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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 1883070, member: 19463&quot;]Commas would have helped.&nbsp; In the time I have been in the hobby, I have seen a few changes in the way sellers are compensated.&nbsp; Now it is fashionable for an auction to hammer down a coin at a price and then (all explained in the rules not everyone reads but said they read before bidding) tacks on an increasing percentage we call buyer&#039;s premium.&nbsp; On top of that, some tack on a fee for using Pay Pal, a credit card, a check, bidding by phone or whatever.&nbsp; Then there are taxes required by jurisdictions including the Value Added Tax which Americans don&#039;t know but Europeans do.&nbsp; Postage is added and is not a small number if you are talking International Registered post.&nbsp; The Buyer&#039;s Premium thing seems like a rip off to buyers but it enables consignors to avoid heart attacks when they see how much of their $1000 hammer price got siphoned off to pay for the salaries of Ardatirion and the janitor who cleans the floor at the auction house.&nbsp; It really makes no difference whether the house charges 20% extra as long as you remember to bid 20% less.&nbsp; My last purchase from Pecunem ended up being 1/3 add ons over and above the hammer price.&nbsp;&nbsp; I suspect some of the coins I lost went to people who bid $100 for a $100 coin and wondered why their bill was $130.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>This is why I like shows better than auctions.&nbsp; When you see a coin at a show that is listed at $100, you rarely pay more than $100.&nbsp; It is like Buyer&#039;s Premium in reverse.&nbsp; You say, &quot;Can you take $60 for that?&quot;&nbsp; The seller does not even have to know what the coin is.&nbsp; He does not have to photograph it or pay someone to look it up in catalogs that he probably doesn&#039;t own anyway.&nbsp;&nbsp; Between 1988 and 2000(13 years), I bought 70 coins from CNG; between 2001 and the present (13 years more) I bought two more coins (computerized record make statistics so much fun!).&nbsp; As more and more of you are willing to pay more and more for the services of full service dealers with professional staffs and ridiculous overhead costs, I doubt this will change.&nbsp; It is not by any means just CNG but all dealers who rarely sell a coin for as little as $100 and who have plenty of buyers willing to pay $130 (or $330) for a $100 coin. </p><p><br /></p><p>There is absolutely nothing wrong with auctions charging buyer&#039;s premiums and absolutely nothing wrong with you figuring out how much the coin will cost you before you bid.&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Fun with statistics:&nbsp; The first coin I bought from CNG (then &quot;Victor England&quot;) was $116.&nbsp; The most recent coin in 2010 was also $116 (both including postage and premiums if any).&nbsp; Go figure.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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