Condition and Grading Standards

Hi all,

I suspect this may be a semi-regular question on the forum, so please forgive my ignorance if it is...

I recently purchased an eyepiece from a gentleman that was rated as excellent. When it arrived it was clearly only what I would consider Good. I am a collector of antiques and there are standards to assist folk in using terms like "New", "Like New", "Excellent", "Very Good", etc. in a consistent way.

My question: Does such a standard exist for optical equipment, like eyepieces? If not, I'd be happy to provide a draft for consideration on this forum.

Cheers!
Blake

Blake,

I've had similar experiences, *very* rare here on AM, and it is usually with Lumicon brand filters and solar filters. Sometimes people simply miss things. Your first step should be to ask the seller to allow you to return the item and refund your money. Most of the time this is honored.

On the surface the ability for someone to rate the condition of an item seems pretty simple...but the reality is this is subjective and the rating one chooses may vary widely based the individual's experience level. In the rarest of cases I to have to "wonder" what the seller was thinking - the obvious modification or damage that goes undisclosed. I rate them accordingly as is the tradition here on AM.

I think it would be valuable to have a set of guidelines for rating used gear. It would be a pretty broad set of material given the variety of Astro gear available. I'd be willing to collaborate on drafting an article on the subject.

HI Blake,
Indeed this has come up many times. It is very difficult to put a scale on condition for some people. One mans excellent is another mans good, so there will always be disagreements on this.
The real problem is enforcing such a scale, about impossible. I think that photos are about the only thing that show condition very well. Some can be posted with the ad and others could be made available to the prospective buyer on request. But even this does not work if the seller has no camera.

Thanks for your replies. I have attached a proposal to this post for forum consideration.

A few thoughts regarding the replies.
- No worries about the example. I've dealt professionally with these kinds of differences in the past.
- I'm also not worried about "enforcement", as the rating scale provided by AstroMart takes care of that.
- My hope for such a guide is that it will help proactively narrow the gap between our interpretations of what these terms mean, resulting in fewer item returns and renegotiations (hopefully the only ones that lose are the shipping companies due to fewer returned items!)

With that said, here for your reading and commenting pleasure is my proposed standard. I've taken the concepts from a number of other hobby standards that I'm familier with, including Toy Trains, Firearms, and Ham Radio.

(jpg of the document is finally attached)

A few thoughts about the guideline: My goal was to remove as much subjectivity as possible. So, I've chosen to avoid the use of percentages. I've also attempted to make the criteria as "yes/no" as possible. Also, limiting the number of grades to 7 +/- 2 seems to make a lot of sense (preferably erring on fewer) as the more grades there are the more difficult it becomes to pick between two grades (6 or 7 grades seems optimal based upon other conventions I am familiar with).

Thanks & Regards,
Blake

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