Does Heritage want "small-time" collectors?
rodepetdinosaur
Posts: 76 ✭✭✭
OK, I'll be the first to admit I'm a "small-time" collector. I've never bought a five-figure coin. In fact, not very many four-figure coins,. I recently won a coin in a Heritage weekly auction. The check cleared according to my bank on Feb. 22. Called Heritage
today (March 8) and coin is "in process of being shipped." Anyone else having similar issues?
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Sometimes they are fast and sometimes they are slow. Have you been assigned a Legacy contact? If so I would call or email that person.
I am a "medium sized collector" for them, and I am a legacy customer. The shipping can be fairly quick, but it can also be very slow. You can't predict it.
"Small time" collectors don't often buy at Heritage if you are talking about something that costs less than say $200. The minimum buyers' fee and the shipping charges make other sellers more attractive.
You're not a "small-time" collector if you have ever purchased a four-figure coin.
In honor of the memory of Cpl. Michael E. Thompson
I'd be surprised if the people in the shipping department at Heritage look up a customer's purchase history in the process of preparing coins for shipment.
Takes 1-2 weeks before they ship out sometimes a little longer that is the norm. It is nothing personal towards you so don't take it that way. They have 1000's of packages to send out most likely weekly based on the volume they deal with.
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I guess that's my point. Somewhere in the process things really seem to get delayed.
I am also pretty small time, and have always been treated very well by them. They are a first class operation, and understand full well that small time sometime become big time over time. 😀
They are just notoriously slow when it comes to shipping. Just read some of the other threads devoted to the topic.
Legacy contact? I usually call customer service and inquire about shipments when I won't be around.
I'm not the largest customer Heritage has but one day I hope to get a rep.
I'm sure that I'm a small collector compared to someone who's a retired dealer. Most of my purchases are over $200 and I always factor in the buyer's fee in my bids. I first purchased from them in 1985, so I'm a "legacy" in more ways than one
Sometimes the coins are in Dallas at the time of the auction.
Other times the coins have to travel back to Texas from the remote auction site after the auction ends, adding to the delivery time.
When I first registered at Heritage I was assigned a Legacy advisor. Check your MyHeritage page. I would contact them if your regular customer service is unhelpful. There is a Legacy team. bids@HA.com should yield a rapid response I would think.
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This was a Tuesday weekly auction, so I can't see why the coin ever left Dallas. My problem is that it's still in Dallas two weeks AFTER my check cleared
Even though the check cleared your bank, HA does not know that. Some auction houses have a 7 to 10 day hold on checks before releasing shipments. With that being said I'm not sure what HA's policy is. Also, you did not specify if you did an Echeck, hold times are generally shorter for Echeck. HA generally gets all the shipments out within 2 weeks of payment. You are probably right on the cusp of being shipped. Customer Service is great, if you call and do some very nice inquiring about the delay they can be very helpful.
This^^
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Its just that auctions and subsequent shipping process takes them more time, especially when the coins have to be transported back to HQ from a show. My last auction win in February took about two weeks to arrive after I was invoiced, which isn't bad at all. When I dealt directly with @mfeld to buy a coin out of their inventory, it was shipped to me the next business day after the e-check cleared.
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I’ve bought quite a few coins over the years from Heritage, and I am a Legacy customer but even if I pay by wire as soon as the invoice is generated, I have to sit back and wait two weeks (typically) to have my coin shipped. I’ve gotten used to it and instead of being frustrated it’s like the anticipation excitement.
That is not unusual with the coin auctions. It has nothing to do with the size of the collector. Sometimes I get the coins in 3 days, sometimes in 3 weeks.
Oddly, comics always ship within a few days.
My point is that this is "the process" and there's no benefit in deliberately holding up orders based on your purchase history.
I frequently got notice that a coin had shipped before I got the invoice so there's that.
Patience. Your coin will come.
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my coin just shipped yesterday so yours should be very soon. Two to three weeks is about normal for HA.
If Great Collections can get coins out the next day, waiting weeks is unexcusable.
Yeah, not seeing the connection between shipping time and collector "time" (big or small).
I guess it depends on where you place the decimal point.
I would rather join with an army of sheep led by a lion, than an army of lions led by sheep.
TY. I learned something. I hit on Bids@HA and a name popped up. I laughed as it was in the comics area, which I signed up for 20 years ago. In the meantime, I'll call if Service becomes an issue
I guess it's nice to know that I've had so few problems that I never knew I had a rep.
I haven't purchased from Heritage in a five years or so. I would always receive my coins quickly, never experienced delays of 2 weeks or more. Kind of surprised to see delays are that "normal" at Heritage.
Mark
So like myself, you’re new around here and already committed your 1st cardinal sin:
Thou shall never speak any negative comments when it comes to HA and their shipping!
Keep your mouth shut and you’ll get it when you get it.😂
But I spent close to 8k? That doesn’t matter either! The amount you paid doesn’t matter!
Back in January, I promptly paid for a coin and it was exactly 21 days before they shipped it. The auction was in Dallas, so the coin was there the whole time. I just don’t buy that much from them and they put a lot of volume buyer’s ahead of me.
So there you have it, you’ve been warned.😉
A search on the forum here will show that people have been complaining about Heritage's shipping since just about forever. If there was something they were able to do to eliminate the complaints, it would almost certainly have happened long ago.
Just sayin'.
I've bought from them from time to time since the early oughts; my most recent purchase (couple months ago) seemed like an unusually long wait.
I love HA but I can't really agree with this. There certainly are things they could do. As i said, HA is capable of shipping comics quickly. They have weekly 2 day comic auctions and the comics are harder to package. So it is something very specific about how they handle coins.
I don't really care that much. I'm pretty patient most of the time. But I don't believe it isn't a correctable problem.
I think HA does a good job, they auction more than just coins, its a huge business and the coin department always gets my coins to me. And a 4 figure buy is not small time!
A simple solution would be to expand the shipping department. When a lot is marked paid in full it moves to the shipping que. Lots to be shipped are removed from the vault and transferred to the shipping department and shipped the same day. I worked in logistics...fancy term for shipping...sending custom fishing tackle around the world. A 3 man team could consistently bang out 350 orders in a day. With no errors. Heritage could do better if they made it a priority. Obviously they know it is an issue....They have your $$$ and your coin.....why should they rush? What are you going to do about it...nothing. It is all about the bottom line.
Who knows what they've tried? Does anybody? I don't. I'd bet they are aware of the perceived problem though, wouldn't you think? It's always possible they really just don't care. Or then again, maybe it's something else. Either way, since the complaints have been coming in for so long, I wouldn't be surprised if things keep going the way they have been.
Agree!
What really burns me is how selective it is. There is one dealer that had his coins on the West Coast in 48 hours after the auction AND hadn’t even paid for them OR even told them to ship ‘em!
But my coin took almost a solid month! How do you reconcile this difference? You can’t other than preferential treatment.
I mean if all orders were taking this long then you could say they need a massive overhaul of the department, but that’s certainly not the case.
Bottom line, the way I see it, is if your a casual buyer, just forget about your purchase as it will eventually get there.
Sucks, though!
Anything more than a few days is silly. I haven’t bought anything from HA in a long time.
With all due respect, there is nothing wrong with preferential treatment for whales. Go to a casino and play quarter slots and see if you get the same freebies as the guys at the $10k baccarat tables.
That said, there is no consistent preference at HA. I'm on the good guy list, but shipping times are erratic. I'm not in the whale category, mind you, but they will ship me coins pre-payment at times and other times it takes 2 to 3 weeks. And I'm buying things almost weekly from them, so I have a pretty good look at their overall behavior.
I don't. But, again, other divisions within Heritage ship more quickly than the coins. And I'm not talking about Signature sales here. Their weekly comic auctions and weekly coin auctions have similar numbers of items in similar price ranges. Yet the comics are always on the way within a few days and the coins usually take a week or two.
However, contrary to some posts here, I don't think it's because I'm not important enough. At times, they ship the coins before payment, so I'm on the Nice List. But I've had it take close to 4 weeks. I bought 2 gold 100 Coronas a couple months ago when gold was 1860. In the next two weeks it went up to 1970. Then in the next 2 weeks down to 1840, and that's when the coins arrived. LOL.
Wasn't it just days ago we were showering HA with Love. That was short lived!
I've never been to Heritage or seen their shipping department so I don't know why that should be. Maybe there's something different about coins when it comes to insurance- how they're stored or who can handle them? Anyway, pissing off their customers provides no upside, so it's not like they're just doing it because they can.
I still love Heritage.
I've bought a dozen or more items all in the $50 - $500 range I believe the last few years. Been inactive last year or more.
Fees, S&H, etc. on low-priced items could be cheaper, but HA is a great resource for small investors. And the archives are a FANTASTIC source of auction and coin information going back decades.
Actually so do I:
They have the most dynamic website and best research, including data on coin populations, multiple price guides(including Greysheet) and auction results. The pics are top notch. When I'm bidding on coins on Great Collections I do all my research on the HA website. My guess is that they are so wide with over 20 categories of products from coins , art, wine etc., with auctions just about happening every day is the issue with shipping. I Love GC for the personal touch you get from Ian, the fast shipping and great customer service. Most of the coins I get from auctions come form GC. I Like HA for other reasons and just accept that it may take a few weeks after the auction is over to receive my product. Maybe GC does a much better job with turn-a-round times because they are more narrow and specialized. I appreciate both enterprises for what they do.
In 2013, I went to Chicago for the CICF. Inspected three lots. Went to the auction that night
and won all three with money to spare. Next morning I went to pay. No credit card for transactions
over $2000. I could split it up and pay the balance with cash. No go. Mail us a check when you get
back to the house. Monday morning I FedEx a check. To my surprise, the three coins are on my
front poarch Tuesday evening. I've bid two other times and was severely shutout. By the way, they
served a buffet at the auction that night. The potatoes were the best I've ever eaten.
Their shipping is slow; amazingly slow. But they make up for that with high shipping fees.
I would like to do more business with them, but their slow shipping annoys me enough that I rarely look to see what they're selling. Maybe it's silly of me, since the coin certainly will get there eventually. But, to me, it's kind of like the company that puts me on a long, long hold, repeatedly telling me that "your business is important to us; we will be with you as soon as possible," but it's not important enough to have enough people answering the phone. I just cannot shake the feeling that, for their high fees, if my business were "important" to them, they would figure out a way to ship quickly.
That's funny, the guy that works for them has nothing to say!!!
Plenty to say about other things
How about it.......................
Mike
My Indians
Danco Set
By the look of your avatar, you are still licking your chops over those potatoes!
In honor of the memory of Cpl. Michael E. Thompson
Id appreciate if you left Mark out of this. He has no control over the shipping department, and he has already escalated the complaints from the forum to his superiors within HA. He is well aware of the delays, and he has acknowledged them in the past, what more is there for him to say about the matter? It's not his responsibility to bear the cross for HA's shortcomings. Mark is one of the most helpful members on the forum, and your comment reads like a backhanded insult imo.
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People have complained for years but many continue to use them (including plenty of those that complain). When the complaints hurt the bottom line (less bidders, less sellers, and less revenue) you will see a change. But without that, there is no real incentive to change. Plus what else would we argue about when we need to take a break from CAC and Vaultbox?
DD
I was trying to get his responses to this and what he was able to see if he made any progress with talking to them at Heritage.
No insult intended, sorry you took it that way
Mike
My Indians
Danco Set
Don't bother buying/bidding with European dealers. After the auction, a 10-14 day wait for
an invoice. I settle my invoices within an hour with PayPal or next day with bank transfer.
Then the wait. They say they pack and ship as invoices are settled. Sure, OK. Try getting a
tracking number. While I like Heritage, Great Collections is Light Years ahead in service over
any numismatic firm I've dealt with in this regard.