I Have Been Wondering Why People Buy Unfranked Stamps At 85% To 90% Face Value

[spottymeg53]

I Have Been Wondering Why People Buy Unfranked Stamps At 85% To 90% Face Value and then have to pay $1.50 To $1.99 Postage on top of the Buy Now Price. It is illegal to use these stamps. I buy new stamps with gum from a very reliable source for about 70% Face Value and on occasions I can purchase Complete Year Books at Auctions for about 30% face value. We are both pensioners and are allowed 50 consession stamps each at 60 cents each for the next 2 years or so. Why do people break the law in this matter? It is not worth it, this is a Federal offence and not taken lightly in the courts. The number of letters I receive through eBay is about 3 or 4 a month and 80% are reused stamps. If i think they are reused I place them in water for a little while and you can see the glue they were stuck on with. I don't like it especially when you are charge full postal costs. Love to hear comments.

Meg

[247newdeals]

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@lyndal1838 wrote:

But just because people use glue to attach stamps it does not necessarily mean that there is anything wrong with it.

Did you read my comment that I was told by the PO to use glue on the stamps that I bought that did not have sufficient glue to stick on the envelopes?

I also have a large stamp collection that I inherited.  I have no interest in them so often use stamps from the collection on mail.  Again the glue has deteriorated so I have to use new glue....there is nothing illegal at all.

Your buyers are paying you to post their items.  How do you know that they are all pensioners and entitled to the cheap postage stamps?   Your buyers are getting what YOU are entitled to, whether they are entitled to it or not.

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I suppose it depends where you are getting the stamps from after I read this post I did a quick search on Ebay and there are sellers who are selling what are clearly reused stamps. By reused I mean they have been through the postage system but come out without a frank mark. When I read unfranked stamps it is them I assume are being talked about. It is not really about gluing the stamps on, if needed, but reusing stamps.

[advertorium]

Hey Spotty,

I would love to know where I can get new stamps at 50% FV.

I buy mine at 20 - 25% and I thought I was doing ok. 

[tcrazer]

I'd love to know too!!

[medalsbadgespatches]

Firstly not new stamps- mint unused stamps. As long as they are decimal they are ok to use. Secondly - do your own homework and find out

[*tippy*toes*]

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@247newdeals wrote:

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I suppose it depends where you are getting the stamps from after I read this post I did a quick search on Ebay and there are sellers who are selling what are clearly reused stamps. By reused I mean they have been through the postage system but come out without a frank mark. When I read unfranked stamps it is them I assume are being talked about. It is not really about gluing the stamps on, if needed, but reusing stamps.

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Saying in a listing that stamps are unfranked doesn't necessarily mean they have been through the system and soaked off envelopes. It just means they haven't been cancelled because there is a reasonable chance they haven't been used. You can also buy franked, or cancelled, stamps on eBay because some people prefer to collect those (why, I'm not sure as the value is only a small amount of an unfranked one, but they have their reasons).

I bought something the other day and looked at the sellers other items to see if they had anything else I might like. They had 4 listings for stamps and they were complete sheets of gummed stamps. They were listed as unfranked. No way they had been soaked off an envelope and reattached to each other with all the holes matching perfectly back up.

You need to learn a bit about stamps and a bit about the system before you start spouting off and trying to get sellers in trouble, not to mention accusing them of breaking the law.

Yes, there have been a couple of sellers who sold what they thought were unfranked stamps, when in fact they had been franked, but it had either faded or washed off. The sorting machines soon picked it up and the buyers of them ended up with a few bills to pay. Those sellers are the minority though. I don't even know if those sellers are even still selling.

[247newdeals]

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@*tippy*toes* wrote:

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@247newdeals wrote:

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I suppose it depends where you are getting the stamps from after I read this post I did a quick search on Ebay and there are sellers who are selling what are clearly reused stamps. By reused I mean they have been through the postage system but come out without a frank mark. When I read unfranked stamps it is them I assume are being talked about. It is not really about gluing the stamps on, if needed, but reusing stamps.

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Saying in a listing that stamps are unfranked doesn't necessarily mean they have been through the system and soaked off envelopes. It just means they haven't been cancelled because there is a reasonable chance they haven't been used. You can also buy franked, or cancelled, stamps on eBay because some people prefer to collect those (why, I'm not sure as the value is only a small amount of an unfranked one, but they have their reasons).

I bought something the other day and looked at the sellers other items to see if they had anything else I might like. They had 4 listings for stamps and they were complete sheets of gummed stamps. They were listed as unfranked. No way they had been soaked off an envelope and reattached to each other with all the holes matching perfectly back up.

You need to learn a bit about stamps and a bit about the system before you start spouting off and trying to get sellers in trouble, not to mention accusing them of breaking the law.

Yes, there have been a couple of sellers who sold what they thought were unfranked stamps, when in fact they had been franked, but it had either faded or washed off. The sorting machines soon picked it up and the buyers of them ended up with a few bills to pay. Those sellers are the minority though. I don't even know if those sellers are even still selling.

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The specific ones I was looking at have not even been soaked off the envelopes they had just been cut off they are being sold to collect but advertised as unfranked and the price is way more (not being a stamp collector I am assuming) than would be paid for an recent aussie stamp that is not even mint for a collector. They are being sold to use for postage and ok I will agree it is possible someone accidently stuck them on an envolope and they was never posted but come on it is unlikely 😉 

[lyndal1838]

When I was a kid it was very popular to collect stamps that had come through the mail and were postmarked.  Part of the fun was to soak them off the envelope and put them in an album.

As you got older you graduated to buying First Day Covers, sheets of stamps, blocks of 4 or 6 or 8 or whatever you were interested in.

A lot of the stamps listed on ebay are still on the paper and are listed as for collectors, not for use.

Of course you will get people who will use them to post by gluing them on envlopes but not everyone who glues a stamp on an envelope is breaking the law...have you read my posts above?

[247newdeals]

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@lyndal1838 wrote:

When I was a kid it was very popular to collect stamps that had come through the mail and were postmarked.  Part of the fun was to soak them off the envelope and put them in an album.

As you got older you graduated to buying First Day Covers, sheets of stamps, blocks of 4 or 6 or 8 or whatever you were interested in.

A lot of the stamps listed on ebay are still on the paper and are listed as for collectors, not for use.

Of course you will get people who will use them to post by gluing them on envlopes but not everyone who glues a stamp on an envelope is breaking the law...have you read my posts above?

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Yes I read your posts above and I agree not everyone who glue stamps on will be breaking the law but a quick search on Ebay and it does not take long to find listings I would guess (and I accept I may be wrong) that even though the listing says for collectors they are priced for reuse not collectors (I doubt a collector would pay them prices for old used stamps) and that is what I got the impression the OP was about if I am wrong then sorry but I stand by my remark I think it is wrong to reuse stamps.

[mbselections00]

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@lyndal1838 wrote:

When I was a kid it was very popular to collect stamps that had come through the mail and were postmarked.  Part of the fun was to soak them off the envelope and put them in an album.

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A bit off topic, but oh, that brings back so many good childhood memories .  My dad got me started - he had an album that had been passed to him by his grandad, he continued collecting & then got me started.  Many a Saturday afternoon was spent soaking stamps off envelopes !  Unfortunately, many many years later on one of the occasions after I was married that our house was broken into all the albums were stolen - but they did miss the icecream tubs that contained the doubles, but they were more recent stamps, very few of the old ones.  To this day it still upsets me, not because of the stamps, but because it was something I had done with my dad who had long since passed away 

[lyndal1838]

Yes, I know what you mean.

My paternal grandmother passed her stamp collection on to Mum who was an avid collector.  I was initially interested but gradually went to coin collecting, encouraged by my maternal grandmother.

Oh the memories of pouring over our small change looking for that elusive 1930 penny.

I still have my original coins from when I was about 10.   I must have had a good eye for them because even now they are quite a good collection of high grade coins.

I did inherit a few sovereign and half sovereign, but not as many as I might have if my grandmother had not given a number to her brother (a dentist) to use as fillings.

After Mum and Dad died no-one was interested in the stamps so I took the oldest album to a Coin and Stamp Fair.  It was a huge album with a very comprehensive collection of Australian stamps but no-one was interested because all the stamps were hinged into the album.  The best I was offered was $500 and I was told that if the stamps had not been hinged I could add at least another 0 to the value.