So I thought this was peculiar...



After much research and debate I finally landed a Speedmaster on eBay. Not only did the research involve the watch I wanted but also the seller (s) I was willing to "roll the dice" on. I'm not going to name names because I'm not sure if this is out of the ordinary or no. I thought I'd climb the mountain, so to speak, and toss this out to you folks.



The deal went down yesterday, I found a watch I was interested in and it was listed by a seller that is well known to be reputable. Heck they have even been mentioned on here more that once as one of the go to sellers... Any way off to the point.



The watch was described as used, Age: retro (1984-1999) Great, I'm OK with that. It had a picture of the warranty card, box etc...

So I bid and I won. Well today I got to thinking about it and I remembered the year on the card was 2001. I sent the seller an email asking about the discrepancy and they wrote back that according to the serial number (yes it matched the case and the card) it was manufactured between the mid and late 90's but the first purchase was June 2001. Is this normal? It seems as though that gives a whole new meaning of the term collecting dust. I'm happy with the price and the watch (as long as it's genuine) but I'd hate to think the card is a fake. Obviously I'm going to take the watch in to be authenticated but what about the card? And yes it was sold in Japan originally.

Question is is it normal for a serial number to be so far off of the registration date.



Thanks in advance for your help

Mike

 

Short answer: yes, a watch can sit in a dealer's case or safe a couple years before being purchased. Also, a movement can sit at Bienne a year or two before being installed in it's case to be sold to a dealer.