Modern Forgeries Found on eBay

I'm wondering if I'm misinterpreting the image of the forgery, but it looks like the forgery is narrower than the genuine.  Couldn't you have just laid it on top of the genuine?  (Could save you the trouble of perfing and watermarking in this case.)

Hope this doesn't sound confrontational, Chris.  I'm primarily just thinking out loud here.  (Was there a scaling issue with one image or the other?)

Thanks for the comments, Chris (chrischross ) and Dave (Philatarium ).

I should mention that if the seller had posted the item with a decent quality scan, I think I would have been able to tell that the item was bogus and wouldn't have bid on it in the first place.  But the seller used a photo, not a scan, which did not show enough detail to be useful.  What I first noticed was that the perfs looked too large to be perf 14.  I was able to count the number of perf holes along one side, and I realized that there were fewer holes on the stamp in the photo than there were on my genuine copy.

Dave, I could see once I had the eBay stamp in hand that the size of the printed portion is slightly smaller than the genuine.  I would say it is short by perhaps 1mm in both directions.  I have already sent the bogus stamp back to the seller, but I will try to overlay the images to see how evident that may be.  I do my image manipulation on MS PowerPoint, which is probably not as precise as other kinds of software.  I don't claim advanced skills in this area, but I have been reasonably successful in doing some nice things in PowerPoint.

I also felt that it was simple enough to check the perfs and watermark and show the obvious differences when filing my return on eBay.  You may be right that all of that wasn't really necessary, but I wanted to present convincing and overwhelming evidence that I deserved a hassle-free return, so I looked for every wrong feature I could find.

Thanks for your comments, Vince (stanley64).  It makes good sense that Gibbons would buy up forgeries to use as references and to get them off the market, although I admit that I don't recall having heard them advertise that before.  I will check out the link you posted.

Dave (Philatarium), please see new image below.  I have cropped and overlaid the printed portion of the fake on top of the genuine.  You are quite right that the bogus stamp is a good bit narrower than the genuine.  I had trouble seeing that when I had the stamps side by side, probably in part because the genuine copy is off-center and the cancel obscures the edge of the design a bit.

By cropping off the margins and doing an overlay like this, the differences become even more pronounced, don't they?  It would appear that the forgers in this case were a bit careless in the sizing of the printed portion of the stamp, as it really doesn't stand up well to a bit of observant scrutiny.


Kenya & Uganda, SG99 £5 Blue & Black genuine example with smaller forged stamp overlaid for size comparison.
It appears that the forgery is about 1mm shorter vertically, and perhaps 2mm shorter (narrower) horizontally.

Thanks for your post, kgvistamps.

Yes, this is the seller in Texas. He has many other similar items, so perhaps he is just playing games to see who notices that the items are all fakes.

The image is actually a photo rather than a scan, which in my opinion makes it harder to see at first glance that it isn’t genuine.

In my case, I only saw the listings shortly before the auction was up, so I didn’t check out the photo as closely as I should have. To me, it was the incorrect perforations that stood out. I was able to tell from the photo before the stamp arrived that the perf size was wrong.

Many thanks for your post, Graham (thegubman ).
To answer your question: probably!  I paid less than 5% of Gibbons CV for an unused stamp.  But I thought I could explain that because the stamp was listed as MNG, which normally knocks a lot off the value.

I would also add that I have purchased more than one genuine COGH triangle, for example, at similar sort of prices (i.e. <10% CV).  With the advent of auction sites like eBay, it can be a bit difficult these days to say what really constitutes "expected market value".  I would certainly agree that the price I paid was way below what I would have expected to pay from a knowledgeable, professional dealer, but I don't know anything about the seller and whether he qualifies as knowledgeable or not.  He claims that he thought the item was genuine, but based on the comments by kgvistamps, that may have been a disingenuous response to my complaint.

I can also state that I paid about 10% of Gibbons CV for the genuine fiscal-cancelled £5 Kenya & Uganda KGV already in my collection, so even though the winning price for the fake £5 KGV was quite low with respect to CV, I didn't find it too concerning at the time.

For me, it seems to have been mainly an example of the old axiom "Act in haste, repent in leisure."  I should have studied the photo more closely before placing a bid.  It is a reasonably attractive image, as kgvistamps points out, but it is not a high-resolution scan, which would have shown the pixelated printing as opposed to line engraving.

Frankly, I am willing to admit that I am embarrassed that I was initially taken in by this scam, but I decided to put my shame aside and share my experience with the rest of you in an effort to help others from making the same mistake.  I also count myself lucky to have received a hassle-free full refund.  Aside from my personal embarrassment, the only other cost to me was £1.70 postage to make the return.

If the same seller as indicated by kgvistamps has a number of these on sale I suggest he knows exactly what he is doing !

Innocent ignorance is one thing, but multi fraud is quite another.

it is time to name and shame and also to file a report or two to eBay. ( not that that will make much difference unless a lot of buyers do the same)

I just checked them out, currently no listings for sale. Looking back at the sold items they seem to mainly be £20-£300 stamps sold, with the same background in many of the pictures. May be they have got spooked, or eBay (highly unlikely) have removed their items. The fakers and fraudsters are very clever at setting their prices to tempt people in, not too cheap and far from expensive. Even the experts get fooled at times, so I would never be embarrassed to have been tricked. It is a learning experience and what is great about your post is you have shared your experience and given many others valuable knowledge. Graham

Please don't be embarrassed at all, Chris. (I worry, however, that my remarks may have contributed to that feeling. I hope not, but I'll own that and offer my apologies right now.)

I really appreciate your sharing your experience here and showing the stamp and the comparisons. I learned a lot.

There is someone on Etsy and perhaps other places that sells gummed, perforated paper. It's done as an enthusiasm for making one's own cinderellas, and, unless I'm confusing a couple of different profiles together (which is a definite possibility), is done by someone who is a genuine stamp enthusiast and collector who also happened to pick up an old printshop perforator a few years ago.

Also, perhaps 25-30 years ago, there was a guy on eBay creating and selling copious amounts of fake overprints on genuine (I think) stamps. A number of us active in the online philatelic community (eBay had a very good discussion board for that back then) were involved in trying to get him to stop, or at least to get eBay to stop hosting his listings. Long story short, he did eventually stop selling, tried unsuccessfully (I think) to sell the business, and, I think, it eventually died out. Nevertheless, whenever I see someone post a stamp with an unusual or heretofore unknown overprint, my mind immediately goes back to that guy. He sold a lot of material, and I suspect it will show up, wittingly or not, in stamp listings.

Apologies for the digressions, but I added all this to say that the more information out there about these types of modern forgeries, the better it is for all of us. Thank you for sharing your experience. It helps!

Philatarium mentioned about the paper. There are 2 things that are not easy to reproduce that can usually be spotted visually in medium-res pics before the stamp is in hand:

1) paper too white (especially on older stamps)
2) perforations are wrong type (line perf instead of comb perfs..., or way too cleanly punched)

Once in hand, of course you can check the watermark if there is supposed to be one, and other paper issues... and you can measure the perforation. But sometimes you can tell it's a fake even without measuring --

Older stamps were produced in much larger quantities than the modern reproductions. And the perforating machines were used for other issues, pins show wear, pins replaced as needed... Modern reproductions often have very sharp circular perforations. A skilled forger will take steps to mimic older perforation appearance. Genuine older stamps will show divots, oval, stretched... perforation holes that have edges varying from smooth to slightly ragged. Depending on the perforator type, the holes may not even line up straight in some places (i.e., wobble).

A skilled forger will address these issues and more. But the wannabee forger is just making it good enough in appearance to sell online. That being said, there are a non-trivial number of online sellers out there who probably don't realize they are selling some forgeries/reproductions. They aren't full-time stamp dealers and are often just breaking apart boxed lots to keep/sell items.

Then there are those purposely doing so, hoping nobody will notice. There are a lot (and I mean a lot) of reproductions of current first-class stamps, high-value collectible stamps, and speculation-driven areas (such as PRC-China). Reproductions of Cultural Revolution era PRC stamp abound and are quickly snapped up online by collectors/speculators who haven't had sufficient experience with genuine ones.

Many thanks to gotstamps85 for your post, which revived this thread from earlier in the year.

Since you got me thinking about this experience again, I just went to eBay to check on the seller (william08052014) who listed my KUT fake and several others, and he is currently only listing books in his store--no stamps.

Thanks for your comments, David (dgdecker).

I am glad to hear about your activities and also to know that a large percentage of sellers are happy to be informed.  I have done similar things with Cape of Good Hope triangles, but my success rate at sellers being pleased to be informed is much lower than yours.  In fact, I have generally stopped doing anything.  There are a fair number of COGH triangle forgeries on eBay, especially recently, and most sellers just ignore my messages to them and don't change their listings.

At least in the case of the Cape triangles, I can say that these have almost all been older forgeries.  I have not seen any modern ones yet, in the same vein as the Kenya-Uganda KGV high values that I encountered.

Just a warning to all TSF members:

Remember this eBay seller from more than a year ago?  Well, I kept him as a "Saved Seller" to monitor his offerings, and he has once again gotten back into the game.  He is now offering the same stamp I returned to him here:

www.ebay.com/itm/185516704867?hash=item2b31a84463:g:GfIAAOSwXBRi4nQu

His seller name is: gilliamdennis63

He is offering lots of rare stamps, all of which look like modern reprints/forgeries.  The main difference I can see is that he is now offering "buy it now" at absurdly low prices compared to catalogue values, where before, he was offering the stamps at auction.

He did give me a full refund at the time, and he claimed that he had no idea that the stamps were not genuine.  He asked me not to give him a negative review, and I didn't.  But now after 15 months, he is offering these items again with no indication in any of the listings that these are fakes.  I have sent him a message reminding him of his dealings with me last year, but I am not hopeful that it will lead to any positive result.

Any comments or advice are appreciated!

All one can do is report him again. It is interesting that he has a few stamp listings that appear genuine like a used lot and a mint hinged item. I see from his sold items that some obvious fakes were sold. Books appear to be more his thing. This was an amusing item he sold for 1.95. The buyer had to know what they were buying at that price. www.ebay.com/itm/185505597846?hash=item2b30fec996%3Ag%3Aw-EAAOSwPYFi1fLu&nma=true&si=mygga3eEjMKhS11YOpaeQxhY2Ls%253D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

Just emailed him letting him know this is a forgery.