Grading Woes - Alternative acronyms wanted for UKG /AFA

Ive only been back in the hobby three or four years so grading was a mystery to me. When I collected in the early 90s to 97, the only repros were lead and the only variants were orange snake or brown snake as far as I was concerned.
So, had a bit of money and bid straight on a graded Blue Snag and won it at a fairly good price if I remember. 'Hey Guys!' I announced back in the hobby - 'my first piece and its U85 graded'.
The virtual tomatoes stung, comments were made, Information was sought out and lessons were learnt. So there you go, my dirty secret, like a bastard child locked in the cellar.
I quickly decided that I didn't like graded figures let alone U grades after I'd realised what that meant to the future of the hobby.
Part of my decided that who the fuck are these nobodies to tell me what a condition a figure is appraised at but the other part of me thought 'hmm they must no what they are doing so maybe if the chance comes along at the right price I should get some of the more desirable figures if they come up, after all. its a guarantee - right?
Ive now had a Luke trooper sitting pride of place in his perspex prison for over a year, along with a couple of other last 17s graded i bought. Even a VC Jawa! At least that must be right now its been graded!
Well,six month, after the black blaster fuss i was chuffed to think at least I've got one in his case all safe so I went to look....and stared...and there it was....a dark blue blaster inside. Arseholes! I felt dissapointed but it seems general consensus that dark blue came with some - Oh well.
Then I won a graded Yoda and when it arrived it was a green yoda with an Orange snake not brown, 'Bloody fuck sticks do they not know what they are doing'. but it soon gets forgotten.
Then a few nights ago after the super rare naked Jawa - gate happened I was looking adoringly at my magneto imprisoned plastic case and looking at the VC jawa, safe in the knowledge that he was legit...but wait....those straps dont look right, and come to think of it , the thumb doesnt either. ARGGH wank-bags! Its the wrong Jawa for a VC jawa...SO....there you go. any glimmer of believing they knew what they were doing has no been extinguished.
AFA - Absolutly fucking atrocious. UKG - Useless konning Gits

Mark, that sucks. You'd expect that these companies would know what they are doing. Especially when your paying them for the service.

I've stayed away from any graded items, just because they artificially inflate the price. I don't need someone else telling me I have a nice figure, MOC, or boxed item and then encase it in an acrylic tomb.

When it started I think there was at least some degree of something kicking about but to be honest they simply don't know enough. I think there was at least 35 confirmed Luke Bespin variants last time I checked. Not just brown hair blonde hair etc.
Now it has become an industry and like all industries, employs staff, most probably won't be 'experts' in the field and will have to obey some guide lines. The grade to me is a day to day thing, hopefully you won't get Workman Bob today who got wankered last night and really isn't feeling work today and BAM your 85 gets a 75 just because he can't focus properly, but everyone gets paid so who cares.

I'll have to dig out my old Brians Toys catalogues from when AFA first started, I believe they claimed they where non profit so none biased...... None profit???? It costs a fortune.... ay more thsan the cost of the materials so I call bull shit.

On a different note.... was there a specific COO for the VC Jawa? I've checked many MOC examples and suspect that the VC was produced in at least 2 factories and most likely the three

Bare in mind that the cape was changed to potentially encourage sales so the original spec was vinyl. So all factroies producing the figure would have produced vinyl most likely? Just a thought.

Well I hope you are right Alex. I thought it lately seemed to be the agreed norm that a VC jawa came with the short thumb, low HK coo and 'stonehenge' bandoleer.
James wrote a useful piece on the Court about how not to be conned thinking that figure only came with a vinyl cape and that it also came with a cloth cape.

Ahhhh fuck that sucks Mark. Sorry to hear mate.

I have some graded figs but I'm no fan of these companies. Although I think they are mostly a negative influence on our hobby it seems a lot of people support them....

No grading company support from me, and the issues you have Mark are just the tip of the iceberg, unfortunately. AFA still refuses to acknowledge their error in the Toy Toni fiasco, and while mistakes are bound to happen, I don't want to be that statistic that ends up with a graded repro piece. Their grading is wildly subjective too, and tends to be all over the place. Very disappointing, when the "market value" jumps exponentially with every grade increase.

Ian