PCGS: Suppose the cert. no. is xxxxxxxx. One way to do it is to type pcgs.com in the URL box of your browser and press enter, click on Verify, type xxxxxxxx in the box and press enter. Pretty quick. Slightly quicker is just type pcgs.com/cert/xxxxxxxx in the URL box of your browser and press enter. For example, pcgs.com/cert/52687289 will bring up a somewhat valuable coin. NGC: NGC is a little more complicated because they will not verify the cert. no. unless a correct grade is provided. They haven’t always required the grade. Not sure why they do. Might be to slow a bot from downloading their database. Suppose the cert. no is xxxxxxxx-yyy and the grade is zz. One way to do it to go to ngccoin.com, click on Resources, then click Verify NGC Certification. Enter the cert. no. and grade, then click Go. A bit quicker is enter ngccoin.com/certlookup/xxxxxxxx-yyy/zz in the URL box and press enter. For example, ngccoin.com/certlookup/6066357-002/68 will bring up a somewhat valuable coin. Mike
I wasn't aware of the quicker NGC way to do things once they started requiring the grade as part of the lookup. I will starting doing this so I can do it quickly along how I already do PCGS (your quick method above). Thanks for the tip. Using one of my own coins: https://www.ngccoin.com/certlookup/2710932-005/4/
I'll try it and see. I'm usually looking up certs from images so I have to memorize part of the number then flip to a cert lookup tab, back and forth until I get it right. I could type it in while looking at a website image and go.
You can also information about a piece if it has been sold in a major auction. Sometimes you find out what a dealer paid for the piece. It's also useful to see if a coin has been resubmitted for grading. Usually it needs to be a rarer, better coin, but it's useful information if you can trace it.
