A collector recently showed me a MNH pair of Scott #613 that he bought on eBay for just over $300. What’s wrong with this picture? Plenty!

There are no genuine mint copies of Scott #613 known. There are approximately 50 used copies known. It has a Scott catalog value (used) of $40,000. I took one look at the pair which had perfs all around the outside, but was imperf vertically between the two stamps. It only took a second to realize that what he bought was a pair of Scott #611 (the imperf issue) and someone added fraudulent perforations around the outside edges only of the pair of stamps, making it an “imperf between” pair. I hope he gets a full refund from the seller.

I recently ran short on some coil line pairs of Scott #1054A. None of my usual sources had any. I found someone on eBay who had them for sale. It’s a pretty common modern issue. I shouldn’t have to worry about fakes or regummed stamps. Pretty easy, right?

I bought 3 coil line pairs. I received them and they were just pairs, not line pairs. I contacted the seller and asked for coil line pairs. After a week of going back and forth in email, I finally asked for just a refund. She thought that because the stamps were side by side (and not in a block of 4 form), that made them “in a line”, therefore, they were “line” pairs. She had absolutely no clue what a line pair is and I couldn’t explain it to her.

I’ve said this before. There are definitely some people selling stamps on eBay that have absolutely no idea what they are doing. They got a collection from somewhere and they bought a catalog. That now makes them a “stamp dealer”.

Some eBay sellers know what they are doing. And you can find some bargains on eBay. But in my experience, there is just too much incorrectly described material and too many clueless “dealers” to make it worth my while. I made note of this clueless seller so that I never buy anything from her again. It was a huge waste of my time over such a common stamp.