I am intrigued when I hear members ask or suggest that a coin "should be sent to the royal mint for authentication" ...of course they would have all that was needed to verify the trueness of a coin , but what is it they have that any other collector might not have? Presumably they are not likely to want to spend any time or effort to authenticate a coin considering the replies recently on a point of clear information (how many of X coin were minted in X year) How difficult is it to have this information on a computer? But I am keen to know what they would do , weigh it, measure it, glance at it, I am sure they are not likely to send it away for scientific analysis. I suppose they might just have a spectrometer but if I recall when using one of these it would not come cheap. So considering they will only be doing the exact same thing any one of us could do sitting in the rectory or in your spare room.....why bother to send it?
What I find difficult to accept is the statement of authority seems a little disproportionate if only minor expenditure of time and money is their duty. What else could they be doing to authenticate? any ideas ?