So I have been sitting on this 1st Edition Base Charizard for over a year and have been very reluctant to send it into PSA because I’m worried it will get damaged. IMO I thought it had a very good chance of a 10. I have looked at this card under bright lights so so many times before and am 100% sure that this damage wasn’t there before. This card was practically flawless. There are now two big scratches on the holo and white chipping on the back. It still came back a PSA 9 despite the damage they caused to it. I am honestly so despondent. These guys are supposed to be the experts so I don’t understand how this can happen. Worst thing is I can’t do anything about it. As they wouldn’t have paid out for a PSA 10 it wasn’t insured for that amount.
Yeh I understand that you can’t be sure from the photo that it wasn’t there but I have never scrutinized a card like I have this one. I couldn’t miss something for so long that I found immediately when I received the card back from PSA. I literally picked up the card, moved it in the light and saw it straight away, under normal house lighting. I appreciate your input though.
From the photos you can’t tell but as soon as I picked up the card I found it straight away. Have looked at it under much more intense light than this and nothing has come up
As you can imagine nobody can be sure the same card was sent in as the one from the photos you’ve shown on tops of the fact that with photos damage cannot properly be seen anyways. It’s your word against theirs and the burden of proof would be on you.
You can contact them and let them know your concern, it couldn’t hurt to do so. I have heard that theoretically they have cameras that they can review? I forget which member had said that but supposedly PSA went back to review tapes of the handling process of their order and I forget if we ever got resolution to that on whether or not PSA actually did damage the card(s). I have heard of situations where PSA admitted to damaging cards and have paid out insurance on them but that was primarily due to accidentally crimping the card in the case grooves when encapsulating and I am talking significant and provable crimp damage in those situations.
Getting PSA to pay out $15,000 to $20,000 on the off chance that damage they may or may not have caused may or may not have hypothetically dropped a card from a PSA 10 to a PSA 9 is about as insurmountable of a feat as I could possibly imagine.
First question I have is what do you mean by this? Did you severely under-declare the value?
I do feel for you mate. I totally believe you would have looked at this card heavily before you sent it, but proving your case is going to be impossible with the photos you have of it mate.
Do you maybe have other photos? Those style of holos have distinguishable Holo patterns. Almost like a fingerprint in uniqueness from card to card.
If you can prove that, it will go a long way to helping your case.
Honestly I don’t have better ones. It was rare that the card ever left the penny sleeve and I didn’t take photos with it off.
What I mean by that they won’t do anything is because I was told when I called them up about insuring it for PSA 10 value that it would be hard to distinguish it from a 9 as a raw card. So even if I did insure it for a PSA 10 value they would be more likely to only pay up to a PSA 9 value anyway.
@nuttun
I sent it in with the 6 free grading vouchers as I just signed up for my first membership
Best proof I can give is the two little red ink dots on the yellow boarder at the top of the card in this photo (can be seen in encased copy too)
Honestly I didn’t think to take so many photos because I hear time and time again how rare it is and thought a few photos would be enough and I would be fine. I remember reading the stuff about the cameras too so I’ll give them a call tomorrow and see what they say. Honestly if it deserved a 9 that’s cool but the fact it has come back damaged and I feel like there is no recourse as I didn’t take enough photos is gettin me down!
For cards like that, why WOULDNT you fully record a video from all angles just to avoid he said-she-said finger pointing heresay? I’ve seen this so many times. Half the members blame PSA, the others say it was prob there before. EIther way, for cards with the potential to be worth thousands of thousands more if they receive a higher grade, it should just be common practice at this point to photograph and video tape the whole damn process right down to boxing it up. That and the whole paying for proper insurance. It’s just WORTH it for stuff like this.
Okay to be fair, Spinch may be undervaluing the card quite a bit, but technically speaking, what choice do you have?
If he goes for what was assumed a PSA 10 charizard, the fee schedule would have been $1500 for the charizard. If his estimations are wrong though, and PSA determined it to be a PSA 9, it would have been a $300 fee schedule. That’s a dramatic difference. I don’t think you can pay for the $1500 service and if PSA deems your card to be less value than that they would refund you $1200. The grading is one thing that always perplexes me when going through PSA…
The declared valuation is 100% the senders choice. Sure majority of submissions are undervalued, but it is all about degree.
IF PSA damaged this card, there is no definitive proof with the photos provided. Regardless, since the maximum declaration was $500, a PSA 9 is already worth well above that mark, so there is no possibility of a payout.
In short, this is the classic opportunity cost of undervaluing a card. This isn’t the first and won’t be the last thread with this occurrence.
What is the main problem that you think kept this card from being a 10? The first thing I noticed was the dots on the front top border. Printer dots really hurt eye appeal, especially on the front. In fact, sometimes they’ll designate for that.
But anyway, what do you think prevented a higher grade?
If that damage happened throughout the shipping/submission/return shipping process it most certainly didn’t happen during the shipping part of the equation. Not that kind of damage. Dropping it off in person would not have stopped this damage if it indeed wasn’t present at the beginning.
Further, even a video of the full process of handling the card at all angles in all lighting conditions and then recording the card being packaged would not prove any damage was done at PSA. It can always be questioned what happened after the video was turned off unless you include the entire process to where you hand it over at the counter. Even then some could claim video editing and/or working with the USPS clerk.
Posts like these makes me worried of submitting items to PSA…did you submit it in bulk or a higher service?