I am feeling like I can trust the Aussie mint (though I may start with a small purchase just to get the feel of it). How about some reviews on various mints and how they treat customers (and any interesting coins that they are offering). I'll start with a link to the Aussie mint http://www.ramint.gov.au/
all thes emints are good australian,indian,british,new zealand, south africa, singapore, canada, iceland, swiss, french i cant remember others that i have bought from the top of my head but if you have any questions just post
I had a terrible experience with the US Mint. I ordered coins...had in hand documentation that the coins were coming when produced... and waited. The first coins in the series arrived... over time... but then the last coins did not.... Then I read an article in Coin World on how the mint had OVER subscribed the limited production and sent people letters who would not be getting the ordered and agreed to coins. Well I NEVER got the final coins and NEVER got any communication from the US Mint that they were not sending the coins ordered and agreed to purchase. :headbang: I had to go out into the market to complete the set. http://www.usmint.gov/
I personally never dealt with the mints but do check my site out - I have already done the painstaking research of world mints, banks etc. http://www.gxseries.com/worldmoneylist.htm Do tell me if you see one that is missing on the list and I'll add it immediately.
Some mints have strange limitations regarding who they accept as a customer, and who they don't want. Rahapaja (Finland) for example will not sell to addresses outside FI; Swissmint does not accept orders from customers in Austria, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands. Now the KNM (Netherlands) won't ship to addresses outside the EU. And so on. In some cases the reason is that the mint has a contract with some distributor. That will usually make a coin more expensive, but shipping will often be less. (Another issue, when a EU customer buys from an EU mint, is that the VAT can be quite a lot. So when I, as an "end consumer" in Germany, buy a coin from the Monnaie de Paris, I pay almost 20% TVA, while I pay 7% USt when buying from a dealer in DE.) Apart from these issues, my experiences with the Dutch and French mints, the numismatic offices in Germany and San Marino, and the mints in the US, the UK and Hungary have been pretty good. Fortunately I have so far not had to return a flawed coin or set from any of those; that may make a "deal" much more expensive. But they were all pretty or very good regarding how they deal with inquiries, and how quickly and reliably they ship ... Christian
