The dockter/Big Al/etc
guinessmstr45
Posts: 9 ✭✭
I got taken on a few coins on eBay this guy was selling as a “safe find”. After escalating thru eBay - and getting denied (time lapsed - sent em all to PCGS, all came back cleaned/harshly cleaned) - I escalated to PayPal. I’ve gotten my $ back (he claimed I was “abusing return policies”) but I noticed something odd. The email address associated w the PayPal return is tied to this website - https://crsstockton.com/ - some hack coin restoration company. Mind you, he sells coins that are “gemmy, near uncirculated, etc” and is scamming eBayers everywhere. I left negative feedback and it was removed - so his rating stays high as he fights the negative feedback and pumps positive feedback thru low $ transactions. I know it’s been said here before / but please - beware of this crook! Avoid him - eBay ID thedockter - buy legit! Don’t gamble and let the crooks get you (like I did - will never happen again - and thank god for PayPal!!)
Comments
Good Information, but it is not a secret here.
How does he get negative feedback pulled thou? I have to imagine I’m not alone here
Funny thing is, he says that you abused the return policy but here he is abusing eBay buyers without even a thought to it!
Most of that dockter's patients die on the table......glad you were able to recover.
I might send the restoration service a question about my coins found in an old safe in a 200 year old abandoned building.
There have been threads linking problem coins purchased on Heritage and fixed, then found. The auctions sometimes have questionable bidding possibly with shills.
Some of the threads:
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1022691/1892-s-morgan-dollar-artificially-toned-to-cover-up-whizzing July 2019
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1022611/thedockter-is-now-doctoring-his-coins July 2019
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1018073/could-all-these-coins-really-come-from-a-several-hundred-year-old-safe-skeptical April 2019
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1015893/safe-find-of-200-year-old-store-during-demo-aka-thedockter March 2019
I think you have learned that unslabbed coins on ebay are often problem coins that won't slab with a straight grade.
It takes experience to be able to see that from photos.
A quick and polite call to eBay customer service can get most negative feedbacks removed without much effort.
Welcome to the forum!
Yes, many of the coins are terminally diagnosed cleaned, whizzed and docktered. Make sure your health insurance covers sickly coins before purchasing.
Yes, The Dockter's eBay shenanigans have been often discussed on this forum. I fear that associating the eBay name with a real person will poof this thread though.
LIBERTY SEATED DIMES WITH MAJOR VARIETIES CIRCULATION STRIKES (1837-1891) digital album
I really wish we could figure out how to get legal action against people like him. There is the ethical side of what he is doing, and the legal side. Flat out lying, making up stories, misrepresenting, etc. Should be a fairly big case for someone to take on, he has done a ton of business, and ripped off a ton of people.
If you get them, are so-so in grading, send them for grading, get back in details ... it is past the 30 day return
These guys are discussed a lot on multiple different forums, facebook, etc.... Not new and unfortunately people are still getting screwed by him!
Edit...
I see hes says hes a member of the "American Numismatic Society"? Ususally I see honest guys being part of the ANA?!!!
Edit....
The ANS is in Manhatten. I guess it's legit. Cant the Dr be reported to this Society? Maybe they can do something?
@guinessmstr45....Welcome aboard....Sorry to hear of your bad experience. This particular scammer has been known to forum members for a long time. Your post may here may help some new collectors avoid him. Cheers, RickO
I find it very interesting it is Alan Stockton. Guess there isn't much revenue in the coin repair business these days. So I guess he has become his biggest customer.
I would love to see his bottom line. Especially now that Paypal is not refunding transaction fees. I've seen at least 20 different Barber Halves relisted at least 10 times.....some ending in the $2-3,000 range.
well, he states that he restores and repairs so what do you expect?
One man's restore and repair is another man's destruct and destroy.
The guy is open and honest about what he is doing. I see no reason to call him names if someone is not reading
I do not feel sorry for people who buy or sell things they know little about then blame the other party for their own failure
He does not reveal this in his ebay listings. That's why I was surprised at the connection!
I didn[t know about him. So this post has helped me.
Interesting find about the email connection. I've thought about using his restoration service in the past, dont think I will now.😮
So you feel there’s no ethical obligation for a seller to reveal that a coin has been repaired? And it’s OK for sellers to blatantly lie?
I’m speaking of the EBay seller being discussed and do not know if he’s the same person as Mr. Stockton.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
He seems well educated in Bovine Scatology.
My understanding is that the coin repair business is completely legitimate and they are quite skilled at it. Whether one thinks a repaired coin is better or worse than a coin with a hole is, of course, debatable.
The eBay listings, on the other hand, are borderline fraud. The story about the provenance of the items is a lie. This may not be illegal but it is certainly unethical.
LIBERTY SEATED DIMES WITH MAJOR VARIETIES CIRCULATION STRIKES (1837-1891) digital album
“Fraud”
noun
wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
Some people have no business buying raw coins especially off of eBay.
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
I did not mention ethical obligations at all.
Neither did I say it is okay to blatantly lie.
I did say a buyer should know about what he is buying.
I did say I have no empathy if the buyer pays more than they should have.
I did say and/or imply that this ebay seller is no different than sellers on TV selling proof sets or ASE for far above the going rate, or the gold sellers who scream that now is the time to buy gold and hire old actors or race car drivers to advertise it at large premiums.
I did assume that the post by Jayyk31 was the ebay seller in question. So it looks like I did not follow my own advise. So do I blame Jay and expect everyone to belittle him?
I think not. I think I just realize I was the fool and learn from it.
He worked on 2 coins for me. WAAAYYYY back in pre-slab days.
I was glad I pencil rubbed the coins. They came back nearly undetectable. And one of them (a 70CC dollar) had been nicked DEEP with a knife probably 50 times or so around the rim. I have no idea how he got that off.
But lack of ethics and lying on the part of a seller often lead to a buyer paying too much - they’re closely related issues. When a buyer’s unknowingly dealing with such a seller, how much responsibility do you wish to place on him to really know what he’s buying, so as not to pay way too much?
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
How much is "way too much"?
That was most likely his father. I had an AU 1855-S repaired by his father. Someone had scratched into all the fields so deeply on both sides of the coin it almost went through the coin. The only real tell tale was the Stockton Color...that yucky yellow brown color. I had it graded and it came back AU details surfaces smoothed. Turned a less than $100 coin into a $2000 coin with full relevation when I sold it.
Your choice - how about 50% or more? If not that, 100% or more?
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
The two I had done didn't have any weird color. I was told that he used actual cull period coins for "fill" metal on holes.
The 2 coins were a pawnshop buy from the display window.
1795 FH $1..... cost $90
1870-CC $1......cost $70
Yep, pawnshops used to be fertile grounds. Once got a bracelet with THREE 8 Escudos mounted in flush bezel style.
Each of them removed with no damage. Whew.
I stopped at Office Depot to buy envelopes yesterday. A box of 500 was $44.95, which seemed a little high as I thought I paid less at Staples last time. So I went to Staples, where they had comparable envelopes priced at $19.95 for 500.
Is Office Depot acting unethically?
edited to add...
To be clear, my position is that buyers are responsible for knowing what they're buying and whether they're paying too much (or not) and sellers are responsible for not misrepresenting what they're selling, regardless of how they choose to price it.
The photos he uses are pretty convenient to hide any problems and he completely glares out most of the coin.
The word comparable is the bugaboo. If staples was marketing fake versions of the 44.95 variety then you would be talking apples to apples.
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I always pay close attention to who is vocal in defending scumbags on these threads. Thankfully, their usernames are the same as when they post on the BST.
I'm sorry, I don't understand. Mark asked how much responsibility one wished to place on a buyer to really know what he’s buying, so as not to pay way too much and I asked how much "too much" was. What does a fake version of anything have to do with the question?
You used the word comparable to describe the cheaper 500 count envelopes. What the scumbag coin doctors do is pass off the comparable as the 49 dollar version to stay with the analogy
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Let me ask it to you this way. Would you have been mad if you bought a box of 500 and there were only 200 in there? Have you sat down and counted each one? If not, why not? Probably because office depot sold them as 500, and you believed them. If they intentionally deceived you, that is unethical and illegal on their part, and I would not expect you to be responsible for that. This guy is buying problem coins, trying to clean them up to hide the problems, then selling them as "old safe finds". That is a lie. Lying about where he gets them, and not disclosing that he KNOWS they are problem coins that will not grade.
AMEN
I hope they allow this thread to stay because this is very valuable information in my opinion.
So it's Stockton who is selling on ebay? I have heard some good things about CRS' work. But I had some poor results with coins that needed what he supposedly provides. I filed a complaint 20 years ago with the ANA; one of the guys on the discussion of whether to boot him from the ANA who was with RCNH said that it was a mixed vote and they ended up letting him stay in the ANA. Apparently he has gotten greedy if that is him selling on ebay.
Well, Mr. Feld, without entering into a discussion of 'are your ethics the same as mine'
The job of a seller is to get as much as he can for what he is selling.
The job of a buyer is to pay as little as possible for what he is buying.
So is it unethical for, say, Ford to sell a truck for $50,000 when it costs them $8,000 for the pieces to build it?
Is it unethical for a mortgage company to charge compound interest so that you borrow $100,000 for thirty years and pay them a total $280,000?
Arguing the ethics of selling, buying, advertising, and interest is a losing cause no matter which side you are on.
If a seller lists a coin with superlatives like "GEMMY " or Super Slider"or 6 plus signs then all I can say is "Son, you're on your own"
When a buyer is shopping for raw coins on line he is swimming with sharks, if he does not know that before he starts he will know it when he dives in. He chose to be there, he agreed to the price paid, and he likely thinks he knows what he is doing. If he does, good for him, if he does not I have no empathy.
Everyone here at one time or another has been, fooled or paid too much. Many have made money on both ends of this spectrum.
So how much responsibility do I place on the buyer?
He agreed to the terms, if he buys his coin and does not like it and there are returns allowed then he returns it and gets a cheap lesson. If he cannot return it than the lesson costs him more.
You pay your money and take your chances.
I live in a no whining zone.
There is a difference in selling a coin for too much money without misrepresenting it, and selling it for too much money by flat out lying about the coin. To not admit that or understand that says all I need to know about you.
Make sure you only say facts in your feedback. No threats, no bad language. That is how he gets them deleted. Simply state that "the coin was not in the advertised condition, use caution when buying" or something like that.
**
Does it?
Tell me Did the seller say the coin was any particular grade number?
Was it PCGS MS 65?
Bet it wasn't.
By some of the standards stated here every car dealer in the nation should be in jail.