CW Test of grading services: Waste of time and effort?
gemtone65
Posts: 901 ✭✭✭
This week's CW reports on a blind test of 8 grading services. Fifteen different coins were submitted to each service over the course of the past year.
Unfortunately, it appears that an astonishing number of coins submitted, 11 of the 15, were mishandled, whizzed, or cleaned in one way or another, while the none of the remainder were gems. Therefore, the value of this test for many of us is essentially useless, as these are not the kind of coins we tend to submit for grading.
As you might expect from this "sample", most of the pieces were acquired raw. One reason probably is that the owners knew what these coins were, and such pieces are not good candidates for any of the grading services. That's about all this test revealed -- it confirmed what most of us knew already.
Why a more reprentative sample was not not selected is beyond me. It would have been really interesting to see how the services differed when grading nice coins, not the dreck chosen. It's almost as if the sample was chosen purposely not to reveal too much information about the grading services.
Unfortunately, it appears that an astonishing number of coins submitted, 11 of the 15, were mishandled, whizzed, or cleaned in one way or another, while the none of the remainder were gems. Therefore, the value of this test for many of us is essentially useless, as these are not the kind of coins we tend to submit for grading.
As you might expect from this "sample", most of the pieces were acquired raw. One reason probably is that the owners knew what these coins were, and such pieces are not good candidates for any of the grading services. That's about all this test revealed -- it confirmed what most of us knew already.
Why a more reprentative sample was not not selected is beyond me. It would have been really interesting to see how the services differed when grading nice coins, not the dreck chosen. It's almost as if the sample was chosen purposely not to reveal too much information about the grading services.
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Of course, someone may be inspired and do it right next time...
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
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Here's my two cents'worth:
You might have noticed them saying they picked the coins from test buys performed on their advertisers, which begs the question: Why are their advertisers selling so many whizzed, cleaned and altered coins and getting away with it?
Also, it's interesting to see that PCI seemed to be the service most unable to spot problem coins - even worse than ACG.
Maybe it wasn't a complete waste.
Chuck
I realized the exact same two points you made. I guess great minds think alike!
I think a valuable additional report would take 10 or so high-graded MS and PR coins and resubmit them 5 or more times to various slabbing companies. In this way you could check the consistency of the various services: Does PCGS always grade a particular coin MS66 or what is the range of the grades? I think that it's consistency that is a major issue with the grading companies. For instance, if PCGS and ICG are both perfectly consistent and say ICG is 1 point higher than PCGS, then there is very little difference between PCGS and ICG. In that case, an ICG MS67 = PCGS MS66 and the prices would perfectly reflect this difference. Obviously the services are not totaly consistent, which is why the crack-out game is so profitable, but I would be very interested to know which of the major services is the most consistent and which is the least.
Mark
Would you buy from a Coin World dealer sight unseen, unless you knew that dealer from another context (show or other dealings?).
It is one set of data points. I think the consistency issue is more interesting - submit the same coins every year and compare results.
This is a YMMV (your mileage may vary) kind of article.
Lurking with intent to loom
Coin World is going to fill a LOT of editorial space with this little project, in what will probably run in multiple parts, and I'm guessing it will also give birth to at least one editorial. And shall we also contemplate the number of Letters to the Editor it will generate, therein filling even more space?
And what did it cost them? A few cheap coins and several grading fees.
Balanced against a writer traveling, plus expenses, the space-filling bang for the buck from this exercise is huge.
-- Dennis (yes, I'm also involved in publishing)
I think the funniest thing is in the lower rung of the services, who's the worst? NTC? PCI? ACG? I don't think ACG is king of the scumbag slabbing services any longer.
If PCGS and NGC gave legitimate reasons for the bodybags, the survey could have been a bit more interesting.
Again, nice concept, wrong coins, in my opinion.
LSCC#1864
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As a professional editor and reporter who has traveled extensively on assignments, I don't get the impression any of their writers ever leave the office - their stories appear to be generated from working the phones. Also, I'll bet their travel budget is pretty tight, if they have one at all.
One other observation about the test: They should have found a trustworthy professional grader to look at the coins and assign a grade. That would set some kind of baseline to compare all the services against, rather than just pitting them against each other.
Chuck
Great transactions with oih82w8, JasonGaming, Moose1913.
The results were more or less what I would have expected, with one exception: ACG actually rejected some coins and gave NG? I honestly did not know they ever did that.
I agree with some others here that an interesting project would be to submit the same coin to each service 5 times over a 12 month period, for example, and see what kind of consistency, or lack thereof, results.
I like the fact that it was "quietly"initiated in 2002. I think there is a healthy benefit of the study, like the price differences, turnaround times, and some of the results were quite informative, for me anyway. It definitely provided a bit of insight into how PCI has been viewed. I also think it pointed out were certain services are strong, weak, comparable and how some of them are a "crapshoot."
I suppose someone will also have a less than positive view of just about any activity that doesn't necessarily provide them a direct benefit, criticizes their own position or those with a knack for viewing the negative rather than the positive (This is a generalization, so noone has to infer it is directed at any particularly respondent)
I, for one, am somewhat pleased that the effort has been undertaken with the results published AND to get an idea how CW "spot checks" its advertisers. Maybe the latter should be improved upon, but most of the time, some action is better than no action at all.
My Complete PROOF Lincoln Cent with Major Varieties(1909-2015)Set Registry
They(ACG) obviously were in on it before the `test` began.
I also agree if you read it right,you see how CW inadvertently demonstrates the tawdry quality of the
coins being offered by its own advertisers.
Yall are some excellent thinkers and writers. This place is great.