Authorized dealer question 0

[rponton]

Good afternoon all,

I am in the process of having several books submitted to CGC.  I am concerned with shipping them to CGC because I don't trust shipping people.
I will be in Sarasota at the end of the month.  I am already aware that I cannot drop books off to CGC directly (I called and asked them)
That brings me to the question of finding someone local that is an authorized dealer. There are a few.
Has anyone here used any of them?  Your feelings?  experiences?  Gut checks/ etc?
Obviously, we don't grade our trash, so these are items I place a certain value on, either financial or personal value.
Are there dealers in the Sarasota area that are preferred?
I would love your thoughts.

[revat]

I don't know a ton about Sarasota dealers, and I'm sure others will be along with better answers....but in the event you don't get a satisfactory answer, there are other potential alternatives:

CGC attends some comic conventions, and has a booth with real employees and accepts submissions at those, which are then taken back to Florida by the employees and graded as any other submission.

You can check the calendar on the CGC website to see which conventions they will be attending (in some rare cases, it is possible CGC will have on-site grading at the convention, though it is unusual, it will be labeled on the calendar).  

good luck

[ramrodcar]

Even if you find someone to hand deliver them (or you drop off at a con), you're still going to have to trust unknown quantities of people to handle your books with care (check out the quality control thread), as well pack and deliver the books back to you via fedex. Insure your books, trust the process...

[Iceman399]

@joeypost he's semi local and to my understanding hand drops the books off to cgc.  Not sure if this is something he'd facilitate or not but I'm sure if you offered to compensate him you guys could work something out.

[rponton]

@ramrodcar

I do trust the process, or I wouldn't even consider it.  I've submitted through a con in the past for a book I had signed at that con.

There is a difference between:
-Handing a book over to an identified employee of the bonded company that will be handling my book, which I did at the con  (trusting the system)
*OR*
-Emailing some person I found on the list of authorized dealers, with an area code inconsistent with where his business is, no address on the website, not much in the way of public reviews of the business and having him tell me to meet him in a strip mall parking lot and pay the fees with PayPal's "friends and family".  There's not a major red flag here, but about a zillion little things that make me nervous.

 

And I want to be clear, I am in no way making any accusation of fraud here.  The person I spoke to seems very knowledgeable and like a nice person, but it behooves me to be cautious and to check the process against other folks' experiences.

Edited July 8, 2022 by rponton

[ADAMANTIUM]

On 7/8/2022 at 12:24 PM, rponton said:

@ramrodcar

I do trust the process, or I wouldn't even consider it.  I've submitted through a con in the past for a book I had signed at that con.

There is a difference between:
-Handing a book over to an identified employee of the bonded company that will be handling my book, which I did at the con  (trusting the system)
*OR*
-Emailing some person I found on the list of authorized dealers, with an area code inconsistent with where his business is, no address on the website, not much in the way of public reviews of the business and having him tell me to meet him in a strip mall parking lot and pay the fees with PayPal's "friends and family".  There's not a major red flag here, but about a zillion little things that make me nervous.

 

And I want to be clear, I am in no way making any accusation of fraud here.  The person I spoke to seems very knowledgeable and like a nice person, but it behooves me to be cautious and to check the process against other folks' experiences.

do you have your own cgc account? if yes, then insure it for what you want through the "bonded?" FedEx or USPS registered mail?

If you don't have your own cgc membership I can see your trepidation, as you wouldn't have a way to track your books through CGC's system.

May I suggest the membership tier that gives you the price paid for membership as membership credit towards submissions? That $150 credit now covers towards everything in a CGC order, but if the cost is higher, you'd pay the difference when CGC receives the books.

 

[rponton]

@ADAMANTIUM

I run a business shipping fragile items all over the country.  If you have ever had to argue the insured value of a damaged item, you'd understand my trepidation.
Sending ungraded books in the mail?  Try convincing the adjuster at the USPS that this pile of paper was worth "X" amount of dollars.  At least on the return shipping they will have been graded and the historical documentation CGC has on graded book sales will be useful in an insurance claim.

 

This whol exercise is built around my mistrust of the shipping people.

[Transplant]

On 7/8/2022 at 12:24 PM, rponton said:

@ramrodcar

I do trust the process, or I wouldn't even consider it.  I've submitted through a con in the past for a book I had signed at that con.

There is a difference between:
-Handing a book over to an identified employee of the bonded company that will be handling my book, which I did at the con  (trusting the system)
*OR*
-Emailing some person I found on the list of authorized dealers, with an area code inconsistent with where his business is, no address on the website, not much in the way of public reviews of the business and having him tell me to meet him in a strip mall parking lot and pay the fees with PayPal's "friends and family".  There's not a major red flag here, but about a zillion little things that make me nervous.

 

And I want to be clear, I am in no way making any accusation of fraud here.  The person I spoke to seems very knowledgeable and like a nice person, but it behooves me to be cautious and to check the process against other folks' experiences.

1000 times out of 1000, I'd rather mail in books of the very high grade and valuable, but not TOOOO valuable, variety.  I've seen people at the CGC booth get a little grabby with drop offs.  At least, that was what I experienced years ago when people still went to cons where CGC accepted books in person.  Just that, between damage occurring to a well packed group of books vs. damage occurring to a stack of raws as they go in box after box at CGC's booth, I'll take my chances with the mail.  

[revat]

To clarify as an FYI for some folks out there:

Pre-pandemic, CGC members (of some tier, irrelevant now) could make an appointment with CGC headquarters, and essentially walk in and drop off books.  

RIGHT NOW, the ONLY folks who can do "in-person drop off" are CGC AUTHORIZED DEALERS, which is something else entirely.