Anyone has experience with londoncoins.co.uk? - update 9/9/2014

desslok

Stumbled on their website, and they have something in their next auction which I'm interested in. I sent several e-mails both last week and this week and received no response whatsoever.

Is anyone here familiar with this company?

http://www.londoncoins.co.uk/

7Jaguars

Yes, they are well established and a reasonably respected auction firm. Their auctions are followed closely and occasionally bring some VERY big numbers - so as usual beware of the estimates because if its a desirable coin, the bidding will go even multiples of what is listed.

A couple of caveats:

- no live internet bidding
- occasionally poor responsiveness as you've experienced
- they are associated with the British slabbing company CGS,
and they essentially auction their own slabbed coins amongst the
slabbed coins on offer (in addition to PC and NGC).
- sometimes the pictures, as usual per auction firms are not
quite the representations we might like

Bjorn

Hey there,

I have bid in their auctions before (and will in this one as well). They are not always timely about responses, particularly in regards to questions about the lots (often I have not received a reply for a week or so, or until a few days before the sale). That said, they are reliable regarding delivery (at least within the United Kingdom) and the descriptions are usually fairly good (although like many British auction houses, I suspect they grade non-European coin by US standards). Their estimates are better than some other auction houses, but as 7Jaguars mentioned they can still be quite far off with respect to certain material (quite often bulk lots and certain countries).

-Bjorn

YQQ

As said above, sometimes very slow to respond.
Best is to call them and email them if you have questions.
I have bid many times on their auctions and had sometimes, but not always, success. One time , bidding on the phone, the person on the other end was very slow to communicate the actual bids from the Auctioneer to me.
and suddenly, without notice: he said sold to a local bidder... last 2 bids were (purposely??) not communicated. (the subject coin was well over 1K GBP). Now, I ask you guys: would you let a bidder who already bid over 1K, just slip away??? unless u have your very own reasons?
Another time a promise was made that they call about 15-20 lots before my interested items were up. Well, I got the call... and was put on hold... until the one special item was sold. I was told the sold price is GBP 800.
this was 450 GBP lower than I would have bid. The coin, very unique and easy to recognize, later showed up at a US dealers web site. I spoke with the dealer and he told me that he had a "local Agent" bid for him. That explains it all... there was, IMO, hanky panky going on. When I questioned Semra Cetin (I believe she is either the owner or manager) I was told to communicate directly with her next time, to make sure everything will go well.
the other issue I have is sometimes the quality of the pictures posted. They know how to hide masterfully if a coin is cleaned or dipped.
I will never bid there again, for above reasons, unless they will have real time bidding -online.
However that should not stop you guys from bidding. Please post your experiences after.

desslok

Thank you all for your replies. When you bid on their auctions, how did you do it? Did you use the online form, or send them an e-mail? Fax? Called them on the phone?

Did you have to register in advance?

brg5658

One other caveat, they sometimes sell counterfeit coins. I know they had a counterfeit 1934-35 Australia Centenary Florin in one of their recent auctions -- back when I was looking for one. I have also seen them auction a gold coin that very knowledgeable members of a British Coin Forum were quite certain was a fake. Make sure you know what you're bidding on.

Nap

Haven't bid in their auctions.

The no live online bidding is kind of a turn-off.

They do sell some very nice things though.

I don't think they are purposely selling counterfeit coins, and would suggest that all auction houses are guilty of occasionally auctioning forgeries, and presumably unintentionally, especially since most British coins are raw.

JCMhouston

The British normally only run 40-50 years behind on technology, so I would suspect sometime in the late 2030's or so they will have real time bidding available.

Nap

<< <i>The British normally only run 40-50 years behind on technology, so I would suspect sometime in the late 2030's or so they will have real time bidding available. >>





Spink, Baldwins, DNW, Time-Lines, St James, etc all have nicely functioning online bidding.

pruebas

<< <i>The British normally only run 40-50 years behind on technology.... >>


Sort of like Stacks-Bowers?

SYRACUSIAN

<< <i>As said above, sometimes very slow to respond.
Best is to call them and email them if you have questions.
I have bid many times on their auctions and had sometimes, but not always, success. One time , bidding on the phone, the person on the other end was very slow to communicate the actual bids from the Auctioneer to me.
and suddenly, without notice: he said sold to a local bidder... last 2 bids were (purposely??) not communicated. (the subject coin was well over 1K GBP). Now, I ask you guys: would you let a bidder who already bid over 1K, just slip away??? unless u have your very own reasons?
Another time a promise was made that they call about 15-20 lots before my interested items were up. Well, I got the call... and was put on hold... until the one special item was sold. I was told the sold price is GBP 800.
this was 450 GBP lower than I would have bid. The coin, very unique and easy to recognize, later showed up at a US dealers web site. I spoke with the dealer and he told me that he had a "local Agent" bid for him. That explains it all... there was, IMO, hanky panky going on. When I questioned Semra Cetin (I believe she is either the owner or manager) I was told to communicate directly with her next time, to make sure everything will go well.
the other issue I have is sometimes the quality of the pictures posted. They know how to hide masterfully if a coin is cleaned or dipped.
I will never bid there again, for above reasons, unless they will have real time bidding -online.
However that should not stop you guys from bidding. Please post your experiences after. >>




That's impressive! Thanks for sharing it.


The local agent isn't something that should make you suspicious. Floor bidders have the upper hand in every single auction that I know of, including all the ones with internet-live bidding, at least according to MHO. I would assume that it's common practice for dealers to have someone they trust, or an agent present at any auction that they cannot attend in person, they know better than to blindly trust any auctioneer's descriptions and images.

If you were willing to bid over 50% above the realized price of the item that you did not win and that you later saw at the US dealer's website, did you end up making him an offer or not?

cwt

For more expensive coins, I would think the best option with London Coins is to contact a trusted dealer and have them examine the coin and bid for you.

LochNESS

Great advice all around. Agree that you must know about what you are bidding. Humans make errors and their auction cataloger surely can't be perfect. The real concern is what did they do after they learned of the counterfeit pieces?

desslok

I opened this thread a while ago. I did eventually manage to communicate with London Coins and participate in the auction, albeit without success.

The item I was interested in was a rare British Mandate of Palestine error coin, 2 Mils struck on a planchet intended for a 1 Mil coin. This might not sound like a big deal to you, but British Palestine error coins are very scarce and desirable by collectors from the U.K., Israel, and various Arab nations. This specific error is the only one of its type I've seen. It was lumped together with a minor British error and estimated at 30-50 UK pounds. I placed an absentee bid with a maximum of 140 UK pounds (which together with buyer's premium and credit card surcharge would have amounted to roughly U.S. $250, and was outbid by one increment at $160 UKP. If I wasn't there, it probably would have gone for the initial 30 UKP estimate. In fact, I can't help wondering if my own interest in this specific lot has sparked some interest which otherwise would have left the item unnoticed. Frustrating, but such is life.

Here's the lot in question:
http://www.londoncoins.co.uk/?page=Pastresults&auc=146&searchlot=1723&searchtype=2
Again, it probably won't look like anything special to most of you (and to the auction house), but it does to me.

Well, if to look at the bright side, that leaves me more money in hand to go after some items in a major collection in my field that is going to go up for auction later this year. So loosing this piece does have some advantages :-)

SYRACUSIAN

We do not underestimate coins from Palestine as you seem to have assumed. In fact, (if I'm not mistaken) one of the members here recently sold the finest and most complete collection of its kind, ever assembled, and more members have smaller Palestinian collections in size, but with some great coins in them too. I don't think that your bid was the reason that the lot attracted attention, unless you suspect foul play, otherwise the increased interest in these coins has multiplied their value in recent years and locating them in top condition seems to be a great challenge.

That's the beauty of this forum. We get to learn about coins that would have otherwise been indifferent to some members, and we often see fantastic examples, most of which practically professionally imaged. You can do a search with the word Palestine if you'd like to see previous threads on these coins.


Sorry that you didn't win the lot. I too was outbid yesterday in a completely different area. Better luck next time to both of us.

YQQ

Dimitri and Desslok

if you read my above post and let your imagination just wander a little bit, it all sort of comes out to the same ...or am I wrong?
maybe. but it is highly suspect.

desslok

Syracusian -
I followed Marc's superb collection on Heritage, and I know there is definitely a strong market for quality Palestine coins. However, this particular example is different. It is a common-date, average grade coin with corrosion spots. A normal coin of this type would have been worth a few dollars at most, but this is an error piece. Although world error coin collectors are few and far between, to us this admittedly ugly-looking coin becomes rare and desirable.

YQQ -
Your experience was different than mine. You imply that they deliberately sold coins for less than you were willing to pay, because the buyer had a closer relationship with them. In my case, the coin sold above my max bid. I have no complaint to the auction house, my bid was executed as I requested. I thought I was safe by bidding 3x their top estimate, but we all know that this does not guarantee anything, especially with odd and unusual pieces where there isn't an established price guide or previous track record.

Still, I can't help wondering, I mean - the auction house clearly didn't think they had anything special, you can tell that from the low estimate and the fact that they grouped it with an unrelated piece. Was it my bid that made them take a second look at the piece and maybe alert some other buyer? That might be. But it's not necessarily so, this was such a high-ticket auction with many much more expensive pieces, this tiny little $250 coin barely shows up on the radar.

SYRACUSIAN

Desslok, I really have no idea how many collectors of coins from Palestine or world error coin collectors were interested in this coin.

this was such a high-ticket auction with many much more expensive pieces, this tiny little $250 coin barely shows up on the radar.



This however, makes me think twice why YQQ posted his reservations in his second post. It's all speculation of course, and it wouldn't be wise to throw accusations left and right. I think that each of us has formed an opinion, that we should keep to ourselves.

JasonZ

My experiences are very negative. Completely unwilling to take responsibility for the accuracy of their listing. They will just say “but that is your opinion, we do not agree”. They will also not take the opinion of any third party grading service. Also they are extremely slow and shipping takes many weeks. I had to repeatedly ask them to ship the item.

YQQ

JasonZ
you replied to a 5 year old post.
BUT maybe it should be picked up again with new and younger experiences about LC.?
I stayed away as I do not wish to be "played with" while bidding on coins.
SYRACUSIAN
Dimitri, sorry for not answering your comment in 2014. truly, just saw it now.
The answer is NO, I did not make an offer to the US dealer. I do not chase coins. One, actually two, did come along in the meantime.