Sometimes UV is a cruel mistress

I bought one of these 20 Korun notes from eBay:

20 Korun - Czechoslovakia – Numista

These are almost £20 if bought UNC. When I received the note I checked it and it looked great. Both sides, the corners, all good.

I scanned the note, put it away to do the UV pictures later and I left the seller good feedback.

When it came to doing the UV images, I found an anomaly on the obverse only, on the right side of the note:

I initially thought this was something only detectable under UV. I got another note and this was perfect:

However when I went back to the original note and made some high resolution scans of the area where the mark is, I found that the surface of the note is damaged:

To the casual eye this can go unnoticed. But once it is seen under magnification, it cannot be unseen. 

What I bought as UNC I have now changed to XF (maybe it is not even that?)

By the way these notes have red blocks on the obverse when viewed under UVC:

Another one from an order that arrived today.

I ordered a pair of notes from eBay, a 50 and 100 Zaires from a seller in South Korea. On initial inspection with a white light I didn't notice anything wrong, however both notes have contaminants visible under UV. When I had a closer look, the marks under UV are visible under white light on the 50:

It is a white residue, perhaps glue or similar. In places where it is on a white background it is invisible under white light.

Here are the marks on the other side:

I'm going to return that note.

The 100 looks okay under white, but this is the contamination under UV:

It's a shame because those two notes are part of a series that has phosphorescent security threads and the 50 in particular is not common.

But once it is seen under magnification, it cannot be unseen. 

What I bought as UNC I have now changed to XF (maybe it is not even that?)

Why skip a grade when downgrading? The next level from UNC is AU (not XF). This is why you see a lot of AU notes which look like UNC but an honest seller will downgrade it b/c he/she knows it has been handled (or damaged & is no longer original in some cases). 

Because it is a physical residue that sits proud of the note. To me that is not AU. It is worse than if it had one minor fold. Not just that, but it is several smears on both sides of the note.

It is probably academic anyway because I am going to return this note unless the seller offers me another one at a discount.

For what it is worth, if a note has a mark that is only visible under UV, I still give it UNC but I tag it as [BadUV] in my collection.

There is some good news about the 50 Zaires note. Those “contaminants” brushed off the note like peeling sunburned skin, leaving no marks or residue whatsoever, not even under UV.

I am puzzled by what that could have been.

Another one, from a reputable dealer:

Fingerprint mark bottom right and UV fluorescent mark on the top edge.

He sent me a replacement note from the same stack and would you believe, it had the same mark on the top edge and whoever handled it managed to put a fingerprint on this also:

The fingerprint isn't visible under normal light. I initially thought the top edge mark was also only visible under UV, but on close inspection it is visible to the eye under normal viewing conditions:

Both notes are contaminated. They are sequential notes so probably his whole stack is ruined. Second note also went back to the seller, he sent me another note to replace that.

It's actually a sad situation when buy UNC and then see Las Vegas under UV (((

Wow, that one is quite bad!

This was from a guy on eBay, who I had bought from numerous times before:

He was not interested in exchanging it, he said that's how it comes in the stack. That was even after I told him I have another one without that contamination.

Sadly, in a case like that, you have to move that buyer to the “no buy” list. So far I have 10 sellers in that list. One is a private business in London, four are Delcampe sellers and the remaining six are eBay sellers.

I've had problems with more than 40 transactions. In most cases the seller has fixed the issue, such as the 10 Pound notes above. But the 10 sellers on my no buy list have either done nothing to sort the problem, or I have had a problem with so many of their orders that it isn't worth trying again.