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We run the Militaria business in our spare time, and our full-time
work often involves working away without internet access. We have made
this page to give you a speedier response. 99% of the questions that
people ask can be answered by using the information or hyperlinks on this page
- please read this page before asking questions by e-mail. Click on the
heading in the table of contents to take you straight to the answer.
- Questions about specific
items of stock
- I can't find what I want in your online catalogue
- Is the item still in stock / How many do you have?
- How do I place an order / May I order by
telephone?
- Are you likely to get any of the
following items in the future? Can you obtain an item for me?
- Please let me know when you get an item that I want
- How quickly can you deliver?
- My order is urgent: do you have a shop, can I collect in person, or do you offer an express
delivery service?
- Do you mail / ship insignia to my country?
- How much will my order cost including postage?
- What is the item price in my
currency, for example US Dollars or Euros?
- You want me to send you money - how do I know that I can
trust you?
- How can I pay - do you accept credit cards?
- I have problems paying via PayPal.
- What is a 'Limited-Value' cheque /
check?
- Can you identify this photograph, badge or button or tell me
which unit is pictured?
- Can I send you an image of a badge /
button that I would like you to identify?
- Will you send me a scanned image of an item from
your catalogue?
- Is the price for a single item
or a pair?
- Will you reserve or put an item aside for me?
- Do you stock insignia to the following unit .....?
- Do you have a Beginner's Guide?
- Why should I buy
your snail-mail postal catalogues if I have internet access?
- Do you do valuations or appraisals - how much is my
badge worth?
- I have items to trade, sell or swap....
- Is the item original and in good condition?
- What does your abbreviation mean?
- Do you accept 'Wants Lists'?
- Do you stock medals?
- Do you have items that my relative may have worn
during the war?
- Do you do discounts or reduced-price offers?
- Do you have any knives, guns, bayonets or German NAZI
items?
- Can you recommend another dealer?
- Can you recommend a book about.... ?
- Please will you telephone me?
- Questions about regimental history?
- Genealogy Questions
- Questions about current British Army units?
- What is your returns policy?
- My question has still not been
answered....
If you are asking questions about specific items of stock,
please include my 6-figure stock number for the item in question. This is
a combination of letters and numbers and is the first 6-figures on the relevant
line of my catalogue. The stock number
consists of 1 letter, 1 number, 1 letter and 3 numbers, for example, D1C726.
Also see my answers to questions about :
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In many cases, we have more than one in stock, but do not
annotate how many we have; this is because quantities change faster than we can
update the web-site, often on a daily basis. If in doubt, ask for the
quantity that you want, and we will do the best we can to meet your order.
In the delay between me replying to your question and you
ordering, the quantity may have changed. This means that there is little point in asking these questions as the item(s)
may have been sold by the time your order arrives. Just order using a limited-value
cheque, and give alternative choices as shown on my Order
Form. I show the uploading date at the top of all my
catalogues and try to keep my online Catalogues as
up-to-date as possible. Also see reserving items.
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As a small business, we only despatch orders once a week on Mondays (except for Bank Holidays, and provided that we are not away on business
or holiday). We can also get swamped with orders immediately following the
publication of a Postal Catalogue, but most
'straightforward orders' are sent in the next available Monday mail
collection.
The mail is sent very early (about 7.30am) on Monday mornings and we normally
stop processing new orders on Saturday evening in order to pack everything for
Monday.
Depending on insurance value, mail is sent by First Class post or Special
Delivery, both are normally next-day delivery within the UK.
Overseas mail is normally sent by Airmail unless
the packet is very heavy and you have requested 'surface mail' to save cost.
Airmail usually takes about 3 - 14 days depending on which country you live in.
NOTE: Complicated orders might be delayed until we have time to try to
work out what the customer wants. The following are typical reasons for
delay:
- customers not using our order forms
- customers not using our
stock codes or not using item descriptions on the order forms
- Customers trying to part-exchange items without
telling us how much they want for their swaps.
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Sorry - we do not have a shop and you may not collect in person.
Our
busy lives mean that we cannot wait here for you to collect from us. The
badge business is conducted in our limited spare time, and mail-order is the
only way that we can run the business effectively.
We only despatch on Mondays, but we will
try our best to help if you
pay promptly and tell us that you need an item urgently
for an event such as a wedding, funeral or important parade. There is
space on our online order form for additional
comments.
If you cannot wait until the following Monday collection and we have to make
an additional journey to the Post Office just for your order, we may impose a
£10 surcharge to cover our time and fuel costs.
Orders over £36 in value are automatically sent by 'Special Delivery' or
'Signed-For' Airmail. This is due to insurance in case of loss, but these
mail services also offer priority delivery. Please note that they will
need someone present at the receiving end to sign for the packet. You may
request 'Special Delivery' or 'Signed-For' Airmail for packets worth less than
£36 if you wish, provided that you cover the additional
postage cost. Please see the
Royal Mail website for more about these
priority services.
If you have bought from us before and can quote your customer Client
Reference (shown on all invoices, receipts and catalogue labels, you may use
our Priority Order Form for Registered Users.
Using your Client Reference makes it easier to prepare your invoice, and we tend
to deal with these 'easy' orders first.
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Yes - I buy and sell world-wide. Click here for postage
costs. There are some countries where PayPal does not operate, so
please read our payment
methods page.
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You should be able to work out the cost of your order without my
assistance. Stock prices are in my on-line
catalogue. The only extra costs are postage
and foreign currency exchange fees if
not paying in Pounds Sterling. These are explained on my
shipping costs web page and on my
payment web page. I do not reserve items, so recommend that
you use limited-value cheques.
Please tell me if you do not understand this, and I will try to modify my
website to make it clearer for you and other collectors.
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We run a business based in the UK and our prices are in
British Pounds Sterling.
-
Each bank uses an exchange rate to BUY currency that is
different from its own SELLING exchange rate. Banks also charge
transaction fees (these are some of the ways that banks make money).
-
We use the BUYING exchange rates shown in the Times Newspaper
- http://www.TimesOnline.co.uk
-
Currency exchange rates vary daily. The buying
exchange rate on the day we receive your payment will apply.
This is why we prefer that you use 'Limited-Value' Cheques.
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Nearly all items are sold as single items, including collar
badges, shoulder titles and rank badges. If any items are sold as pairs,
they will be clearly marked "(Pair)".
Sometimes we list items as "Pair Available", this means
that we have a matching set in stock, but the price will be based on single
items. In other words you need to order 2 if you want a pair.
If in doubt, assume that the price is based on single
quantities. I sell items for collectibles, and collectors tend to want only one of a kind, not duplicates.
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No - I do not reserve items or 'put them aside'.
Experience has shown this to be an unsound business practice. Many items
are stocked as single quantities, so the fairest way with orders is first-come,
first-served. If you have (or are prepared to open) a
PayPal
account (a method of paying by Credit Card), you may order online using my online
order form.
First look at my Stock List index. This will
help you to navigate your way through my huge selection of stock.
This search will only tell you which web page to open. You must then open
that web page and locate the item using the 'Find' facility on your web
browser. For Microsoft Internet Explorer, the Find facility is in the Edit
menu. Click here if you still have no success.
Yes - click here - Dictionary and
Beginners Guide
If you are using my electronic search box, simply type a few words describing
what you are looking for in the entry box, then click [Search]. The more words
you type in the box, the more matches you get.
Capitalization doesn't matter. The ranked results will come from a total match
on the words and phrases which you supply, so try to think of several specific
terms for your topic and spell them correctly using
British-English
spellings. It's worth trying a few variations on the theme - as examples,
try -
- 'Parachute' as well as 'Para', 'Paratroop' or
'Paratrooper'.
- 'Canada' as well as 'Canadian'.
- 'Welch' as well as 'Welsh' or 'Wales'.
- 'Gurkha' not the Microsoft mis-spelling 'Ghurkha'.
- Traditional spellings - 'Serjeant' as well as
'Sergeant'
- Try singular as well as plural nouns - 'Beret' as
well as 'Berets'
- I try to avoid unit abbreviations - also try a search using the
full unit title - "Special Air Service"
as well as 'SAS'
To narrow your search, enter searches for the names of units such as 'Royal
Marines' rather than generic headings such as 'Marine Insignia'. Please
make sure that you are using British-English spelling and the same abbreviations
as I use.
Remember that this is a fairly basic search and will only tell
you whether the item is listed and which page of my website to open for further
details.
You then need to open the relevant web page and do a second
search using the search function on your Web Browser. If using
Microsoft Internet Explorer you can search the relevant page by pressing 'Ctrl'
and 'F' together.
If you still have no success and are looking for British and
Commonwealth military and police insignia post-1881 you are in the right place -
please try again in a couple of weeks - I have over 4100 different items for
sale and my stock is changing all the time.
If you are still having no success, then ask me but keep your
questions short and simple so that I can give 'yes or no' type answers. I
have other commitments apart from badge dealing and my time is limited. Click here
to send an E-mail message to me. I will be more sympathetic if you
say that you have tried my online catalogues with no success.
In 1990 our business started as a purely Postal Catalogue before the Internet
boom. We still have many postal customers from pre-internet days, and owe
these regular clients a debt of loyalty. Although we update our
fresh stock web page on a regular basis:
- we stop adding to the the fresh stock web page a few weeks before the
mail-order catalogue is issued.
- we deliberately keep selected good-quality items for the supplementary
postal lists so that loyal postal subscribers get first-pick of them.
- we have good stocks of insignia waiting to be catalogued and use this
stock to 'balance' the postal lists so that there is something for everyone.
- many of the items on the postal catalogues are stocked in single
quantities; if these are sold to postal subscribers, they never make it as far
as the web pages.
Please see - How to Order Insignia from Ian Kelly
Militaria
You may not order by telephone because we cannot accept payment by telephone.
There are other reasons as explained on our telephone
and fax policy page
We deal in collectable insignia, and in the nature of the hobby, some items
are scarce and patience is required. We deal in original items, and cannot
predict what we may get as future stock, or when we might get it. We
cannot just go to a warehouse or fellow dealer and pick items from a shelf.
The badge business is run in our spare time, and the amount of time and
effort to search for specific items is not usually cost-effective. We
regularly update our website with fresh stock and you can sign-up to a
free e-mail notification system to tell you when we
update web pages.
With over 6100 collectors on my books, I find it difficult to remember
individual requests. To help you, I have added a 'Change Detection'
feature to all my online stock pages.
'Change Detection' electronically monitors specified web pages
and sends you an e-mail message if the specified page changes. If you want
to see what 'Change Detection' looks like, go to the bottom of
this Frequently Asked Questions page.
To use 'Change Detection', take an educated guess at which web
page you think the item will appear, then go to the page and use the 'Change
Detection' box on that page. See my stock
index page to help you find a suitable page to register with 'Change
Detection'.
For example, if you want a Scottish item, then go to my Scottish
insignia web page and enter your e-mail address in the 'Change
Detection' box on that page. Change Detection will
send you an automatic e-mail when the Scottish insignia page is updated.
Top Tip - use 'Change Detection' on my 'Fresh Stock'
page - http://www.KellyBadge.com/NewStock.htm
and my 'News and Updates' page - http://www.KellyBadge.com.News.htm
We do not do valuations or appraisals. We cannot tell from an internet
image whether an item is genuine or not.
Beware of confusing rarity and value.
If you want to know what something is worth, look on our online
catalogue. If it is not there, then we am sorry: we cannot help.
Please see our purchasing
policy.
99% of our stock is already pictured on our website. To
see a picture, click the camera icon at the start of each line of our online
catalogues. This might appear as a pop-up window, so you might have to set
your web browser to 'accept pop-ups' from our website. The other solution
to problems with pop-up windows is to hold down the 'CTRL' button on your
keyboard whilst you click on our camera icon with your mouse.
If you ask us to scan a catalogue item that is not yet pictured, this will have to wait
until we have spare time and may take several weeks. We do not reserve
items, so the effect of this delay is that the item may be sold to someone else
before we have time to scan it. The easiest way to see
what a badge looks like is to order it - you may send it
back if it is not what you wanted.
If you still want a scanned image, please quote our
stock number
for the item.
Probably not. Attached images can contain viruses and we
have set-up our message form so that it does not accept attachments.
Please also see -
You may assume that items I sell are in good condition unless
otherwise stated in my catalogue. My criteria for inclusion is 'Would I
have this in my personal collection?' If the answer is 'no', then I do not
offer it for sale.
If any item I send you does not meet your standards, then I am
happy to take it back. Please see my returns policy.
Try my abbreviations and
references page, or for more detailed explanations, try my Dictionary
and Beginners Guide.
Collectors sometimes make long lists of items that they are searching for,
called 'Wants Lists', and circulate these lists around several dealers.
We will happily look at Wants Lists - but tend not to reply to Wants Lists
unless the item is in stock, and we only retain lists sent by
paid-up subscribers to our
postal lists.
We give priority to dealing with orders
that are submitted using our stock
codes, and urge you to look at our catalogues as
these show the majority of the items we have in stock.
Collecting is about hunting and the excitement when you
eventually track-down a rare item. These pleasures do not come through
asking someone else to do the searching for you.
From our point of view, it can take a long time to deal
with 'Wants Lists'. Our time is limited and it is
usually faster to look at our catalogues instead of
sending Wants Lists.
Also see my answers to the following:
Sorry - we do not deal in medals. These are outside our
specialist field. We deal in badges, patches and buttons. For other dealers, try Windrow
& Greene's Militaria Directory & Sourcebook 1998.
Ask other people who have dealt with me - look
at my Guest Book on my home page. Add
your own comments to help other collectors.
I accept credit and debit cards via PayPal,
click here for full details. If you do not have a PayPal account please
read my payment
methods page.
Please see my PayPal solutions
page.
Items on our catalogue sell faster than we
can update our catalogues, and customers sometimes try to order items that
have already been sold. If they have sent a cheque, this will often mean
they have paid too much.
Whilst personal banking in the UK is usually
free of charge, because we run a business, our bank charges us business rates on
our bank account. We pay a fee every time we pay money in or out of our
account. This means that it costs us money to send you a refund cheque.
We prefer that customers pay using
Limited-Value Cheques.
A Limited-Value Cheque is one that you sign and date, but instead
of writing the exact value of the cheque, write “Not More Than £_____ only”
For example, if you work out that your order
and postage comes to £25, write across your cheque “Not more than £25 only”.
If an item you want has been sold before we
receive your order, we will complete your cheque for a lower amount. If the
cheque is lost or stolen in the post, no-one can complete it for a higher amount
than you specified.
Please see the example below:
This method of payment is a simple, effective
way of reducing banking costs. It
DOES
work - my customers and their banks (UK and
overseas) have been happily using this method since I started business in 1990.
Sorry - we run a small business in our limited spare time and simply do not have time to deal a lots of requests
for information. We have made a Beginners
Guide page which is a good starting point to help you in your research.
For old British military photographs, try the combined
brain-power of the BritRegiments
Archive - they have a link on my web site and deal with this type of
question all the time. Membership is free using the box on my links
page. Be careful when you sign-up to specify in the 'Read
Mode' box that you want messages as a 'Daily Full Digest' rather than individual
e-mails - otherwise you will be flooded with e-mails about interesting military
trivia which may not be relevant to your enquiry.
When posting your enquiry to their message board, please keep to
short plain-text messages (no HTML) and do not
e-mail large image files to the message board as it clogs up the system and
annoys others. Instead you can post images to the BritRegiments
'Vault' or post a link to an image on your own web site.
For identification of buttons, try
http://www.britishbuttonsociety.org/ButtonIdentification/index.htm
Please see my Beginners
Guide page - as well as a section on buttons, this has helpful advice
regarding identification using the materials and colours used, also using the
design including dating the badge or button using the shape of the crown.
For identification of modern badges and non-British items
including weapons and equipment, go to my links page and
try the Militaria Collectors
Network. Membership is free and they have an online identification
section. They have a message
section similar to the BritRegiments Archive - the same sign-up and
image-file size advice applies as above.
The book Army
Records for Family Historians may also be useful.
Please be specific about what you want - remember that I do not
deal in medals, bulky equipment or complete uniforms - just insignia. Do
you want cap badges, collar badges, buttons, etc? Look at my online
catalogue index - it will give you an idea of what types of insignia are
worn.
Please see my Help for Beginners
page.
You also need to know your relative's unit, approximate
dates of service and whether or not he or she was an Officer.
- British military insignia is usually based on different designs for each
unit - even rank badges can vary between units. Some
Territorial Army badges are different from Regular Army badges.
- Insignia has changed over the years, both in design and production
materials -
- Key dates are 1901 and 1952 as the shape of crowns on badges
changed. Not all badges have crowns, but I mark on my list if they
do. QVC indicates pre-1901. KC indicates 1901-1952 and
QC is post-1952.
- My lists show an abbreviation for production materials. From
about 1950, Staybrite -
Anodised Aluminium (A/A) started to replace Brass (Br) and/or White
Metal (WM) as the main metal for military badges.
- Officers badges are often different from Other Ranks badges.
If you don't know exactly what you want, then ask
me, but please keep your questions short and
simple so that I can give 'yes or no' answers - I have other commitments apart
from badge dealing and do not have time to read entire family histories. I
am quite happy to answer 'yes or no' questions such as -
'My father served as a Sergeant in the Border Regiment in WW2, I want
to buy a cap badge of the type he may have worn. I found the following
on your online catalogue - is it a WW2 pattern badge?'
L5B709 KK 2011 King's Royal Rifle Corps Voided Centre KC Black £6.00
With that type of question, I can quickly and easily reply 'Yes'
The book Army
Records for Family Historians may also be useful.
In short, NO. Here is the background to this business
policy decision -
- My prices have been published in catalogues for 17 years and on the
internet
for 10 years. With over 4100 items listed, people now use my
catalogues as a way of valuing their own collections. If I
subsequently offer items below listed prices, it devalues people's
collections and offends other customers who have previously paid full price
(Ten years ago I lost a customer because he heard that I gave someone else a
discount - I do not wish to make that mistake again).
Collectors like to think of their collections rising in value,
not reducing.
- Over the years I have paid varying amounts for items, sometimes paying too
much in error. If I offer a fixed percentage discount I may be
out-of-pocket.
- Haggling takes time. As you can read on my website, I am very busy
with other work apart from the badge business, my time is stretched thinly
and I simply do not have enough hours in the day to haggle.
- The no-haggle policy works 2 ways. If you want to sell me an item or
swap it, I will pay the price you want, or not buy it at all. See my Purchasing
Policy for more details.
I think that you will find the prices on my lists
very reasonable anyway.
We specialize in authentic British and Commonwealth Military and
Police insignia. We do not deal in knives, g uns or German NAZI items and
cannot recommend anyone who does.
We prefer not to recommend other dealers unless we have known them
a long time and trust them implicitly. For other dealers, try Windrow
& Greene's Militaria Directory & Sourcebook 1998.
Try my Recommended Books page.
This includes details of the main books that I use. If the answer is not
obvious, then try Ray
Westlake Military Books
Probably not - for reasons and more details, please see
our telephone
and fax policy page.
For answers to questions on British regimental history, please
try Land Forces of Britain, The Empire and
Commonwealth this is an amazing source of historical reference - far better
than my humble offerings. If you cannot find the answer here then try
posting a message on the members message board of the BritRegiments
Archive
Regimental Museums are listed in Windrow
& Greene's Militaria Directory & Sourcebook 1998.
See Roots Web - http://www.RootsWeb.com
Try the British Army Website
To give you confidence in buying by mail order, everything we send is 'on
approval' - if the item you receive is not what you want, simply
send it back promptly and well-packaged.
We only sell items that we believe are original and in good condition, and we ask
that you pay postage costs both ways so that we
are not out of pocket. Despite you paying the postage, mail order is still a
lot cheaper than driving to a militaria fair, auction or shop in town.
Refunds. Our bank charges us a fee for every cheque we issue.
Most of our customers are collectors who return time and again for more insignia
from us. Unless you request otherwise, we prefer to hold small refund
amounts as a credit against your future purchases. The exception to this
is if you originally paid via
PayPal, in
which case we will send you a refund via PayPal.
Thank you for working your way through my Frequently Asked
Questions - the following e-mail link WILL send a message to me and I will try
to help when I get the time. The response may not be immediate as I
go away quite often. Click here to send an
e-mail message to Ian Kelly (Militaria).
If you want to buy an item, I suggest that you order it rather
than wait for me to respond to your questions - I might only have one in stock
and the delay caused by asking questions may result in the item being sold to
someone else. If the item is not what you expected, you can always return
it to me.
99% of the questions that people ask me can be answered by using
the information or hyperlinks on this FAQ page - please re-read this page
before asking questions by e-mail.
Be
notified when this
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