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Forums10
Topics40,336
Posts574,016
Members14,700
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Most Online32,084
Jun 14th, 2026
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Joined: May 2010
Posts: 1,551 Likes: 116
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: May 2010
Posts: 1,551 Likes: 116 |
Please remember the Trade uses the auction houses to dump stuff they don't wont to sell/cant sell/ dare not sell.
I find it hard to credit some times when after 20 or so emails , 6 phone conversations and 10 or 15 photos of a particular gun ,that a client then goes and bids on a catalogue description and gets screwed.
Also bare in mind the commissions that the auction houses make ,20% on the hammer and probably the same from the seller. Not bad for selling something you don't own .So with that in mind when was the last time you saw a discription " Beaten up old dog, pits dents and bulges, stock broken and repaired ,generaly rattles like a bag of spanners",?
Not saying here that all goods sold in auctions are junk or that all auctioneers are less than scrupulous. If you know what you are looking at and you are there on the day, you can get a good buy .It is also a fact under British Law [The Sale of Goods Act
that goods must be "fit for purpose" and of course with guns comply with proof law. Apart from that anything goes.
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Joined: Jul 2008
Posts: 1,008
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Jul 2008
Posts: 1,008 |
Guys, none of this is surprising or unusual and it all occurs in auctions everywhere. I have bought at auctions on the Continent, in the UK, the USA and in Japan and would never, ever bid on anything that I have not personally inspected or have paid a pro to look at.
Yes, one can get bargains at auction but as gunman said, auctions are the place where dealers dump the stuff they wouldn't dare sell to private clients. My friends who are dealers in rare books, antiques and prints dump their problems at auction and generally get good prices for things they would never offer their clients.
Many people think that auctions are where "wholesale" prices reign. Sometimes one can get astoundingly good items cheap but equally prices exceed anything reasonable.
Auctioneers also "run up" prices. Yeah, I know it's illegal but it is done, even to good clients.
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Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 2,090 Likes: 83
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 2,090 Likes: 83 |
I have been lucky with guns on the US auction sites and only have been burned once, on a 16ga hammergun. That said it has always been a buyer beware world. If you can't afford to write off the price of the purchase don't make the buy. If you buy enough guns you will get burned eventually. I have seen the Brits at work in Iraq and Afghanistan and they can be captivating. You don't even know you pocket is empty. They make darling stuff, but I never forget my grandfather's people had to run them out of their country. I enjoy their guns, their jackets, and their whiskey (well scotland's anyway) But I never forget in matters of the marketplace "BEWARE"
Michael Dittamo
Topeka, KS
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Joined: Aug 2011
Posts: 704 Likes: 1
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Aug 2011
Posts: 704 Likes: 1 |
You know I had that happen to me recently. The "Trade", ie. gun dealer offered me a wonderful sidelock for 12,000 pounds. After requesting some additional pictures (first pictures were very incomplete) and having an expert examine those pictures I declined any interest in the gun as it appeared I was being offered something that was not exactly right. Subsequently the gun dealer "Trade", instead of listing the gun on his web site, within a week or so the gun appears at an auction house listed as an estimated bid of 1,500 pounds (BTW it did not even bring the 1,500 pounds)! So yeah the practice of the "Trade" "dumping stuff they don't, won't sale/can't sale/dare not sale" does exist. Heck this particular gun must have been such a PoS that the Dealer would not even list it on his own website. He was though willing to try and dump it off on me. What a bargain I was offered for 12,000 pounds. Please remember the Trade uses the auction houses to dump stuff they don't wont to sell/cant sell/ dare not sell.
I find it hard to credit some times when after 20 or so emails , 6 phone conversations and 10 or 15 photos of a particular gun ,that a client then goes and bids on a catalogue description and gets screwed.
Also bare in mind the commissions that the auction houses make ,20% on the hammer and probably the same from the seller. Not bad for selling something you don't own .So with that in mind when was the last time you saw a discription " Beaten up old dog, pits dents and bulges, stock broken and repaired ,generaly rattles like a bag of spanners",?
Not saying here that all goods sold in auctions are junk or that all auctioneers are less than scrupulous. If you know what you are looking at and you are there on the day, you can get a good buy .It is also a fact under British Law [The Sale of Goods Act
that goods must be "fit for purpose" and of course with guns comply with proof law. Apart from that anything goes.
Last edited by 1cdog; 10/04/11 07:13 AM.
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Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 1,284
Sidelock
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OP
Sidelock
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 1,284 |
An update from my end.
After a constructive email to Holts (and to the point). I've received a refund today for the total for the gun. It'll go back this week.
So, after all that, they did at least listen. No reply, and I don't think Nick Holt actually agreed...lol..but they did refund it...so I'll keep buying from them...but I think the "beware" notes still stand.
Mine was a technicality. I'd said that they "ALWAYS" put a note if any barrels were below recommended thickness. For this description they either forgot or otherwise...and that is the case I made. To their credit they appear to have agreed.
Regards,
Tony
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Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 7,911 Likes: 684
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 7,911 Likes: 684 |
Glad you got your money back. Shame about the gun. I looked hard at the listing and even considered bidding on that one myself. By the time I got the gun over here there would have been no way to recover my money with shipping and having to pay some one to send it to me.
Still I thought that gun was very interesting with so many features that bridge from pinfire to centerfire. Plus those crab joints always catch my eye. Better luck next time. I suspect we will see that gun listed again with a few more notes in the description or on a sealed bid auction. It will be lucky to reach half the bid you made.
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Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 1,284
Sidelock
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OP
Sidelock
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 1,284 |
Yes, it was interesting, in a mad way I'm kind of sad to see it go. However, I should be spending my time on other things, and guns!  T
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Joined: May 2010
Posts: 1,551 Likes: 116
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: May 2010
Posts: 1,551 Likes: 116 |
1dog ,it is ,I'm afraid a fact of life that in the gun trade as with all other trade we have our fair share of stuff up merchants. I am glad you did not fall foul of one. One of the problems is that we get people who enter the trade as dealers full of enthusiasm having read all the books and,with the gift of the gab ,as we say, think they are experts and pass themselves off as such. .Yes they may quote chapter and verse as to history ,patents and so on ,but they would not know the difference between a good gun and a heap of junk .
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Joined: May 2010
Posts: 1,551 Likes: 116
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: May 2010
Posts: 1,551 Likes: 116 |
Appologies that should be adressed to 1cdog.
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Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 1,284
Sidelock
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OP
Sidelock
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 1,284 |
That would be me then gunman. Clearly!
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