I am jumping in now on this discussion as I feel it is relevant. I recently broke out 4 x CGS coins. All graded from 80-96. I submitted them to NGC (Why because I am guaranteed to get more money at auction with NGC or PCGS than CGS or LCGS, I don't apologize for this, I am a dealer as well as collector and need to put food on my table).
The CGS 80 came back "AU Details Cleaned". Because of CGS slack grading I lost money on this coin .
The others came back between MS63 and MS65. I suspected they 96 was overgrazed by CGS and I was correct. The grading by a world recognized grading company will cove rtes grading costs and the loss I made on the cleaned coin. I am other dealers will always bid more on big ticket auctions for PCGS or NGC graded coins.
When I think about it I should not be surprised. LCGS are really just dealers like many others. They have their own grading service and they use it for coins they sell, so it's the police, policing the police. This is why we use grading companies such as PCGS or NGC. They are in the business of grading coins and make money certifying coins and not selling them. LCGS are in the business of selling coins and as a side line offer a grading service. When you consider some coins can jump sometimes tens of thousands for one grade, does LCGS really have the coin collectors best interest at heart?
While I like the Sheldon scale, I also see nothing wrong with LCGS 100 scale, but with my hand on my heart can not trust LCGS to do the right thing for a coin collector.
One other point, the CGS/LCGS slabs are crap, they don't fit in proper holders, are hard to stack of you like me travel with 50-80 graded coins in my brief case, but its a moot point.
If you are a CSG graded coin collector, one day you or your next of kin may wish to sell them. They/you may have to sell them in one go and contact a dealer or place them at a large auction house like Heritage Auction/ Stacks & Bowers. Bidders will not the grading seriously and the final hammer price will be much lower. Knowing this I wonder why people waste money on LCGS service?