now I can see the lack of detail ... so does eBay has the same kind of pictures? or they list bad quality and claim it is a real coin? may be advice should be "do not buy expensive coins with bad pictures"?
I do not know, most sellers use graphic project instead real photo. I thought you can always ask for high quality pictures but looks like some of the seller are being offended.
My opinion is that if a seller is going to ship you fake chinese coins, they can also use pictures of other sellers and then ship you a bad coin. They are also doing like this on ebay. And is also useless that you ask for an update picture, cause they can have a real coin in hand to take pictures, but again send you a fake coin. Above Power Coin was mentioned by barsenault. Power Coin is for sure a CIT direct distributor and very reliable seller, I bought from them Hedgehog and Argali same day the coin was presented to public. Other reliable CIT distributors I know are Paris Coins, Intercoins, Downies and few other I trust 100%. If you buy from small dealers who bought in second market, you can never be sure, because maybe they bought thinking it was a genuine coin, but nowadays the copies could be almost perfect. So don't ask to dealer. Ask directly to CIT providing the dealer name, if the dealer is quite big. Small sellers I doubt they are direct CIT distributors cause CIT works only with a few around the world, that can guarantee big purchase volumes than not every seller can afford to be their distributor. Alex.
I still think that asking for high res photos should give you some cover. First of all, most of the cameras or smartphones offer geo location. So if you go to properties and see location as Germany (when your seller is from Canada for example) or date which is 5 months old you know that something is not right. Second, if you get your coin and it differs from previously sent pictures, simply go and start claim via PayPal. You should have your money back in just a few days.
Good points Acme. Hoping that the seller with fake coins doesn't remove photo EXIF data (sometime it is enough to resize and save, and the picture info are lost), and that the seller haven't left the paypal account empty, in that case paypal doesn't cover anything. Maybe asking a picture wiht seller business card beside coin, would help even more. But think also about seller, if all buyers would ask such things, would be such a waste of time. But for selling a valuable coin I think that a seller would do that. Alex.
Not sure if all sites do this but if you register with PayPal PL you MUST provide credit card and bank detail as well as signed direct debit. Even if your PayPal account is empty, they will get money of you via direct debit. I would say that same should apply to all PayPals (com, au, de, etc.) but I am not certain so it good to check before you buy. Important: always use PayPal, if possible
And you can get an extra cover if you pay your PayPal invoice using your credit card. MasterCard or AmericanExpress should cover this as well as PayPal protection.
Those 2 pictures CIT (real and fake) they sent someone here were actually mine, I sent CIT the flickr link and everything. I told you they were getting pretty good. They were trying to do something about it against the seller. By the way, sellers have the habit of posting pictures that do not belong to them, ex. from a catalog, then when you buy the item they send you the counterfeit. Paypal/eBay can't do whack about it. they tell you that you have to send the coin back (overseas) to receive a refund, but ITS A FEDERAL OFFENSE TO SHIP ANY COUNTERFEIT ITEM THROUGH THE US POSTAL SYSTEM! eBay doesn't give a rat's ass if you commit a federal offense. Its just a BIG HEADACHE! Only buy from US sellers if you must.
is it real? i have no idea if it is from CIT dealer or others ... if there's anything wrong with the coin let me know
Or seller "hacked" someone's account / faked the location and you will get them from China... It's lottery (and trust - you can decide which thing you trust more ).
well, I kind of trust the seller as I bought couple of of coins from the guy: chinese, australian lunar .... P.S. saying that if I find it fake I might try to return it, and if he refuses to accept it and it is fake - I can easily report to police and the guy will be prosecuted (it is illegal here to sell the fakes)
You shouldn't be worried if seller has good rating and especially if this is not first purchase. eBay sells are based on trust. Check his feedback carefully. If you know him, then no problem. Just realize that there is possibility that it's getting fakes and it doesn't know about it and that its account can be "hijacked". But that is the same: you can cross one road 10000 time, and on 10001 stampede of rhinos will happen and they will run through you... So best bet is to be optimistic.
Stark, you are right ... that's why there's eBay protection, so when proved fake money will be returned The warning is very good as buyers should be cautious what they buy and check the coin whenever whoever they buy from.
