CGC’s OFFICIAL Mechanical Errors / Returns Policy 11 11

[asteroid-comix]

On 5/16/2023 at 9:02 PM, Tcarroll17 said:

I like to think it's negligence, not intentional...but really makes you wonder with this policy change.  I think the levy finally broke for me.  

Back today... After paying for walkthrough...pressing takes 11 days.  Grading takes another 9 days, both WK tier.  Mind you, took 5 days to open the box, covered in red and black WK.  Okay, great, they get slammed, I can live with it, although it's not cool for paying a premium.  

What I CANNOT tolerate, is after waiting 25 days for an advertised 5 days total TAT (3 pressing + 2 grading when sent in), is my cherished collectible being returned to me like this.  Like what the actual heck?  It is COVERED in the now standard CGC smudge/scuffs/goo/whateveritis on the sealed bag.

I mean, seriously, how is this acceptable to return to me like this?  

Now my recourse is to rush it back in, lickety split, or else I'm out another $50+2x shipping charges.  Wait 60-90 days and pray that maybe, just maybe it will look better this time.  

I was beyond excited to get this back.  It's like being a kid on Christmas morning again.  Then just absolutely crushed when it has issues.  Unbelievable.  

Pictures are just the worst.  It is all over, 1-3mm spots up and down.  Somehow the back is crystal clear, yay.  

That's unacceptable. How is that not caught? How does someone let that go out the door? There can't be any quality control, given that is not uncommon. If that were the exception, it could be marked down as isolated human error. But, with virtually everyone getting submissions back with issues, there can't be any type of quality process.

If it were isolated, they wouldn't be coming out with a policy like they have here. They are hemorrhaging money (errrrr...gluttonous profit) on ME (paying shipping, materials, etc.). They are trying to stop the bleeding and have no other ideas on how to make that happen. 

Having studied organizations and run operations for a very long time at a very high-level with a terminal degree for the same on the horizon, I'll say this as fact. These inconsistencies and quality issues are just what we see, but there are others. There are serious breakdowns in process happening at CGC (which comes from poor leadership). Heck, just look at the way they track cycle-time. Cycle-time starts from the point when they open the package? Serious? How is that my experience as a customer? The cycle-time of a firm should represent the experience of the consumer when you publish it to convey to the customer how long something should take, not your internal garbage processes. How do they not see this? No one cares about how long it takes Johnny from the point at which he opens the package. They care about it from the point you got the package until when you sent it out. That's a firm more concerned about themselves than their consumers. Period. 

My next batch of books are going someplace else. If anyone thinks that the grading, book storage and protection, or anything else at CGC is being run effectively and consistently, you are delusional. You don't wet the bed this consistently on quality of cases and nail everything else. It just doesn't work that way with organizations. I remember the old days when we used to joke on these forums about the grading company that was being paid for grades or swapping books out. Well, how far we have come. I no longer trust CGC. 
 

Edited May 17, 2023 by asteroid-comix

[JollyComics]

You have increased prices and made stricter policies in last few years BUT you have NOT improved Quality Control for a long time.  Returning within 14 days is NEVER enough and is NOT 100% justified or satisfied.

A prolonged QC problems haven't solved and you are trying to cut down losses while you have increased the prices to make up upon the losses.   Please fix QC problems!

 

Edited May 17, 2023 by JollyComics

[Tcarroll17]

On 5/16/2023 at 9:44 PM, asteroid-comix said:

That's unacceptable. How is that not caught? How does someone let that go out the door? There can't be any quality control, given that is not uncommon. If that were the exception, it could be marked down as isolated human error. But, with virtually everyone getting submissions back with issues, there can't be any type of quality process.

If it were isolated, they wouldn't be coming out with a policy like they have here. They are hemorrhaging money (errrrr...gluttonous profit) on ME (paying shipping, materials, etc.). They are trying to stop the bleeding and have no other ideas on how to make that happen. 

Having studied organizations and run operations for a very long time at a very high-level with a terminal degree for the same on the horizon, I'll say this as fact. These inconsistencies and quality issues are just what we see, but there are others. There are serious breakdowns in process happening at CGC (which comes from poor leadership). Heck, just look at the way they track cycle-time. Cycle-time starts from the point when they open the package? Serious? How is that my experience as a customer? The cycle-time of a firm should represent the experience of the consumer when you publish it to convey to the customer how long something should take, not your internal garbage processes. How do they not see this? No one cares about how long it takes Johnny from the point at which he opens the package. They care about it from the point you got the package until when you sent it out. That's a firm more concerned about themselves than their consumers. Period. 

My next batch of books are going someplace else. If anyone thinks that the grading, book storage and protection, or anything else at CGC is being run effectively and consistently, you are delusional. You don't wet the bed this consistently on quality of cases and nail everything else. It just doesn't work that way with organizations. I remember the old days when we used to joke on these forums about the grading company that was being paid for grades or swapping books out. Well, how far we have come. I no longer trust CGC. 
 

It's absolutely baffling, infuriating, and frankly, insulting.  Honestly, shame on me at this point.  Had so many issues the last few months.  Should have learned my lesson last month with my GSX 1.  Near same situation, except the TAT was spot on.  Press looked great.  But my slab is littered with the scuffs, and then the inner bag had two plastic shards inside.  Not in the slab, literally sealed in the bag, touching the comic.  

I agree.  The only conclusion I can arrive at is that there is literally no QC.  There cannot be.  It's impossible.  If, by some chance there is really QC, I cannot even begin to fathom how bad the other issues are?  Like how bad are the other QC problems that they see my extremely valuable comic littered with scuffing and say, "yeah, you know what, good enough compared to those other, more egregious errors I caught."  I've found these scuffs are hard to capture in pictures, but they are obvious in-person.  A human could not have looked at this Hulk 181 and not noticed.  No way, it's all over the front, it's the first thing you see, not my favorite character flying claws out, but the scuffs.

Right, it's basically a game of chicken.  They are daring people to send it back.  You want to rush it back, wait 3 months, and maybe not even fix the problem?  You want us to possibly charge you because we say you are wrong and the issue is "acceptable?" We dare you, roll the dice, come on!  90% of people probably will never send it back in.  In reality, the rate of errors is probably much greater, because many people just eat it.  

In summation I would echo what you say.  I no longer trust CGC.  I won't do it anymore.  This is a hobby...it used to be fun.  This is insane and I'm jumping off the carousel.  If the other guys were smart they'd offer a $5 conversion to their product.  In the end, the product speaks for itself.  And this product is simply vomiting.

[Le Chat Noir]

On 5/16/2023 at 4:22 PM, Stefan_W said:

I can understand some of this but the newton rings one is a joke. I have had to send 16 books back out of a 25 book order before due to major newton rings everywhere, and if that happens now I am stuck with them. 

People buying on Ebay are still going to return books if they see the flaws that no longer qualify. The amount of discount slabs out there is going to skyrocket. 

This is the biggest issue. Most people aren't going to M-E over a minor <10% ring... as it will probably come back worse. But when it completely obstructs the focal point and ruins the presentation of the book, what's the point in getting it encapsulated? It isn't as though CGC can't prevent rings from happening. They've chosen not to. Sellers shouldn't need to put a disclaimer about Newton rings, QA should check for them.

[wombat]

So what if you use a facilitator or a shop to submit for you? Its like the biggest FU they can possibly come up with. Not 4 weeks. Not 3 weeks. 2 frigging weeks. Better pray you aren't out of town when books come in. Just when you think they couldn't possibly care less about their customers they do something like that. Good work. 

[Buzzetta]

So they cannot get their own turnaround times under control where it can take almost a year for them to process your books but are only offering you 14 days including transit time to get your items back to them after they screw things up HOPING that they notice them in the warehouse. 

Yeah, there is a reason they are getting ripped right now across social media over this right now. 

 

[Beastfeast]

Yep...Not renewing membership after this.  I've never even sent a ME return back but if this is the way forward for this company, don't let the door hit ya where God split ya.  

Edited May 17, 2023 by Beastfeast

[wombat]

Is this the straw that broke the camel's back for some of you? Its mind boggling to me it hasn't already happened. 

[Tcarroll17]

On 5/16/2023 at 11:11 PM, wombat said:

Is this the straw that broke the camel's back for some of you? Its mind boggling to me it hasn't already happened. 

It's not the policy so much as the policy change in conjunction with price increase and QC issues.  I would have no problem with this policy if 70% of the books I get didn't need ME returns.  I don't trust them to fix them, so I'll just be done sending instead. 

Edited May 17, 2023 by Tcarroll17

[Buzzetta]

On 5/16/2023 at 11:13 PM, Tcarroll17 said:

It's not the policy so much as the policy change in conjunction with price increase and QC issues.  I would have no problem with this policy if 70% of the books I get didn't need ME returns.  I don't trust them to fix them, so I'll just be done sending instead. 

There were quite a few books in Heritage's auction over the last couple of days that were sold raw.

There were books that when all said and done reached a value where years ago it would have made sense to have graded and encapsulated. 

@VintageComics was correct with this and I think we are starting to see a market shift where reputable auction houses and dealers will just abandon CGC if the policies and turnaround times as well as the prices and business decisions no longer make sense to use their service. 

[Stefan_W]

On 5/16/2023 at 11:11 PM, wombat said:

Is this the straw that broke the camel's back for some of you? Its mind boggling to me it hasn't already happened. 

If there was a competitor waiting in the wings this would be a huge issue for CGC, but in all honestly it is a one-horse race right now when it comes to comic grading and CGC can do what it wants. 

The potential impacts of this decision have been rolling around in my head all evening. Sure, I will have less books graded. I haven't had an order without an ME in ages, and now that a lot of issues are no longer covered I feel less confident sending books in. That is all a first order effect which is obvious. But there are second order effects as well. For example, I regularly buy books from Comic Link and sometimes I get books with defects in the slab. This is frustrating because they never list these defects in the listing. I can see people who get books with newton rings and other things just dumping them at CL in the future knowing full well that people will bid as if those flaws did not exist, and although I do not own a crystal ball I anticipate that percentage of flawed slabs in their auctions will grow. This means I am less likely to buy comics from sites like that (caveat that prior to bidding you can check the slab number to see if it was slabbed before or after May 16 2023 but I am really not doing to do that). 

[WernerVonDoom]

So let's say someone submits an Amazing Fantasy 15 (say $500 in fees) and it comes back with a labeled as a Aquaman 6.  The submitter is on vacation and misses the 14 calendar day window. This policy says, too bad, you are stuck with the Aquaman 6 unless you pay for shipping both ways and the high dollar reholder fee.  OMG

I seriously never thought they would do this. I knew not fixing newton rings and scratches would be a debate, but not fixing an incorrect label?!?! 

This is incredible. 

[skypinkblu]

On 5/17/2023 at 12:02 AM, WernerVonDoom said:

So let's say someone submits an Amazing Fantasy 15 (say $500 in fees) and it comes back with a labeled as a Aquaman 6.  The submitter is on vacation and misses the 14 calendar day window. This policy says, too bad, you are stuck with the Aquaman 6 unless you pay for shipping both ways and the high dollar reholder fee.  OMG

I seriously never thought they would do this. I knew not fixing newton rings and scratches would be a debate, but not fixing an incorrect label?!?! 

This is incredible. 

When those labels start showing up on eBay...what will that do for the brand?

[captainzombie]

I posted this in the QC thread, but would probably be good here to.

@CGC Mike Please have a talk with upper management and if you need examples (like you guys don't have enough already), please use the images that I sent as a PM to you two weeks ago where I had several books all get mislabeled. I try to privately message you about the issues I encounter out of respect and I know you do your job to help us out, but some of these issues of late are not cool.

I think a lot of us can swallow these price hikes and inconsistent kinks in some of the process if the tables (with regards to cases) by Blackstone and CGC are not turned around on the customer.

They really then need to figure out the situation with these cruddy cases if they plan to have 14 day return policy to fix the issues. Even worse is the newton rings on cases now are our problem, when in actuality its the cases you guys use. Then if the cases are in such bad shape, your company should be really looking at a new company to produce better cases. My previous submission before last, I had a case that looked like it was dragged on pavement and then placed in the box to be shipped to me.

[Le Chat Noir]

On 5/16/2023 at 10:50 PM, Stefan_W said:

If there was a competitor waiting in the wings this would be a huge issue for CGC

They're out there and they have a really ugly label.

[Cat]

This policy is fine, BUT CGC needs to remove their advertising that states their 'crystal clear case' and all that nonsense, as it's apparent that that's not the case, and they have no intention of making sure that's the case. It'd blatant false advertising, and I hope they get reamed for it. 

No wonder they can't keep QC staff. I wouldn't be able to tolerate this BS either. 

[Tec-Tac-Toe]

[IcedDog]

On 5/16/2023 at 4:17 PM, ak47po said:

For more information about Newton’s rings, watch the video below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That video (unlisted on their YT channel btw) is hilarious...the basic gist is don't worry, Newton rings are just an "optical illusion", it's a trick of light, and it happens with all kinds of archival solutions...even on cell phones 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 5/17/2023 at 5:11 AM, skypinkblu said:

On 5/17/2023 at 5:02 AM, WernerVonDoom said:

So let's say someone submits an Amazing Fantasy 15 (say $500 in fees) and it comes back with a labeled as a Aquaman 6.  The submitter is on vacation and misses the 14 calendar day window. This policy says, too bad, you are stuck with the Aquaman 6 unless you pay for shipping both ways and the high dollar reholder fee.  OMG

I seriously never thought they would do this. I knew not fixing newton rings and scratches would be a debate, but not fixing an incorrect label?!?! 

This is incredible. 

When those labels start showing up on eBay...what will that do for the brand?

This is the exact position I find myself in this morning. I have an AF15 set up on the system - my first ever submission - and it's going to cost me £1,215 to have it graded via the UK office if I decide to press send. That is a lot of money even with my grading contest credit reduction. Now I see that CGC have 'clarified' their terms and conditions. The timing of that action in itself speaks volumes as to how lucky I am and if my submission comes back with issues, as my luck suggests it will, the scope for successful, cost-free resolution appears to have narrowed somewhat for most ME scenarios and has been removed completely for Newton Rings (if I'm reading it all correctly). 

Even with all that has gone before, and my word hasn't there been a lot of it, I'm scratching my head here wondering how even CGC's management team can think this is an acceptable policy announcement. Has the time finally come for us to stop giving them the benefit of the doubt and accept that their business practices intentionally fall some way short of what would be considered acceptable in any other industry? Am I the only one here who feels that participation on this forum is fast becoming a nose-holding exercise? Why do we give CGC our time and patronage? Do they deserve it? Why do we submit and why do we keep this forum running through our participation, often posting freely the type of information that draws in new members and which others would likely charge for? In all other walks of life, if you disagree strongly with how a private company does its business you steer clear of them. There are good people in the CGC operation, but this is not a company that I feel I want to support anymore, if this latest announcement stands and is as it seems.

Seven years I've been here and the first time I go to submit a comic they redefine Newton Rings as acceptable in all cases. That's quite comical given the poll I posted all those years ago. It almost feels like payback. So if my book comes back covered in them, I'm reading that I will have to pay to give CGC a second go at it but with no guarantee that the end product will be any better. Dear, oh dear. Werner - you hit the nail on the head: it is indeed incredible. Incredible and indefensible.

 

[Gaard]

CGC - "We F'd up. We'll give you about a week to complain about it. After that, if you want us to fix our F-up, pay us."

 

 

pathetic