Both collectors and dealers have been "manufacturing" imperforate singles ever since there was a price difference. I have a couple of stockcards that are nothing but imperforate banknotes, bureau issues and even commemoratives all having nice wide margins on 3 or 4 sides.
Buying singles is a matter of trust in the dealer - frankly the only ones in my collections are pairs or blocks. ..
Trusting the dealer is great - I have a dealer that I have been using since 1972 (actually his son runs the business now) and I trust him totally. But he is passing on stuff he got from other people and the conversion could have been done long ago. I know some people only collect coils in pairs, maybe the same should have been done with imperforates. I guess the beast we can do is just not worry about it.
You can always place the imperf stamp on top of a perf stamp (same design). If the perfs stick out from underneath the imperf stamp, that is a clue that the imperf stamp may be forged.
This might be a stupid question. I'm bidding on a US BOB R code stamp that is perforated. It has really good margins on 3 sides which started me thinking. The value of this stamp would be much higher if it were imperforate. What would stop an unscrupulous seller from trimming the perforations to manufacture a different valued stamp? If the stamp had good margins on 4 sides it should be fairly easy to pull it off, especially if it were done a fairly long time ago so the edge of the cut would look more worn and dirty. It makes me wonder about some of my imperforates. Is there a way to tell an old cut from a new cut since the stamp image would be the same size.
re: Question about imperforates
Both collectors and dealers have been "manufacturing" imperforate singles ever since there was a price difference. I have a couple of stockcards that are nothing but imperforate banknotes, bureau issues and even commemoratives all having nice wide margins on 3 or 4 sides.
Buying singles is a matter of trust in the dealer - frankly the only ones in my collections are pairs or blocks. ..
re: Question about imperforates
Trusting the dealer is great - I have a dealer that I have been using since 1972 (actually his son runs the business now) and I trust him totally. But he is passing on stuff he got from other people and the conversion could have been done long ago. I know some people only collect coils in pairs, maybe the same should have been done with imperforates. I guess the beast we can do is just not worry about it.
re: Question about imperforates
You can always place the imperf stamp on top of a perf stamp (same design). If the perfs stick out from underneath the imperf stamp, that is a clue that the imperf stamp may be forged.