Complaint Review: Investment Rarities Incorporated - Internet

Here is a copy of the BBB report I filed against this company and the response and rebuttals from them:

Consumer's Original Complaint :

I was charged an additional $300 premium for silver dimes that was agreed to be "Brilliant Uncirculated" in original mint wrappers --- they were not.

On Wednesday 07-14-10 I called John Strangis, referred by Pam Lovett (Operations Manager), inquiring about my options to buy silver dimes.  After John explained my options, I told him I was interested in purchasing a quarter bag (50 rolls = 2,500) of silver dimes in "Brilliant Uncirculated" condition in original mint wrappers for the price of $4,100 or better.  He said that Friday is usually the best day for prices.

On Friday 07-16-10 John and I spoke and he said that he was able to get the order filled for $4,065 including the shipping cost.  He said that he would try to get the San Francisco Minted dimes I requested, but it might take a month or two, and may still not be able to get them.  I agreed to wait and wired Investment Rarities the money.  The transaction number was G620876.

On Thursday 08-19-10 I called John to ask about the progress of getting the San Francisco minted dimes and he said to give him another couple of weeks, because his company was buying out another company that might have some on hand.  He said he should know by Thursday 09-02-10.

On Friday 09-03-10 I called John and he said that he would not be able to the San Francisco minted dimes and he would send out that day whatever "Brilliant Uncirculated" condition in original mint wrappers dimes they had, which would probably be from the Denver Mint.  With a holiday on Monday, he said he would call me with the tracking number on Tuesday.  He did not call on Tuesday.  Wednesday I called and left a message and he did not return the call Wednesday or Thursday.  Friday I called again and finally spoke with him.  He called back later and provided me the tracking number and when I asked when the package shipped, he said on Tuesday 09-07-10, even though it did not appear in the tracking system until the evening of 09-10-10, the actual day he gave me the tracking number.

On Thursday 09-16-10 I received 50 rolls of various grades and dates in each wrapper.

This was not what I paid a $300 premium for.

After going through several of the rolls, I contacted John by email on Tuesday 09-21-10, in which I received an automated response when he opened it up several hours later.  He did not respond back.  On Thursday 09-23-10 I sent him another email that he read within an hour and never responded back.

On Friday 09-24-10 I called John and he said he needed to do some checking and would call back that afternoon or the next day on Saturday.  All he seemed to be able to comment on was the value of what I did receive had gone up in value, which was not the issue.  I never have heard from him since.

On Wednesday 09-29-10 I sent Pam Lovett (Operations Manager) an email and she never addressed John's misrepresentation of our purchase agreement and played down my complaint by stating what a discount John had given me (unknown to me), and said "You got great coins, some in original bank wrappers.  Please thank us for the good job we did."  Just like John, she side-stepped the issue (not the coin grade agreed upon, maybe in bank wrappers, but not the agreed mint wrappers).

After appealing to Pam again the next day without any success, I contacted James Cook (Owner/President) by email and received a sarcastic response from him.

John Strangis is the second person I have purchased from.  The first person by the name of Tom Sykora, also had some shady sales practices back in February of this year when I purchased over $12,000 worth of silver.  When I complained to Pam then, she dealt with it and I found out that Tom was no longer working with them.  At that time, Pam recommended John for any future business with them, and it turns out he is the Owners Son-n-law.  So I have a feeling that Pam's responses are a bit biased because of that relationship.

Consumer's Desired Resolution:

The $300 premium I paid.  This is not a refund of the silver dimes I paid for, obviously because the silver dimes has gone up in value, but the $300 premium for the grade of coins I was suppose to receive and in original mint wrappers.   I paid a $300 premium for a grade of silver dimes that I did not receive (instead received different grades), and even more important, did not receive them in original "MINT" wrappers which was critical.  John and I had extensive conversation that truly indicated that he knew I was referring to original mint wrappers, not the so-called "bank wrappers" that Pam talked about.  Just because a bank rolls a bunch of dimes does not make them "Brilliant Uncirculated," especially when I find grades in the rolls such as "Very Good" to "Fine" condition instead.

BBB Processing

10/13/2010                web       BBB        Complaint Received by BBB

10/14/2010                TC         BBB        Complaint Validated by BBB Operator

10/14/2010                Otto      EMAIL     Send acknowledgement to Consumer

10/14/2010                Otto      EMAIL     Inform Business of the Complaint

10/20/2010                WEB      BBB        RECEIVE BUSINESS RESPONSE :

Mr. Rodgers purchased brilliant uncirculated dimes from our firm and received brilliant uncirculated dimes.

As Mr. Cook pointed out in his response to Mr. Rodgers, he obviously does not have the skills to determine the difference between lightly circulated and uncirculated coins.

Mr. Rodgers has placed orders with our firm in the past and we appreciate his business.  However, looking at his past transactions, it appears that Mr. Rodgers determines how much he is willing to pay, regardless of the actual amount of the transaction.  His first transaction was shorted by $206.50 and the second transaction was shorted by $100.80 and that transaction was only for $494.20.

Mr. Rodgers did not pay a $300 "premium" for his coins.  The Broker, Mr. Strangis, actually discounted the transaction by $480.63, provided tubes at an additional expense of $25, and split the shipping cost in half in order to "appease" Mr. Rodgers demands.  In actuality, due the the discounted price he received, he received brilliant uncirculated dimes for less than what the circulated dimes sold for on that day! (1/4 bag circulated dimes sold for $4,250 on that day)His order was processed for BU dimes and our shipping department shipped him BU dimes. When Mr. Rodgers is ready to sell his coins IRI will buy them back as BU dimes.  He received a great deal!

10/20/2010                TC         EMAIL     VF2 - Forward Business response to Consumer

10/26/2010                WEB      BBB        RECEIVED CONSUMER REBUTTAL : (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)

Obviously IRI does not monitor or record calls between the brokers and the buyers in order to clearly identify the true content of the conversations and agreements that take place on the phone.  Instead they massage the real story with facts they only see documented by the broker that he had to do (unknowingly to the buyer) in order to close a deal.  For example, by offering a discount from the full regular retail price (which is highly marked up to begin with to allow the brokers room to work a deal out).  As for the $300 ''premium,'' this was the additional amount the broker said I would have to pay for ''Brilliant Uncirculated'' dimes in the original mint wrappers rather than just loose circulated dimes.

As for splitting the shipping cost, this was something the broker stated he did for all of his clients.  And yes, he did offer to send coin tubes because of my preference of storage.  I find the terms IRI used in their response such as ''appease'' and ''demand'' was a bit exaggerated, considering the brokers seem to make offers more appealing in order to try and close a deal.

Notice how IRI mentioned the first purchase discount of $206.50 without mentioning it was on a purchase of $12,450.00 on 12-10-2009.  As for the second purchase discount of $100.80, IRI wanted to clearly show how big of a discount it was against a $494.20 purchase on 01-15-2010, when they conveniently failed to mention was part of an agreement made on the larger purchase of $12,450.00 five weeks earlier.  When the first purchase was made, it was for a set of 20-coin tubes of each year that the Silver Eagles was released (total of 24 years).  The broker made an agreement to sell at a greatly discounted price the 25th year 20-coin tube to complete a full 25year set when released in the next several weeks.  Through shady sales practices, the Operations Manager refunded a $25 check for the difference of the verbal agreement the broker made with me after charging a higher price than agreed during the first purchase.  Even though that particular broker no longer worked for IRI immediately after the complaint following the second purchase, the Operations Manager indicated that the broker would be paying for the $25 refund, and in my opinion it was a very small price to pay to avoid bad press or relations against the company.  The actual ''shorted amount'' (discount) from the marked-up retail price for these first two purchases was a very small 2.3%.  Wow, what a great deal (not really).

Because the Operations Manager quickly handled the $25 overcharge from my second purchase, several months later I went with her recommendation and did business with the broker she suggested, just to experience another round of shady dealings where the broker tells you one thing and does another. 

IRI says that I determine how much I am willing to pay, regardless of the actual amount of the transaction.  Do they not know that the brokers talk about what they can sell the product for and even ask what you are willing to pay?  If the broker cannot meet the price the buyer is willing to pay, they will say they will make note of the price and let the buyer know at a later time if the price fluctuation comes down to that price.  The brokers do not arbitrarily let the buyers pick their own prices.  This is a product where the price fluctuates up and down minute by minute, not a fixed price like on most products that are purchased.  Again, IRI massages the facts to make them look like the good guys in this complaint.  They do not mention that one key issue is that the broker and buyer made an agreement to the conditions of the sell and instead took the payment and sent what they felt the buyer should receive instead, not what was agreed upon.

I agree with the owner of IRI that very few people have the skills to determine the difference between ''Brilliant Uncirculated'' and ''Almost Uncirculated.''  However, when a grade further down the scale such as ''Very Good'' and ''Fine'' is found among those I received, which happen to be 4 and 5 grades lower than ''Brilliant Uncirculated,'' it doesn't take a skilled person to know that it is not ''Brilliant Uncirculated.''  Out of the 2,500 dimes I found several coins in this lower grade, which casted doubt on all of them as to whether the majority were ''Almost Uncirculated'' or the grade I paid for of ''Brilliant Uncirculated.''  As a result, I spent the time and money to take the dimes to a professional numismatic expert in the area that was a 40 mile round trip and 1.5 hours of my time to Roseville Numismatics.  I was told that the majority of the dimes were ''Brilliant Uncirculated,'' a very large number of them were border-line between ''Brilliant Uncirculated'' and ''Almost Uncirculated.''  The expert also confirmed that a handful were several grades further down.

Once again IRI ignored the largest issue, which was the agreement the broker and I had about the coins being in original Mint wrappers.  How convenient.  If they would have been shipped in original Mint wrappers as agreed, we would not even be having this conversation, and there would be no doubt about the grade level of them being in ''Brilliant Uncirculated'' condition as well.

I still feel that I should receive a $300 refund for not receiving the dimes in original Mint wrappers as agreed and instead received a handful of clearly circulated dimes and a large amount of border-line graded dimes, wrapped most likely by their own coin wrapping machine at IRI.

10/27/2010                TC         EMAIL     FU3  Forward Consumer Rebuttal to Business

11/01/2010                WEB      BBB        RECEIVED FINAL RESPONSE FROM BUSINESS :

We respectfully disagree with Mr. Rodgers.  We have done all we can.  His requests have become unreasonable.

Sincerely,

Pamela Lovett

Operations Manager

11/01/2010                TC         EMAIL     Forward Final Response to Consumer

11/01/2010                Otto      EMAIL     Inform Business - Case Closed AJR

11/01/2010                Otto      BBB        Case Closed AJR