Teletrade...plusses and minuses?

Bochiman

What are the good things about teletrade (and bidding practices) and what are the bad things?
I am thinking of starting to bid on some coins there since I can't find what I want elsewhere right now (and will need to look at heritage as well)

Cladiator

minus's = fees and taxes

p8nt

Plus:

• Deals to be found occasionally (Vams and mis-categorized items)
• Pretty good pictures. You know (most the time) what youre getting.

Minus:

• Buyers Premium
• Returns are costly

Drizzt

Minus: If something doesn't sell at say, $360, they don't lower the reserve or start price. They just keep hammering the $360 price at you and not selling any until its finally the accepted market price.

Fletcher

+ Fast shipping!
+ Good customer service.

- Buyers fees.
- California sales tax.

RedTiger

Pluses, searchable price history, some coins that are tough to find elsewhere

Minuses, shipping, fees, taxes in some states

The biggest minus is hidden reserves. This often means that bids are a total waste of time and energy. The other big minus is that some firms use Teletrade to dump their low end for the grade coins (some firms also use Ebay and Heritage for that too).

PhillyJoe

Good:
You can check upcoming auctions for the next two weeks.
Shipping is fast.
Pictures are pretty accurate of coin.
A coin you believe is a $200 coin may sell for $125.
Accepts paypal

Bad:
Auctions end at 10:00pm eastern. Put in a bid before 9:59:50 and most likely you will get sniped.
Bid with a max and 9 times out of ten, the bidding goes up to your max. Not always, but I often wondered.
A coin you believe is a $200 coin sells for $400. Did you miss something or did they overpay?
Don't know what the coin's reserve is.

Joe

KoinDawg

Seller Buyback. You may be highest bidder but still lose the auction because seller did a buyback to avoid low selling price.

rwyarmch

Pluses - They are real coins in TPG holders which you will actually receive if you pay your bill!
-No feedback "games".
Neg-Fees, sniping (as is the case everywhere), inexpert descriptions, reserve games

ABC123

A Convenient Dumping Ground for Widgets !

WaterSport

Good customer service staff.

WS

MyWorldCoinTypeSet

A Convenient Dumping Ground for Widgets !

That a plus or minus?

Coxe

Pluses

Easy bidding and paying
Archives are complete back far enough
Very fast shipping
Customer service
Only top TPGs
Something for all levels of collecting
Images (DjVu) are reasonably good considering the number of coins processed weekly
Telephone bidding option (network outages or on the road)
Credible single party seller, unlike eBay -- you'll get the lots per policy and not deal with the feedback games

Minuses

Low availability servers near close of auction
High bids not immediately updated
Phantom reserves
Bid confirms should be based on post time not process time
Return fees
Ascala spectre of distrust
Results are not immediate like eBay (not a huge thing though)
Dumping ground (but we are aware of that)
Laughably poor descriptions on the few lots they do describe
Fitzgerald hoard summary abstract on 50 Morgan lots per auction

Bochiman

Well, I bid on one item and didn't get it.
I tried to rip in a low bid since the title was incorrect (a 46-64 Roosevelt set....title said NGC MS66, but it was PCGS and the item only showed 1 coin instead of multiple).

It went for $725+juice. If i were a dealer or really wanted something in that, I would have bid higher and then sold the rest.
As it were, I am buying what should be a very nice, raw, set from a board member for our collection and my son can decide if he wants to play the slab game on these later. I think raw is fine but if I could have gotten the rip at a low price, that would have been cool.

So, the negative(s) that I see from what I tried yesterday:
• I'm west coast and ending at 7pm my time sucks since I may not get home that early from work
• Looks like a few errors in the listings.....would suck to be a consignor
• Not a lot of cool items from what I saw yesterday
• It is NOT a rainbow if it has color on it....to be a rainbow, it should look like a rainbow! So many things listed as rainbow that weren't!

The positive(s):
• I love how easy it is to see past prices realized for similar
• I like the photos
• Looks like there are a few auctions a week....that's cool

123cents

Plusses-- Usually a nice variety of coins. Minuses--buyer fee 12 percent. Up from the previous 10 percent.