ctbrian Posted January 28, 2023 Share Posted January 28, 2023 I have seen at some conventions there are 3rd parties that will submit books to Cgc for you. Does it cost more to use these companies vs submitting directly yourself? Not sure how the 3rd parties make money. Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
revat Posted January 28, 2023 Share Posted January 28, 2023 Some yes some no If the price works for you then do it, if not then dont theres different tiers of membership and different rates, and possibly economies of scale Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theCapraAegagrus Posted January 30, 2023 Share Posted January 30, 2023 The guy I used to submit through did. If I ever submit again, it'll be direct, simply because I would deal directly with CGC if I experience any issues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Nikon Posted January 30, 2023 Share Posted January 30, 2023 The simple answer to your question is, it depends - if the third party decides to charge a service fee for submitting your books. Even if they don't add a service fee, the 3rd parties I've looked into for this purpose all pass the shipping fee to the customer. I don't have a huge collection, so I only submit my books for signature events or just the really special books, so I don't have a large and consistent volumet to send in and so I'm fairly sensitive to shipping fees. A 3rd party (e.g. my local comic shop), will usually wait to get a larger number of submissions together before sending to CGC. They will also send/receive the shipment on their courier account which usually ends up being a lower shipping cost per book. I'm in Canada so CGC only gives me the option of using their preferred international courier (FedEx) at a cost of USD$80 - obviously very costly if I'm submitting only one or two books at a time, so unless I decide to set up an account with a courier and use this to send/receive submissions, advantage goes to the 3rd party. Even with the shipping cost being potentially lower with the 3rd party, it adds to the amount of time to wait to get your book back if they wait to reach a minimum number of books for their shipment. So if you want quicker turnaround, go direct. That said, CGC's current turnaround times for regular grading submissions is pretty long (and estimated vs actual completion times is a topic for another thread - and let's not get started on the estimated vs actual time when you add CCS pressing services) so a couple of weeks more with the 3rd party may not matter to you. Another consideration for submitting via 3rd party is that the submission will not show up in your submission tracker under your CGC account. Your submission will be tied to the 3rd party's CGC account and so you'll need to go through them to get any updates on your book(s). Connected to this and as has been noted in another reply to your post, is that any issues you have with your submission (e.g. cracked case), you'll have to take up with the 3rd party. All to say that anything you need to handle with your submission could end up being a hassle if the 3rd party customer service is unsupportive of your situation. Personally, I prefer going direct to CGC as it keeps things simple - it allows me to track submissions, see the grading notes (when CGC decides to include them), and I have the ability to deal with CGC directly if anything goes pear shaped. Hope this helps! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ctbrian Posted February 2, 2023 Author Share Posted February 2, 2023 Thank you for the very thorough answer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
