Numismatic Ethics

This is the unfortunate truth. Sadly I think some of you missed the point and might be less ethical than you give yourselves credit for. As a person with ethics, regardless of law, your job or bank mission the RIGHT and ETHICAL thing to do would be to tell the person. If they didn't care that is a different story. On the reverse side, you should tell the seller too as hard as that may be to do. I have in a few instances and was rewarded with a discount still.

 

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Exactly!!!!!!!!!!!!!:hail: Think about it if it were you or a member of your family, you would hope they would be told. From a banking standpoint I think it would be better for the person to sell them and bring back 11-14X the face value for a deposit.

 

Again, it depends.

If the amount is small I don't think a teller is obligated to inform a depositor of their folly. Suppose a person is depositing some cash and the teller spots one 90% silver quarter in the lot. That quarter is worth $2.50 to $3.00. That's not a great loss to the depositor (it would cost him that much to drive to a coin shop to sell it) and I have no problem with the teller keeping quiet.

On the other hand, if the depositor (say she is an elderly widow) is depositing several rolls of silver coins - all of which are worth 12X or more face value and some of which may have some numismatic value - we are talking about some serious money. In this case I think the teller should inform the depositor of their mistake.

What is the cutoff between the two? Let your conscience be your guide.

 

Legal this legal that blah blah blah

What ever happened to treat others as we would wish to be treated?

Is that not a simple enough ethics rule for anybody in any situation at any time in any place?

I dont get it.

10% restock fee.....a legal agreement in the Ebay contract ( even tho I cheat and juice pics and overgrade )

bank teller find.......hey, the old lady just wanted face value ( but she needed the money enough to turn in her change) Perhaps you should drop out of dental school and go to law school instead, you well on your way to thinking like a lawyer

cherry picking a dealer? ? Thats a level playing field and not to be confused with an ethical decision

spotting undergaraded coins at a show? see above

 

Since my collection was stolen 25+ years ago I have had no active interest in numismatics. I do, however, maintain a passive interest and, to that end, have been reading, and occasionally contributing to, this forum. In the time I have been lurking here, I have learned quite a bit about numismatics and about ethics.

As far as coins go, I wish I had known 25 years ago much of the information I have since been made aware of. If I ever get back into collecting I will be able to do so from a more informed poiont of view.

As far as ethics go, I am saddened by some of the things I have learned here. When I read that some of you would willingly take advantage of someone else's ignorance in order to enrich yourselves, I fear I may have been introduced to the wrong crowd.

It is amazing how some here can justify cheating another person with less knowledge than they have. I'm not trying to be a sanctimonious jerk but I really couldn't live with myself if I enriched myself at someone else's expense.

I'm not a religious person. I've only been in a church about a dozen times in the past 20 years for weddings or funerals, but I live my life according to the Golden Rule and naively expect that others would do the same.

 

What is a Collector to do...

I have ask the banks I have ask the bank tellers to save me any old or silver coins they find. I will pay them more after work . They tell me just pick them up at the bank 1:1 even money. alot of people don't care. I got a roll 1971 Dollars from the bank unopen in the roll.
I let them know to me it is a part of history. They tell me that they just ship them off to the main branch and don’t care.
I have found 1 bank person that is a coin collators. He has told me that people jest don't care.
What is a Collector to do...:goof:


tellers to save me any old or silver coins they find. I will pay them more after work . They tell me just pick them up at the bank 1:1 even money. A lot of people don't care. I got a roll 1971 Dollars from the bank unopen in the roll.
I let them know to me it is a part of history. They tell me that they just ship them off to the main branch and don’t care.
I have found 1 bank person that is a coin collator. He has told me that people jest don't care.
What is a Collector to do...

 

What is the difference between a teller who knows what a customer is holding and one that doesn't? When is one morally obligated to let that person know? If teller A and teller B each have a person at their window holding $50 in face value silver halves that are obviously worth more, but teller A knows what is in front of them and teller B doesn't, does this automatically make teller A more morally responsible or more morally incomprehensible because they didn't say anything? How many coins have to be presented to initiate that conversation. Let's say this same teller received a handful of change and finds one silver quarter in the bunch - should they say something to their customer? At what point do you tell the customer that they are holding something far more valuable than face value? In the end, in the most simplest form, when a person goes to the bank, they are there to either give away or take away money - nothing more and nothing less. It is not the banker's responsibility to be an appraiser.

 

Going back to the bank deposit scenario, my question to all of you is, if someone deposits $50 worth of any denomination coin to a bank and the teller realizes the coins are worth more than face so he/she takes the coins and give the depositor credit on their account, aren’t the coins now property of the bank? If the teller then trades his/her pocket change for those coins, aren’t they stealing from the bank, i.e. bank robbery? If someone really stupid gives the teller a double eagle and ask $20 dollars be credited to their account, the bank now owns the gold and to swap $20 for the gold coin would be considered theft in my opinion and the comparison is no different than the half dollar deposit.

 

Great minds think alike.

What does that mean? It was incomprehensible. :kewl:

 

Bruce, it is an honor to be able to think like you! :smile

 

In my days running a cash register I did have people spend coins worth more than face. Know what? Tell them so and they still spend them.
OK fine I did my part and you know where the coins would end up.

Now at the shop it is different.
The boss bought a collection about a month ago. All in books. In it, well a 16-D of course. Howver, horribly stored (PVC) damaged and cleaned to boot.
Boss paid extra for this one, of course, and told them we would send it to ANACS. IF it came back legit he gets another $300.
Came back today as VG10 net. Boss called the guy and told him we owed him $300. That's good business.

Now from another angle we buy some very large collections at times. Lots of "junk" silver etc.

We honestly don't have time to sort these out when buying. Coins get run through the counter at a set price.
I've seen the boss tell people "I'll give you X dollars" for that box etc. Just not enough time.

Sooo... since April I have found a 16-D Merc, 32D and S Washingtons (which I bought) and an 08-S Indian Cent.
Is this unethical? Not to me. We can not sort through the stuff when it walks in. Would take hours. WE DO sell the books so the seller can do that if they so choose. If they pluck out the keys they get more money.

Today we bought a pretty fair amount of Washingtons and Mercuries. Ran them through the counter and set them aside. I notice wear patterns when I run them through.
Looked like it had some potential so guess what I'll be doing in my "spare" time at work the next several days?

 

Look
We can compare charcoal to gas grilling all day long. Pro and Con.

This a thread on a tangent from another thread, like it or not.

What should a bank teller do if the old lady walked in. Not an overdate at a show in an allstate case, not a key in a batch of 90%, not a Vam unmarked......

A woman selling her change cause she needed cash. Period.

Do you cheat her or not?

 

I sort of feel that this thread is an indirect attack on me. But, thats OK.

Finally, someone who understands how it works.

 

hmmm...I have given this a bit more thought and I have to say if I were to hand over a coin worth more money than face to a teller because I didnt know it was more valuable....I would blame myself if I knew I did it. I think blaming the teller who may have known what it was is displacing blame....if a teller knows his American coins real well and is checking every coin that is passed to him and he recognizes some penny that is worth a lot of money (that I didnt see because I am not familiar with what pennies people will plunk 100 bucks down for) then I figure thats his reward for those nights bent over a pile of pennies, books, etc...

I might have done this many many times as I do not examine my US change all that closely save for the obviously different ones like a buffalo nickel, indian head penny, merc, etc...I always pull these types and have a big jar still unchecked for years so there might be a real valuable coin there. Its just not how I collect coins and my interest isnt in checking every penny I have in 5 gallon milk jugs...I pull them, wrap them, as I wrap them I simply pull silver and any non current types...so I might have given away hundreds of coins that are worth more than face value.

I dont blame a collector for making a great find I missed when I discarded my change, so maybe that is why I dont see a person who might cull coins in such a way as ethically challenged.

 

As the bank teller handling the transaction, and only speaking as that person. If I notice what she has, and am aware of what she has, I would tell her what she has. This however bears not one bit of guilt or shame or attack on richieb16, he was not her teller. He did not know at first the roll was solid, and he bought the roll from the bank once it became the property of the bank. It was a legitimate good find, and kudos to him for it.

 

Ummm. why does if have to be a little old lady...would anybody treat a teenager, or a 20 something different, or a man?

If I knew it I would say something. Nice and simple - but if they bought in rolls and I had 20 people behind them I might not catch it and I would not feel guilty. Then again I am not a teller.

The tellers at my credit union pull out any silver for one teller to buy for her husband. They told me this - does this make them unethical? I can tell you this neither had a clue about selling the coins for silver content. I found this out when one asked me why I always got $20 or $40 dollars in ones(quest for radars and star notes). That is when I found out what they do and I, personally, do not think they are doing anything wrong.

 

Over the long haul, greater rewards will come by doing the right thing.

I want to be the guy uniformed friends/co-workers/acquaintances come to with questions about coins.

 

I agree with Jack. Treat others as you would like to be treated. All this blah blah blah.... one quarter or a bunch if you would like to know then the other person would appreciate your honesty.. Do you want to admit to someone that you didn't.. I wouldn't.. As they say " knowledge pass it on"....

 

As someone who teaches ethics, I have found this whole scenario rather interesting. In fact, I will use this as an example in an upcoming semester...I will even use this very thread.

I am not going to pass judgment on anyone, as that is a fool's errand; but I will tell you, throughout history, people often convolute the issue to justify immoral actions. When I teach students about ethics, I try to show them how to peel the layers of the onion, see through all the rationalization and smoke, and get down to the most simple question you can ask about the issue. And, in my opinion, Jack found that question...

...it really is that simple.

 

Jack, go to the head of the class.