Reply With QuoteThey certainly have some good watches there and coming up.
No connection but will be interested to watch how it progresses ...
https://www.watchcollecting.com/?ref...5D=live&page=1
They certainly have some good watches there and coming up.
Sadly the £600 minimum buyer’s fee, kills it stone dead for finding decent watches under £6000 I reckon.
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Yes ... read the small print:Originally Posted by kibrisjason
How much does it cost to buy an auction lot on Watch Collecting?
The entirety of the winning bid will be paid to the seller of the auction lot. When you are the highest bidder in a Watch Collecting online auction, and the auction lot has met or exceeded the reserve, we charge you a 6% premium (with a minimum charge of £600). There are no additional administrative fees on top of this from Watch Collecting.
No thank you
"Well they would say that ... wouldn't they!"
Ok if you’re going after something of higher value, just take the maximum you’re prepared to pay and take 6%/£600 off it and crack on.
A decent deal for sellers so I suppose it’s no wonder they have so many watches already.
I was thinking that 6% was bloody good until the £600 min which makes it relatively expensive for anything under £1.8-£2k. Gets increasingly good value over that threshold though.
£600 min or 6% is fine if selling something decent like a Daytona. To be honest if I ever considered selling mine, that's were it would go. At least you could set a reserve and know you won't attract any flak. The Buyers will just factor it into the price.
Looks like CollectingCars are expanding into watches, Exactly the same business model.
https://collectingcars.com
No selling fees, the buyer pays the 6%
Zero protection from fraud for the buyer.
Sorry my wording was a bit clumsy but yes the buyer pays the fees.
If you pay via CC you have some protection there.
Their T&Cs are a bit of an eye opener though. We'll take you payment, but hold no responsibility for anything related to the sale... and any issues are solely between the seller & buyer. Despites the fact they have changed the buyer for a service....How that is complies with consumer rights, I have no idea.
I saw a 1984 Rolex 1160 sell at auction recently, by the time you add buyers premium +VAT and online bidding fees + VAT you would be paying about 30% on the hammer price.
Like any auction you factor in the fees before you bid.
I’ve read on a car forum somewhere that one or two buyers on the Collecting Cars website have bid on cars and won-
Collecting cars have immediately taken their 6% buyers commission via credit card.......the transaction between buyer and seller has fallen through (no fault of the buyer, the sellers pulled out) - and yet the winning bidder has never got his 6% reimbursed by Collecting Cars. - Outrageous business model really.
So in theory you could win the auction for your dream Rolex Daytona - pay 6% commission and then the seller decides he will stick it on Chrono24 instead- surely Collecting watches should have some safeguards in place!!
Did they get their money back via their CC company? Surely it's a failure of service from the site.
As for the 6%, it really is a good price compared to an auction house but with all the above & their T&Cs, I'll generally be avoiding it as it only benefits the seller. Might risk it for a bargain but if they don't even take full payment & pass it on, it does seem like there is zero protection from seller fraud.
So I asked them this question directly because their FAQ suggests that buyer is liable for fees except where the seller defaults.
They confirmed that they will refund the fee if it can be shown that the seller has defaulted.
Well they just set a record for a double sealed 2016 nautilus at £82500. Some very strong prices in the first lot sold.
Well that's a tidy £5k in buyer fees for them - Effective hammer price is £87,450.
What’s it worth if you break the seals?
Is it not a £600 flat fee?
I see it's £600 or 6%
No. 6% or min £600.
Yes so probably the lowest buyers premium ever paid on a nautilus at auction too 😁
That would have been £110,000 to the buyer if it is sold at Sotheby’s for example. That doesn’t even consider the sellers fees too.
If I ever sell a Rolex, this will be the place to go.
Yep it's cheap as in comparison. Lowest auction house fees I've seen are about 18% plus VAT. But then as a buyer you get some actual protections and at least know the watch exists so I'd stil prefer buy there. As a seller though this is likely to be way better.
Pretty sure these guys are london based watch dealers who have started this up
They sold a Singer Porsche a month or so ago for a record £700k and promoted it to death as a record sale.
Month later and the same car was for sale with a dealer....make of the auction what you will?
It’s car dealers running an auction site and taking zero responsibility for absolutely anything (read their extremely long terms and conditions).
I heard of someone being told to lower there reserve only for the winning bidder to be collecting cars sister company...
No it’s the people behind collecting cars and from their Instagram someone who used to run the Breguet boutique in London and seems to know his stuff:
https://adrianhailwood.com/about%20Adrian%20Hailwood
Anyone used the services of their watch photographer?
I may be cynical but this looks like a recipe for disaster. I don’t see any benefit over C24 or ebay. What would happen if a watch is fake, lost, not delivered?
Edit; just realised this has been discussed above.
Last edited by Rodder; 22nd June 2021 at 17:41.
They have a 1665 for sale that has had 7 services and is UNPOLISHED!
As you can clearly see (from the super thin lugs and non existent crown guards…)
https://www.instagram.com/p/CQEau94F...dium=copy_link
Yeah, but "unpolished" is a zero-meaning word that buyers demand to see, and sellers are compelled to use... 😝
Never sell a Rolex, Mick. Thought everyone knew that?
Just looking at the sold section and there's a Panerai Luminor GMT that sold in May for £1300! To good to be true?
https://www.watchcollecting.com/for-...-luminor-gmt-1
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I bought a watch recently via Collecting Watches -
The auction house are extremely efficient at collecting their fees…..
When you bid they immediately freeze their commission in your account to ensure they get it-
So days before the auction has even finished they’ve already locked in their commission from your account-
if you don’t win the auction they then release the commission back into your account.
The watch I bought was advertised as a 2021 watch which came with the original purchase sales receipt.
When I collected the watch it was actually dated Sep 2020 and the vendor refused to give me the sales receipt
saying he wanted to keep it.
I contacted the Watch Collecting team and received an email back saying I’d got the watch for a good price.
I certainly won’t use the website again.
That's not a great sign. Are you going to pursue it any further?
Life’s too short.
The point is Watch Collecting rely on the vendor telling the truth- evidently they don’t do anything to verify
the details- how hard would it be to see a copy of the dated Rolex warranty card?
The platform is superb but ultimately it’s a risky place to buy an expensive watch imho.
That would really grate with me as it’s been clearly misdescribed to inflate the price, with a very disappointing response from watchcollecting.com - if they’re not going to stand behind the integrity of the items being put up for sale on their platform then there’s no way I could purchase anything from them.
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I would not be impressed either and would spread the word of how disgusted I was with their business model..
May I ask how you went about completing the purchase? Did you meet the seller or use escrow?
I'm impressed by the platform but unsure if it's risky meeting someone to complete the sale. Where would you (did you) meet?
A simple post & explanation of your experience on social media and they’ll be crawling to you for an apology & solution……!
I wonder if they would behave same way if it happened on their collecting cars sister website
Any positive experiences?
I was following a watch closely this week with a view to bidding within the last hour but out of nowhere it was removed and the URL came back as a 404 error. Didn't show up in the sold section later.
I presume if I had actually bidded I would have gotten an email communication explaining but it has put me off a bit.
I have no experience with them, but had a quick browse of some of the prices they have realised (completed items, as it were).
It would seem that it is not a good place to sell, a lot of watches seem to have sold for considerably less than what they should.
I don't know the top end market, perhaps they perform better with those, but things like Bremonts and so forth had gone pretty cheaply
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