I have spent 6 months debating between joining ANA or PCGS or NGC for grading and today I was on the ANA site and joined in roughly 2 min and 39 seconds... So I am about to submit some coins, and I have nightmares of coins lost in the mail or the grading company incorrectly grading coins. So I wanna here your horror stories(if any) with submissions. Let's keep it to NGC and PCGS... I don't need to hear about SGS. Sorry if this is an old thread. Look forward to hearing the grading company problems. -Henry
Don't get paranoid about this sort of thing. Are you afraid to leave your house because you might get hit by a car? Or get mugged? If you do what you're supposed to do there's VERY little chance of something going wrong. Mail your coins Registered with appropriate insurance through the USPS. Pay to have them returned in the same fashion. The chance of them getting lost or stolen is close to 0%. And if you stick to PCGS or NGC as you said the grade will be as accurate as humanly possible. If you join the ANA, you don't have to join NGC. NGC accepts submissions from ANA members as if they were NGC members also. To use PCGS you have to join them. Another possibility is submitting your coins through a dealer. Sort of piggy backing on their membership. But this is where I grow cautious. I have to have confidence in the dealer. Fortunately I have such a dealer. Relax and enjoy the hobby.
No horror stories. just understand that if you send your coins via registered mail (which you should), you should anticipate your coins taking a week to get there.
According to this chart, you have to be a paid member to access the Census Reports. http://www.ngccoin.com/MemberPortal/Login.aspx Chris
Why ? If all you hear are "horror stories", you will have a very warped view of reality. Isn't it better to get a reasonable view of the full range of experience ? I have no horror stories. That said, TPGs are human and make mistakes. So here are some things you can do to cover yourself : Take pictures or scans of all submitted coins. Ship insured. Whenever possible, submit coins directly to the TPG at a major show. This eliminates the "send" side of shipping - including cost, insurance, time, and chance of postal mess-up (which is rare). Make sure you fill out the form properly - many "horror stories" are the submitter's fault
Insure your coins to the max, take pictures, send registered mail and track it online. I have a bunch of coins at NGC now, my 4th or 5th ANA member submission. An advantage of submitting as an NGC member is you can see the results before they are actually back in your hand but thats not a big deal for me, I can wait. The current wait time for economy tier is around 30 working days so between shipping time both ways I'm looking at around 2 months door to door.
The worst horror story I can think of (didn't happen to me as I don't submit) actually came about because the TPS's recommendations were NOT followed, and it actually had to do with coins submitted to PCGS directly at a show. It happened at a Long Beach show. At the end of the show PCGS took all of the coins that had been submitted to them and for security rather than carrying them back to the offices they mailed them back. But they ignored their own instructions to collectors to ship by registered mail and shipped the coins to the office by express mail. The coins never arrived. Think about that. ALL of the coins submitted at a major show (other than walkthroughs) being lost in the mail at the same time. I can't help but wonder how much that cost PCGS to reimburse everyone for their coins. (Actually PCGS probably had the shipment privately insured. Postal insurance would not have covered it.)
