phil-comics auctions home
Home
Auctions
Vendors
Auctions Result
Sales
Auctions Result
Collectors' Club
Contact
About
 



Auction
Services

Overview

Have you found your childhood collection of comics in your parent's attic that you want to cash in on? Cleared a house and found a stash in the garage? Or are you a collector looking to sell a large collection but lack the time and/or experience to sell? Well, you've come to the right place!

Here at phil-comics we can offer one of two solutions for you:

1) Make an offer to buy your collection outright; we make competitive offers with other vintage comic dealers and can travel to buy large collections.

2) Sell the collection on your behalf on eBay on a commission basis. In March 2019 we set up a Trustpilot account and now ask all vendors to leave us a review.

Well established as one of the foremost places to buy vintage comics, eBay is an exciting place to buy/sell comics and we achieve consistently high prices with a long-standing reputation and extensive, worldwide customer base.



Key Features

Why commission phil-comics?
  • An impressive eBay feedback record of over 20,000 ratings
  • Large, worldwide customer base
  • High quality, friendly and customer focussed service
  • The personal touch
  • Consistently high prices
  • Watch the bids coming in live on your own items on eBay
  • No collection too large or small (if the items are right)

^TOP

Auction Results

We pride ourselves on achieving some of the highest prices on the market and have a huge archive of auction results on this site for you to browse. The archive represents one of the biggest free image archives of British comics and can be searched here.

Our selling strategy involves listing the vast majority of items with a 99p start price with no reserve. Experience over the years tells us that this is the best way to achieve consistently high prices as bidders don't feel alienated by higher start prices and can become involved in bidding at an early stage.

When we auction items on commission the vast majority of items will be listed with a 99p start price and no reserve, unless prior agreed otherwise.

^TOP

Testimonies

The following feedback represents just a small number of the vendors that we have worked with over the last fifteen years, whose items or indeed whole collections have been auctioned. In March 2019 we set up an account with Trustpilot and invite all vendors to leave us a review, once they have used our Auction Services.

January 2016: "I wanted to sell my collection of over 1,100 comics, mostly from the 1970s, but had neither the time nor expertise to sell them effectively. I asked Phil to auction them on my behalf and found he offers an excellent service. He graded each comic and listed them on eBay with all the information collectors would want. The collection was sold over four months, and after each auction Phil sent me a detail list of comics sold. All the way through the sale process, I was impressed by Phil's thoroughness and expertise. He's also good-natured and helpful and generally made the sale trouble-free. He was worth every penny of his fee and I was very happy with the final sale price achieved. Thanks Phil!"

January 2016: "Having chosen phil-comics to sell my treasured childhood collection of comics and annuals I can give testament to the informed, professional and friendly service on offer. From beginning to end the process was handled with minimal stress but with the appropriate level of communication and feedback. The prices achieved were in excess of those I was offered elsewhere and were beyond my expectations. In summary, on the basis of my experience, I can recommend phil-comics without hesitation."

January 2016: "I commissioned phil-comics to auction my collection of British comics, including Marvel UK, 2000AD and Eagle titles. I was very impressed with the level of service provided, the updates sent during the auctions and the values achieved from the lots. Having previously sold items on EBay, I appreciate the effort and the time required - Phil made the whole process extremely easy. I have no hesitation in recommending Phil Comics to any comic enthusiast interested in selling their collection."

December 2015: "phil-comics auctioned my 1960s collection of around 600 boys' comics at the end of 2014. The whole experience was straightforward, interesting and pleasant. The final total I received (after commission and fees) was much higher than I anticipated. Had I auctioned them myself I am certain I would have had fewer bidders and received much lower prices. The only effort I had to make was one bulk delivery following up by one courier delivery. Everything was handled by phil-comics, including keeping me informed by email throughout the process. I recommend anybody with a comic collection for sale to do as I did, and leave everything to the experts."

Earlier feedback:

"Wow! Well done. We watched the auctions live - it was very exciting. Thanks you again very much - you have done a fabulous job."

"I would like to say that I was very impressed with your service. I was kept up to date and you achieved a great price. I will definitely be using you again in the future."

"Credit where credit is due your service has been top drawer and it's hard to find these days, I guess I am old school and remember the days where people did what they say they would!"

"I was delighted with the friendly and professional service I received from phil-comics. Just as when I've bought comics through them in the past, they proved a model of efficiency, honesty and good communications - excellent service combined with low charges. For anyone who wants a hassle-free, fairly-run, profitable and dependable way of selling comics, this is the one to go for."


"Service was first class and prices I got were terrific. I highly recommend phil-comics to anyone who wants to sell items. Phil does all the hard work and keeps you updated on everything throughout the bidding. Thanks again for everything."


"phil-comics sold a near complete collection of Victor and Commando Comics on my behalf on eBay over a four month period in 2007. Throughout this time I was kept regularly informed on auction progress and received regular payment cheques with a detailed breakdown of the figures. I have sold a fair number of items myself on eBay and found the phil-comics approach to be thoroughly professional and very friendly. I believe that their high reputation amongst comic buyers boosted the final auction values achieved. I would have no hesitation in recommending their services to others considering selling their comic collections."

^TOP

Items sought

We actively seek most pre-1975 British comics, annuals, books, free gifts, summer and holiday specials, memorabilia such as flyers and original artwork. We are selective about what we take on but if the items are right then no collection is too large or small, but in any doubt please contact us.

The titles we seek include:

Beano, Beezer, Bimbo, Black Bob, Broons, Bunty, Buster, Candy, Commando, Dandy, Diana, DC Comics, Eagle, Film Fun, Giles, Hornet, Hotspur, Jag, Joe 90, Knockout, Lion, Magic, Marvelman, Marvel Treasury Editions, Marvel comics, Mickey Mouse, Oor Wullie, Pow, Radio Fun, Rover, Rupert Bear, School Friend, Smash, Sparky, Superman, Tiger, Topper, TV Century 21, TV Comic, Valiant, Victor, Warlord, Wham, Wizard and more!

^TOP

Consignments

Feel free to call us for an initial chat. An email with a basic inventory of the items you wish to sell, including a general idea of their condition (see Grading Guide below for guidance) will be very useful. This can be simply a list of the number of issues present per year, e.g. Beano comic 1965 x 52, Dandy comic 1967 x 48, Warlord 1974 x 14 etc and a list of the annuals / years present. We can then advise on which items are suitable for our auctions and ask for further details.

Pictures of the collection sent by email are very useful.

For consistency with auction layout including descriptions and images, all items must be held by phil-comics auctions prior to any work commencing..

^TOP

Seller fees

For items selling for £9.99 or less - 27% seller's commission.

For items selling for £10.00 or more - 22% seller's commission.

A fee of 25p per eBay item is applied to cover eBay's listing charges, in addition to a 15% fee to cover eBay's final value fees and associated PayPal fees.

All % fees apply to the final eBay bid price.

The 25p per item fee applies whether the item sells or not.

So as an example, if an item sells on ebay for £100, we charge £22 seller's commission, £15 to cover the ebay fees and a 25p listing fee, so you would net £62.75.

We work hard to maximise the price of every item we handle and that means breaking collections down into small batches and, sometimes, listing comics individually if we feel they will sell for a higher price in this manner. It's a case of finding the right balance.

With larger collections, if we need to sort the comics into order we charge £15 per hour (deducted from balance) but we're well practised and efficient at this.

Please note: You would have to pay the ebay fees anyway should you sell the items yourself through eBay.

Over many years of trading on eBay we've built up a worldwide customer base of returning comic collectors and buyers. With a 100% feedback record of over 20,000, buyers have complete faith and trust in our services and we achieve some of the highest prices on the ebay comic market. We list 400-600 vintage comic auctions on ebay each month throughout most of the year, so buyers not only have faith in our auctions, they take advantage of combined postage when buying several items in the same auction. This means they tend to spend more with us and the money they save on postage tends to be put towards higher bids.

So, we do all the hard work of selling to maximise the bid price and would argue that our commission may be cancelled out by the potentially higher prices we would achieve as a professional seller.

* Very occasionally a discrepancy may occur with a buyer and if a slightly reduced price is agreed then the fees will apply to the lower price.

^TOP

Contract

Upon agreement of business and receipt of items, if we meet in person two copies of a contract will be supplied. Both copies will be signed by each party and a copy retained by each. For collections sent to us by courier, the email correspondence forms the contract.

^TOP

Payment

Payment to vendors is made after each batch of items is sold. Our preferred payment method is bank transfer but we can also pay by cheque if preferred. For international vendors PayPal is used.

Payment will be made approximately 3 weeks after the auctions have ended which ensures the buyers have time to pay, receive the parcel and are happy with the items.

^TOP

Courier delivery

We can arrange and pay for your items to be delivered to us by a private courier in one of two ways:

- dropped at a local convenience store and picked up by UPS (£11 per 20kg box).

- picked up from your home or business by ParcelForce (£13 per 20kg box).

They will need to be packed securely in a sturdy box and not exceed 20kg. Any spare space inside the box should be filled tightly with bubble wrap or screwed up newspaper.

The courier cost will be deducted from the first payment sent to you.

If you wish to arrange your own courier, we would recommend using the online courier agents P4D or Parcel2Go.


Collection of items

We are based in Hertfordshire and regularly travel to Birmingham, Manchester and Sussex, so can potentially visit en route to pick up a large collection. There may be a charge for collection to cover time and mileage.

^TOP

Grading Guide

All items sold by phil-comics auctions are graded strictly and fairly using this guide. The prefix + or - can be used to define a more specific grade; Very Good+ lies between Very Good and Fine, for example. Any writing (inscriptions, puzzles etc) and price clippings are stated separately.

Poor (PR) Sometimes known as a research copy, the item is complete in terms of page number and text, otherwise the item will be stated as incomplete. Extensive wear can include spine wear and loss to corners and margins, tears, creases, folds, foxing, light to heavy tanning.

Fair (FR) General, medium to heavy overall wear. Ideal as low cost gap fillers or general reading purposes.

Good (GD) General medium wear throughout, ideal for those wanting something affordable, yet reasonable.

Very Good (VG) Middle of the road, books and comics often appear in this grade having experienced light general wear over the years. Sound overall, displaying light signs of wear which can include creasing, nicks, small tears, light foxing and page tanning.

Fine (FN) The "Fine" grade will generally cause a flutter in the heart of the collector and will satisfy the majority. The item shouts condition at you. Minor wear to include light page tanning, the odd small tear and/or crease and light scuffing.

Very Fine (VF) Speaking personally as collectors, "Very Fine" is as high as we realistically aim to achieve. With white/off-white pages, the item will be clean, bright and sharp with close inspection revealing only very minor wear.

Near Mint (NM) The item is as close as one can imagine it to be when new. Clean, vibrant, tight, sharp, crisp. The cream of the crop and truly outstanding.

^TOP

© 2006-2024 phil-comics auctions. All rights reserved.Created by WebCreation UK