Thoughts on cabinet friction from a professional grader.

I heard you the first time, no reason to yell. By working for that company and taking the salary they pay you, you are complicit in the final grade that you don't agree with. You don't wanna be a sell out? Quit your job.

I refer you back to your own defense of Doug in this very thread and his use of absolutes. There is no difference between what you defended Doug for doing and what the authors of this section of the PCGS Grading Guide did, NO DIFFERENCE!

As to the larger point, an overwhelming majority of Saints show roll/stacking friction and this point was confirmed by a very knowledgeable Saint collector. And despite all your bluster in this post, you haven't denied my assertion that most Saints to suffer from roll/stacking friction.

BTW, it is plainly obvious that I hit a nerve by calling you a sellout. FWIW, I don't blame you for taking the money, I would probably do the same thing. But I stand behind what I said. You are taking money from a company that violates your own grading principles by deliberately over-grading coins that deceives the most vulnerable collectors, the uninformed. But consider this, would you be so upset if there wasn't a measure of truth to my accusation?

 

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In order to change grading standards cyclically as many collectors on this forum suggest. A process whereby the TPG loosens then tightens their grading standards in order to boost resubmissions, the TPG would have to use internal memos to effect such a change in policy. Any memo of this nature would be irrefutable proof of the fraud that they are committing by offering a grading guarantee, changing the standards for grading, and then refusing to honor their guarantee upon receipt of a coin sent in for appearance review.

There are hundreds of current and former graders at these TPGs. It is your assertion that all these people have such little integrity than not one has decided to expose the fraud by violating the NDA they invariably signed?

 

In most of these cases, the TPG would have paperwork to prove that the error was indeed "clerical". For example, I purchased the following coin sight unseen as a top pop mint state example for the date/mm.



Once I received the coin, I instantly could tell that the coin was a proof coin and that the MS instead of PF was a clerical error.





If NGC were to review their records of the graders on this coin, it would assuredly be designated as a proof and the "MS" was typed in during the labelling process as a mistake.

So while I understand your point about clerical/mechanical errors, that isn't going to fly as an excuse when an overgraded coin is submitted for appearance review.

 

Perhaps, but the language in their policy is vague enough to let them call any grade discrepancy a mechanical error without providing any such proof.

In practice this would greatly hurt their reputation if they did this excessively. But they absolutely could do it.

 

This got colorful, literally! I need to read it when I get a chance.

 

Lehigh96, posted: " heard you the first time, no reason to yell. By working for that company and taking the salary they pay you, you are complicit in the final grade that you don't agree with. You don't wanna be a sell out? Quit your job."

You just don't get it. If I grade a coin AU cleaned and it goes out MS-61, that is not my problem. If a customer sends in an over-graded coin or C/F, that's not my problem either. This discussion does not bother me at all. Hopefully, some eyes will be opened by it. I use interactions such as this to teach students "the way things ought to be in Utopia." I sleep like a baby at night and grade some AU coins MS during the day. Finally, I'm one of the lucky people in the world. I DON'T HAVE A JOB! I get to play at my hobby all day long and get paid to do it.
And you suggest I quit...!

"I refer you back to your own defense of Doug in this very thread and his use of absolutes. There is no difference between what you defended Doug for doing and what the authors of this section of the PCGS Grading Guide did,
NO DIFFERENCE!

Oh my, are you equating Doug with the OFFICIAL GUIDE published by the PROFESSIONAL COIN GRADING SERVICE? Doug's good but let's keep this between you and I.

As to the larger point, an overwhelming majority of Saints show roll/stacking friction and this point was confirmed by a very knowledgeable Saint collector. And despite all your bluster in this post, you haven't denied my assertion that most Saints to suffer from roll/stacking friction.

Please don't misquote me along with your other . Any YN in Basic Coin Grading 101 know this is true: "Most Saints suffer from roll/stacking friction." I never said they didn't. Some "Ex-Pert" you consulted told you a PCGS "Ex-Pert" wrote that any saints w/o this characteristic are counterfeit! The opinion of two "Ex-Perts" is still (hyperbole) just a few drops of water in the cup!

BTW, this thread is NOT about Doug and NOT about Stacking rub! It is about the weasel words"cabinet friction" and how this crack in our "old" grading system has allowed some AU's to be graded MS (EVEN BY ME in the pursuit of my daily hobby). So lets stay focused.

"BTW, it is plainly obvious that I hit a nerve by calling you a sellout. FWIW, I don't blame you for taking the money, I would probably do the same thing. But I stand behind what I said. You are taking money from a company that violates your own grading principles by deliberately over-grading coins that deceives the most vulnerable collectors, the uninformed. But consider this, would you be so upset if there wasn't a measure of truth to my accusation?"

If I write that I am not upset at all, does that indicate that I am upset?

I already answered this. Just as you don't agree with some of the grades you receive, I get paid to grade coins as I see them. As I wrote this, I just realized that at every TPGS I worked at I actually did put my personal grade on every coin I examined. Yikes! I've been mistakenly calling myself a sell out! I'm the first grader on a box and when my grade is overruled (mostly up graded) it is not my problem. I really don't play the commercial grading game. That's why I didn't get upset! I don't call AU's MS after all!

Lehigh96, posted: "In order to change grading standards cyclically as many collectors on this forum suggest. A process whereby the TPG loosens then tightens their grading standards in order to boost resubmissions, the TPG would have to use internal memos to effect such a change in policy. Any memo of this nature would be irrefutable proof of the fraud that they are committing by offering a grading guarantee, changing the standards for grading, and then refusing to honor their guarantee upon receipt of a coin sent in for appearance review.

There are hundreds of current and former graders at these TPGs. It is your assertion that all these people have such little integrity than not one has decided to expose the fraud by violating the NDA they invariably signed?"

Please, don't be naïve. You are absolutely correct, the TPGS don't change their grading standards.

Do you care to share your age with me?

 

Just keep it colorful, civil, and fun.

 

Actually, that is not the way it works! Virtually every labeling error as this occurs when the coin's description is incorrectly entered BEFORE it enters the grading room. The coin was graded, slabbed, checked, and no one caught the error. I change AT LEAST half-a-dozen input errors as this on a daily basis and we get back about thirty coins a year to correct something as this. Thankfully most are caught/corrected before they get shipped.

 

It absolutely is your problem. You are a representative of that company. If you acquiesce to a grade that you don't agree with and didn't assign simply because they pay you, that my friend is tantamount to selling out.

No, I'm equating the practice of excusing hyperbole in the form of absolutes. You did it with Doug's comments, and I did it with the passage contained in the PCGS book. Your previous comments cast the authors of that book into a very bad light, unless you meant 100% uninformed crap in a good way. I'm sure Doug will be delighted to hear that he is worse than 100% uninformed crap.

See the part highlighted in red above? I'm taking that as the win and moving on. My larger point was that if roll/stacking friction is treated as wear, then virtually every Saint in existence would be graded AU. I know that you don't personally agree with that, and you have said so several times in this thread. But remember, my larger point wasn't directed at you, it was directed at the many people engaged in this thread who believe that "wear is wear" and that coins with roll friction should be graded AU. So, we both agree that most Saints have roll/stacking friction, and those coins should be graded as mint state coins.

I'm not even gonna touch the rest of what you wrote there.

It doesn't matter that you graded the coin differently, your aren't a subcontractor, you are an employee. If your grading principles dictate that the coins are AU, but you are fine with them changing your grade because they are paying you, you are a sell out. That is literally the definition of a sell out. It begs the question though. If they just ignore your assigned grade and simply go with the grade assigned by the finalizer, why don't they just have him grade the coins?

I made a very logical argument which deserves an answer better than, "don't be naive!" There are only two scenarios. First is that the TPGs don't change their grading standards. The second is that there is a criminal conspiracy and they are engaged in an ongoing fraud that effects the entire coin collecting community.

I am 47 years old.

 

How does an error related to the numerical number happen before the coin gets to the grading room exactly?

 

And that is one of the reasons why they don’t publish the fact that they do. Even Baseball has admitted that they have changed their standards. That’s when you know it is fact.

 

So you are saying that PCGS, a publicly traded company has been committing an ongoing fraud for decades? As someone who has actually worked in the corporate world, I find that notion to be wholly unbelievable.

 

We may never know the true motivations, but I agree with you that generating resubmissions isn’t one of them. The only people who would know if there is indeed a cyclic change in grading standards (intentional or not) are the dealers who submit far more coins than you or I. I interact with such people at shows and on Facebook and the like. There is occasionally mention that “PCGS has gotten really tight on XXX” or “NGC has gotten loose on XXX”. That’s more telling than someone just saying that there is no cycle.

Well, they don’t explicitly say that their standards are guaranteed to never change, and they also throw in that convenient “opinion” word. Even if a big-shot dealer sued them for fraud based on incrementally-changing standards overall, I doubt a court would side with the dealer.

However, the dealer may have a case if he focuses on the fact that some of the standards explicitly published on PCGS’ website (no wear on MS coins, ANY abrasive cleaning warrants a details grade, etc.) do not match their actual practice, which can cause damages.

 

I don't know about NGC, but for PCGS that is multiple grades off as in several minimum not one or two.

Also as a side note it's generally the people who come the most aggressive that have the most problems with things like that.

 

Great question! Think about it some more. What is on the label: Date, denomination, grade, company name, identifier. I've put in color what can be incorrect due to some error while at the TPGS. Everything in color can be changed by any grader. Raw coins come up in the graders' computer with the red filled out. The graders put in a grade. The grade is their personal opinion.

When a coin gets out with the wrong information (colored) it is the fault of the grading room! After it is graded and slabbed, the QC guy is the last to see it. He is in the grading room.

Tell @Lehigh96 that cannot be true! That would be fraud.

 

Your innocence is a positive trait. I hope you are able to keep it as you age while a collector. If I graded a coin AU-50 1986 and MS-62 in 2019 did I commit a fraud? If I graded a coin MS-65 the three times I examined it over a year and then decided it was actually a 66, did I defraud the person who owned it when it was still a 65? Do I lose sleep because this happens all the time? No.

 

The old scale was broken from day one. The overall standards are overwhelmingly the same, but there is no fraud or changes for resubmissions like so many suggest. Increased knowledge changes things over time, always have always will. The initial grading didn't even use the full MS scale so something can upgrade with no standard chance at all because it was being rounded before.

Don't drag me into the conspiracy nonsense it's exactly that. I get what Lehigh is saying and he's saying many of the same things just people like to play word games with him like some others liked to troll me.

But don't play the word games here, standards are always evolving in everything and over long periods of time will change from the evolution, but don't try and make it sound like they sat down one day saying time to turn everything upside down

 

No, but it doesn't mean you were right the first time as a 50 either. For some reason (likely because it makes coins cheaper) the lower number is always assumed correct. I had a mechanical error before where a clearly AU coin came back an F and it wasn't even debatable, simply being a lower number doesn't make it right or better.

If you changed the grade because of the submitter yes, if you blindly changed it than no

 

@baseball21

Too many what if's to deal with. I could add a few more that don't apply to my examples.

Good Night all! Fun thread. ZZZzzzzzzzzz.

 

I don't care what some anecdotal experiences of disgruntled sellers are, they don't meet the statistical requirements to prove that their disappointing results are anything more than inherent subjectivity in the grading process. Furthermore, the only motivation to change grading standards is to generate resubmissions. If you don't believe that is the reason, then you are accusing the management of these companies with gross incompetence.

If someone sued, it seems they could obtain internal documents related to the grading practices. Without written proof that the TPGs actually are guilty of this conspiracy theory, and lawsuit would be DOA.