Friday 24 August 2012

Changes Afoot at Delcampe

A Business Responding to its Customers! - Whatever Next?

Delcampe has announced changes to it's fee structure, in a move to remove the hordes of minimum-value stamp listings caused by their no-listing-fee policy. 

They are introducing a fixed-fee charge for each item sold of €0.15, in addition to the monthly commission. I think this is a marvellous initiative. Do a search of any basic stamp on Delcampe and you will often find hundreds listed, at €0.05. While you can exclude them from your search, these listings are costing Delcampe money in bandwidth, and slow down searches due to overloaded servers.

Delcampe listings can be set to relist, for free, almost indefinitely. This is another area that they are looking into, along with the following:
  • the possibility for a buyer to exclude the sales of a certain seller in a listing,
  • automatic closure of sales which have not received any visits for a certain period of time,
  • an automatic price reduction for items fulfilling certain conditions,
  • the insertion of at least one picture,  
  • changing unsold auctions to fixed price sales
Delcampe have created a Google doc for comments here. Why not express your opinion, as at least you know they are listening. I have suggested a minimum pixel size for pictures, to remove dross like this from their site (the seller, all of whose images are like this, had a starting bid of €2.00 on this)


I think Delcampe deserve the support of collectors the world over for responding to requests for change. 

Another global auction site would do well to respond to it's customers in a similar way!

(please note that I have no affiliation with Delcampe, other than previously selling on the site, and as a customer)

Friday 10 August 2012

The 1935 Silver Jubilee - A New Discovery? UPDATE

Another Example of an Unlisted Variety?

In my blog of 22 June, I showed an example of a potential new discovery on Northern Rhodesia SG21, the 6d  Silver Jubilee issue. It takes the form of a "derrick" on the Round Tower, left of the flagstaff



I'm pleased to report that I've located another, very similar, example on a commercial site, which I've just purchased. However, this is on SG19, the 2d value.


I'm intrigued by this variety, which is far more visible than some of the listed varieties on the Silver Jubilee Omnibus issue

My search will continue for more, and I would appreciate any and all information for further research.

Specifically, as a sheet position would be needed to confirm this as constant, or semi-constant, it would be ideal if it showed in a positional block. If you have any holdings, please check them!

Tuesday 7 August 2012

The Great St Helena Rip Off - Part 2

Cancelled Remainders - Quantities

Subsequent to my blog of 24 July, I received some information about the quantities of key-plate remainders that were cancelled with the violet diamond-grill cancel in 1904.

The information was confirmed, with the following details from an article published in 1981:

  • 1½d - 49,409
  • 2d - 58,394
  • 2½d - 29,229
  • 5d - 39,588
  • 10d - 43,376
That's a staggering 219,996 stamps, with a combined face value of over £3,700!

There are two types of diamond, one with five bars and one with four, with the former being the scarcer. So, I suppose, if you really want to collect these abominations, you could focus on the scarcer ones!

The violet cancel can also be removed, and fake cancels exist.

For illustrations of genuine cancels, I would recommend The Postal History of Ascension, St Helena and Tristan de Cunha by Proud.