That doesn't make sense to me.

There are many examples where there are a very limited number of 10's have ever been graded of a certain card over decades, and it turns out the majority of them were all graded at the same time, in the same submission, for the same submitter.

That's not happenstance, that's fraud.

perezfan · #9 05-21-2025, 01:10 PM

I'll relay a recent experience to this effect, and sorry up front for the lack of specifics, as I prefer not to identify the AH...

I recently broke a somewhat scarce card out of a PSA 5 Holder. I wanted it in the SGC "Tux" to display it and show it off better. So I submitted it to SGC, where it received a grade of "A". I knew this was BS, so I cracked it out and decided to try an experiment....

I sent the newly cracked raw card to a well-known auction who heavily features PSA-graded cards in every catalogue. I can't bring myself to send anything to PSA, so left it up to the Auction House to get it graded and put it in their auction.

Sure enough, it came back a "7" this time around. So it went from PSA "5" to SGC "A" to PSA "7" (when the prominent Auction House submitted it). This entire debacle aged me, but worked out okay financially (even though I'd rather have kept the card). Mostly though, it demonstrates the following....

Either the prominent AH gets preferential treatment from PSA

or

The issued grades are completely meaningless and random, depending on the grader of the day.

parkplace33 · #10 05-21-2025, 01:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by perezfan

I'll relay a recent experience to this effect, and sorry up front for the lack of specifics, as I prefer not to identify the AH...

I recently broke a somewhat scarce card out of a PSA 5 Holder. I wanted it in the SGC "Tux" to display it and show it off better. So I submitted it to SGC, where it received a grade of "A". I knew this was BS, so I cracked it out and decided to try an experiment....

I sent the newly cracked raw card to a well-known auction who heavily features PSA-graded cards in every catalogue. I can't bring myself to send anything to PSA, so left it up to the Auction House to get it graded and put it in their auction.

Sure enough, it came back a "7" this time around. So it went from PSA "5" to SGC "A" to PSA "7" (when the prominent Auction House submitted it). This entire debacle aged me, but worked out okay financially (even though I'd rather have kept the card). Mostly though, it demonstrates the following....

Either the prominent AH gets preferential treatment from PSA

or

The issued grades are completely meaningless and random, depending on the grader of the day.

Bingo. Again, if you have raw cards and want to get graded and sell, pick an AH an submit through them. You will be pleased, believe me.

Ima Pseudonym · #11 05-21-2025, 02:14 PM

I was recently talking to a friend who was getting ready to submit a whole bunch of T206-era cards for grading. He was saying that he should have them back in a couple of weeks

Being in the middle of waiting for my own submission to be graded, I told him that their lead times had been moved out to about 25-30 business days.

He told me that he was submitting through one of his other friends who always gets them back in a week or two, regardless of the stated lead time.

We'll see if he was speaking the truth, or if he was just blowing smoke, but I told him, "wow, that sounds like the kind of preferential treatment that the grading companies swear doesn't exist".

I guess I'll know in a couple of weeks if it's true.

Ima Pseudonym · #12 05-21-2025, 02:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by perezfan

Sure enough, it came back a "7" this time around. So it went from PSA "5" to SGC "A" to PSA "7" (when the prominent Auction House submitted it). This entire debacle aged me, but worked out okay financially (even though I'd rather have kept the card).

Out of curiosity... are you allowed to change your mind? If you see that the card came back a 7, are you allowed to contact the AH and say, "you know what, I changed my mind... I just can't bear to part with that card after all. It belonged to my dad and I'm feeling really horrible about selling it"

I mean, they'd obviously charge you for the cost of grading and shipping, but can you rescind your agreement to sell through their auction?

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