For those of you who have thought of selling or buying an antique clock from an auction house beware. I was heartbroken to see what had happened to clocks that I had spent some thirty years collecting and perfecting their restoration and performance.

In reviewing the posted photos on their website I had seen so much damage that was done to the clocks which included broken carvings, bent and or missing linkage along some damage to the mechanical music functions. I had to contact the auction house though out the auction process as to issues with the clocks damage and descriptions inaccuracy’s.

I will do all future sales though eBay or directly with the buyer in which I will have the clocks professionally packed though the UPS store and pass along the exact cost to the buyer. As just one example Fontains auction house charges 10% to the seller and an additional 25% to the buyer, that’s 35% you are not realising on the sale price of your clock.

So when you see the final sale price of the clock you can take off 35% off of that price that is what the seller actually received, pretty sad 😔

The one who makes out on the sale is the auction house not the seller “so beware”. Note : EBay charges a flat rate of 15% (see charges below) that’s a additional 20% in the sellers pocket and it surly lessens the chance for damage to the item you are selling, plus your getting UPS insured packaging for any damage that incurs during shipping.

I’m sure Fontains along with other auction houses also makes money on the shipping cost of items sold.i can post all the damage I have seen on almost alll the clocks in my particular auction but below is just one example of some major damage to a very rare highly documented one of a kind clock🤬

Note: the second photo shows damage to the wind-chest and the missing lifting pins which are individually set to each note. The last photo shows the condition of the movement before it went to auction.

EBay charges :

• 15% on total amount of the sale up to $1,000 calculated per item

• 6.5% on the portion of the sale over $1,000 up to $7,500 calculated per item

• 3% on the portion of the sale over $7,500

PS this is only one example of several clocks that were damaged😠