Paddy

Probably something in your settings for the site - you can elect which actions trigger an email notification and which don't. If you click on the down arrow beside your name in the top right of the screen, and then select "Account Settings" from the drop down. The page you get to has "Notification settings" as a link on the right side beneath the advert box. Click on that and you should see your current options. I suspect you have "Do not send me notifications" set at the moment. Further down you can also select which actions trigger a notification in the website and which an email to your registered account.

The drugs don't work by the Verve....

Ah, you are running into the limitations of a generic coin book - they don't have the space to cover all the finer details of varieties. The E and the S on shillings are indeed for England and Scotland. For the George VI ones, the England lion faces left, whereas the Scottish one is facing forward. (I remember which by thinking of the Glasgow handshake... 🙂 ). For QE2 the English has 3 lions, the Scottish one lion. (England football logo should do that.) For the enormous number of varieties of Pennies, you are best to use this site, maintained by a member here: https://headsntails14.wordpress.com/ For halfpennies, your best bet is this one, maintained by the same member: https://halfpennyvarieties.wordpress.com/home/ There are numerous books that go into all the detail - I leave others to advise on those.

Agreed - and a consistent temperature is important (within reason). Attics are generally a very bad place to store coins as the temperature varies wildly over the year, often freezing in the winter and 30c + in the summer. (Hotter than outside because of the roofs exposure to direct sun.) Attics are generally not good for storing anything of value. Wood dries out and splits, oil paintings crack, silver tarnishes and clothes get mildew.

I have tried it occasionally, but can't say the results have ever been rewarding. Silver dip will get rid of the marks, but also all the lustre, leaving the coin flat and lifeless. Using a cotton bud dipped in silver dip or Ammonia or lemon juice allows a more selective cleaning of just the spots, but getting to a result that doesn't still look blotchy takes a lot of effort and is rarely successful. I have not tried the aluminium foil and bicarb of soda technique on a modern coin - maybe someone else has? If you have examples that are not too scarce or valuable, experiment and let us know your results. After all, the coin will still be worth its melt value, and that is all most buyers would give you anyway for the common coins.

Probably as a he "cancelled all bids" before ending the item. Maybe the earlier cancellation of the high bid was after the bidder requested a cancellation after realising it was a dud, and that triggered (eventually) his ending of the item.

Thanks for that. This was from early in my collecting days, just wishful thinking and has reduced the gaps by one for the last few years. Now I will have to take it out and probably scrap it - one more I need. I can't say I go looking very hard for the missing Victorian 3Ds - it goes against the grain for me to spend many hundreds of pounds on a tiny piece of silver only a few numbers different from other 3Ds of the same period. I would rather spend the money on a Saxon penny from a reign I don't currently have.

Ah, I have managed to get back to my photos and now know why I didn't really want to share this one! Even "fair" is a gross over-grading, and the identification as an 1846 is close to guess work! Here we go anyway - don't laugh!

According to my spreadsheet I do have an 1846, though marked as only "fair". I can't get to my photos at the moment - I will try to tomorrow. I must have had it for years as I have bought nothing in this area for years.

I think on Ebay these days you can make an offer even if the seller has not included "or best offer". If you go to "contact seller" and push through to sending a message, you can make an offer there. Ebay seems to encourage it! Sometimes (I can't quite work out which sequence of events brings it up) a button for "make an offer" appears. That seller is in the US and prices there consistently seem much higher than in the UK, even for GB coins, so I would not be surprised if they get 2/3 of the asking price on most of those. As Rob says, it is much easier to drop your price if you have over-cooked it than ask for more once the buyer has clicked buy-it-now!

Is the 1991 Jamaica set any good? Just spotted one coming up in an auction...

I'd agree it is confusing. In the end the fact that the service is offered on the Post Office website, which was quoted, but not on the Royal Mail website, is the clue. I have run into this before - Royal Mail and Post Office are two completely separate entities these days. I discovered this when trying to send stuff to Thailand early in the first lockdown. Royal Mail site said post was now being accepted for Thailand, but the Post Office wouldn't take it as their website still showed it as closed! When I queried this at the counter they explained that RM and PO are now independent of each other.

I checked at my local Post Office this morning. Consequential loss additional cover is available through the Post Office - it is not a Royal Mail feature. You can get it added at the PO when you buy your Special Delivery postage. Because it is not a RM offering, you cannot do it online if that is how you usually pay for your SD postage. Interestingly the first teller I spoke to had never heard of it, but a more experienced person overheard our conversation and came to our rescue!

I can't really say I know much more about farthings than anyone else, but based on the images on aboutfarthings.co.uk I would agree - obverse 1a and reverse Ab. (I saw this post before but assumed someone with more knowledge would chip in!)

This one was outside my window when I was stationed in Hong Kong in the 1980s:

I am not certain but I think the Jacaranda is native to Southern Africa. Certainly when I was young my parents drank Jacaranda Sherry, which was South African. (My mother was born there.) I still have a "pottle" - half a demijohn size bottle - with the Jacaranda Sherry label on it. Currently filled with home made Apple port...

I am a minnow when it comes to Penny varieties too, but you can learn a lot from Richard's site: https://headsntails14.wordpress.com/ including relating Gouby and Freeman references.

I take it the 1971 Jamaica set is common? I have spotted one at auction if anyone is interested.

What he is doing of course is maximising his chances of a random google or Ebay search turning up his coin as a match. I have just done a search for "1915 Calendar" within coins, to track down an advertising token I have come across for that year, and lo and behold, his junk 1966 penny was top of the "results matching fewer words" list!

I have picked up bucket loads of coins in the last week and am enjoying sorting through them. This one interested me - obviously Tredegar 1812 penny, but very clearly overstruck on a Union Copper Company Birmingham Penny. Is this unusual? I see lots of 18th/19th century tokens, but have not noticed an overstrike before.

Nothing special but I finally managed to spot an 1895 2mm in a pile of Victorian pennies (I think!).

Thanks for trying @bagerap. Did you see the examples in the two links I gave? Seems unusual that there are examples in well documented collections without it making it into any reference. In the end I will sell it as it is outside my collecting area. Any idea of value? PM me if you don't want to reply in public 🙂

Beaten to the pass - another dealer has offered him £650, which I think is too high, so no deal for me.

Thanks for that @Rob - I am glad I was on the right track. If I get to buy it, it will not be for my collection, as I don't do gold, but to sell on. I have a number of non-professional collectors that visit me regularly and would love to have something like this in their rather random selections. All depends on how much the current owner is prepared to accept for it.

Thanks - I may get to own it, but I need to do my homework first!