The stamp and coin collecting thread

[elephantnose3334]

Anyone is welcome in this thread. Do you collect stamps and money? Do you still own your collections? I am planning to collect stamps on Australia Post in the future.

 

[sonofagun]

I used to collect stamps mostly commonwealth also British first day covers....but they seemed to start bringing out new stamps every five minutes.
I stopped collecting covers some time back I also still have my albums -they are not worth much unfortunatley.
Never collected money spent and wasted a lot of it though.
I did collect other things like post cards of engines,beer bottle labels and badges but as I have grown older my my collecting things have waned.

 

[sonofagun]

Made pictures with unused stamps.

 

[Nells250]

Have been collecting stamps on and off since the early 1990s. US, back-of-book, certain foreign and topicals.

 

[Lateral Line]

A number of Christmas cards from England arrived at our house, (in Denmark), there were both pictorials and definitives. My question: they have a two dimensional barcode type thing on the right side, is that part of the stamp or should it be removed?

 

[elephantnose3334]

A number of Christmas cards from England arrived at our house, (in Denmark), there were both pictorials and definitives. My question: they have a two dimensional barcode type thing on the right side, is that part of the stamp or should it be removed?

Welcome back! I don't know anything about stamps.

 

[Essjay]

My question: they have a two dimensional barcode type thing on the right side, is that part of the stamp or should it be removed?

The bar codes are part of the stamp, they should not be removed. They were introduced in 2022 and we were given a deadline for using un-barcoded stamps or swapping them for barcoded stamps which has now passed.

 

[Lateral Line]

Okay. The stamps don't look like they are part of the pictorial/definitive but I don't really care. They will stay.

 

[Essjay]

We have a few barcoded stamps. First and second class definitives with Queen Elizabeth's head and Christmas 2023 commemoratives with King Charles head. We haven't used up the Elizabeth head definitives yet but when they're gone the next batch will be Charles difinitives. It's non-barcode definitives which can no longer be used, though I read somewhere that non-barcode commemoratives can still be used at the moment.

 

[Nells250]

collectors & dealers in the UK must love knowing their spare mint stamps will soon be useless...

 

[Essjay]

It doesn't matter to collectors and dealers. The collectors want to keep them not use them and dealers are happy to supply collectors.

We were given plenty of advance notice. The barcode stamps were introduced in February 2022. Initially the non-barcoded stamps had to be used or swapped for barcode stamps by the end of January 2023, but that was extended to the end of July 2023. That's well over a year to use or swap the non-barcode stamps so if anyone has some old ones left it's their own fault.

 

[Nells250]

People don't like to use them on their mail there? Dealers, either? Maybe postally-used isn't as big a thing there?

 

[Essjay]

Mint stamps are worth more than used stamps. Mint Victorian stamps go for ...a mint Used stamps are mainly for children, serious collectors want the best quality they can get, which means mint.

Though to be honest, there's not much call from collectors for anything recent. Collectors are more likely to use modern stamps for posting their own letters, assuming they don't just use email. I doubt very much that dealers will have any stamps issued within the last 30 years or so, no demand. They'll just buy them to post their mail with.
Now stamps 130 years ago, yes, very collectable, especially mint ones.

 

[Fishmanic]

HISTORY OF US POSTAL RATES
from Pony Express to modern times
inflation caused rapidly rising postal rates starting in 1968

History of United States postage rates - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

nowadays there is another class of mail called "email". Cost is FREE

	8

 

[Nells250]

Mint stamps are worth more than used stamps. Mint Victorian stamps go for ...a mint Used stamps are mainly for children, serious collectors want the best quality they can get, which means mint.

Weeeeeell... that can be debated BIG TIME! There are cancellations and uses that are very rare indeed.

Some stamps loose most of their value once removed from a cover or document (especially revenue stamps). Modern postally used US stamps are actually hard to get now.

I tend to collect pre-1960 engraved issues, back-of-book, revenue, and odd-balls. I'm a sucker for nice engraving and high quality printing.