How to contact us, The Plate Lady of Tampa Bay, Florida

Contact The Plate Lady™ ®

What's On This Page:

Buying From Private Individuals | Getting Collectibles Information | Emailing Us | Ordering | Please Inquire & Backorder Notes

Buying From Private Individuals

Unfortunately we do not know of anyone who is buying used collectibles at this time and we do not buy from private individuals due to IRS rules.

We only buy at auction from state registered corporations, but those companies do not buy from private individuals either. They get collectibles from companies that buy estates, but we don't know the names of those companies, because that information is confidential.

The only help we can give is to link collectibles owners to a website that we have found to be very valuable in finding out all sorts of information about collectibles of every kind.

We have also supplied an article on "Demystifying Limited Edition Plate Identification" to help plate collectors learn more about Limited Edition Plate Collecting.

Please Inquire & Backorder Notes

If you see a note under a product that says 'Please Inquire About Availability' or "Backordered" it means we may or may not have that item in stock. You are welcome to send us an Email to see if that item is back in stock yet and/or to request that we put you on our notification list, so we can let you know when we do get it back in.

Our stock is in a constant state of flux and it's impossible to keep up with changing a website every time items go temporarily out of stock, without being on a database. However, it is our decision not to use a database because it would make browsing our website a great deal more difficult and time consuming.

Therefore, we might at times be out of stock on an item that is not marked as being on backorder. If you must have an item by a certain date, it is always a good idea to check availability before ordering and to let us know of your deadline date, so we can make every effort to accommodate you.

You are also welcome to ask us to put you on a notification list for plates we do not have already listed, so we may email you when they come in. We get new listings everyday, so do not hesitate to ask.

Ordering
To use our secure order form for orders, just click on the 'Add To Cart' link next to the item you wish to order and you will be taken to our online order form. Any personally identifiable information will be entered on a secure page and encrypted before transmission to a secure Cisco Server, where it will be kept only temporarily until retrieved.

If you feel uncomfortable with ordering online or if you have questions about our products, you can call us Monday - Friday 10 am - 5 pm Eastern Standard Time at 813-855-1566 (Selection #2). If we happen to be talking to other customers at the time you call, PLEASE leave a message to let us know what you are inquiring about, so we can be prepared with the required information when we call you back. We promise we will make every effort to get back to you as quickly as possible.

You can also find our phone number on SuperPages.com under Plate Lady.

We accept Visa, MasterCard, Discover, and American Express. We also accept Visa or MasterCard Check Cards. Our system will accept Visa & Mastercard Gift cards, but please let us know if you are using one so we can make the necessary adjustments. Unfortunately we cannot accept PayPal, Bank Transfers, or checks at this time, due to the need to calculate shipping costs before a final total can be given.

An accurate email address and a working phone number are required when using our online order form. We need these in case we have a problem with your order and we promise we will not use that information to spam you, nor will we give that information to anyone but shippers, as required.

If you do not have an email address, you can use our email address on the order form (mailbox@theplatelady.com) and the software will send us your notices and tracking numbers instead, so that you can call us to get any information needed.

It is important that you give us a standardized mailing address for shipping.

You can find out what that is by going to usps.com and clicking on "Find Zip Code". Then when you put in your address without the zip code, the software will either return your standardized address to you or it will tell you your address may not be deliverable with the information provided. If the latter, then try different forms of the address. If your address is undeliverable, you may need to give a PO Box address for shipping.

***Shipping charges cannot be refunded on orders that are returned to us undelivered, therefore, we must have a deliverable shipping address.

PLEASE NOTE: WE DO NOT SHIP OUTSIDE OF THE UNITED STATES because of high shipping costs and because shipping costs, return shipping costs, and importation fees for undelivered goods are not refunded to us by the shipper. We do not wish to accept the risks incurred with shipping across borders.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

***Our shopping cart will only accept shipping addresses within the USA.

However, if your billing address is outside the USA and you are shipping to an address within the USA, just leave the fields that cannot be changed and then edit the billing address on the last page of our order form where it collects payment information and asks you to verify your credit card's billing address.

Also, customers shipping to Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico will receive their orders by USPS Priority Mail due to high UPS shipping costs to those zones.

Getting Collectibles Information

We get many daily requests for appraisals and information about collectibles.

That is why we have placed a link to an excellent website, where you can get information from experts in all fields of collecting, on our Collectibles Information page.

It is extremely hard to find good sources of information about collectibles and we do want to respond to that need. The Plate Lady founded our company because of her love of collecting, and we feel a responsibility to make sure collectors have access to the information they need, to build a valuable collection. That's why we leave reference pictures of Limited Edition Collectibles on our web site, even when we no longer have those collectibles for sale. Just being able to quickly see what plates were made and who made them, is a valuable tool. Of course our information might not be all inclusive, because we do not list plates we have never had in stock.

The search box we placed at the bottom of each page is a good tool for finding specific artists and/or series on our website. It helps to narrow down the search results if you try to use the most unusual word in a phrase for your search. The results will show you every page on our website that displays that word.

We do try to help with other information when we can, but The Plate Lady is no longer able to help us find information for you, due to her advancing age. Therefore, we may or may not be able to help you identify collectibles that are not already listed on our web site. We apologize for that inconvenience.

One final word: Our prices are not meant to be used for appraisals. We use a formula for pricing items that is not the same as the formula an appraiser would use. Our prices will go up or down depending on how many of an item we have in stock and how much we have invested in those items. As stated above, The Plate Lady can no longer do appraisals due to her advancing age and health condition.

Thank you for your understanding and patience.

Emailing Us

Please Note: We report all unsolicited spam emails that we receive. If you are collecting Email addresses for that purpose, your IP address will be sent to the authorities and, thereafter, all further emails from you will be blocked.

We do not spam and we do not appreciate being spammed.

We are not a wholesale distributor and we do not buy from private individuals nor unsolicited sources. We only buy from wholesalers and distributors that we select AND make first contact with. We are a Retail Company that sells new products & mint condition retired Limited Edition collectibles.

On The Other Hand:

We love hearing from our customers!

Don't ever hesitate to drop us an Email at any time. Your questions, comments, suggestions, and especially positive feedback, are most welcome.

You can Email us at mailbox@theplatelady.com

Email is checked several times daily and we do our best to respond within 24 hours, but due to the frequent severe weather and power outages, here in Florida, it may take up to 48 hours or longer at times.

NOTE: Our email software is set to automatically delete any pictures, attachments, spam, viruses, etc.

***Please do put pictures in your email. Our email software will automatically delete them.

If you want to inquire about specific products, add them to the shopping cart and then copy/paste the information from the shopping cart onto your email. That way we will have the PRODUCT NUMBERS and advertised prices, so that we will know specifically what you are inquiring about.

***A good way to make a WISH LIST is to add products to your shopping cart and then either print the shopping cart page or save it by clicking on file / save as and then save it as a web archive file (*.mht) on your desktop for later. (Use the drop down box, under where you can name the archive file, to select the file-type you want to save as.) This file type does not connect to the internet in any way unless you click on a link, such as "Continue Shopping".

If you do not hear from us within 24-48 hours:
It may be possible that your spam-blocker has blocked our reply. This can happen because we use a different email address to reply to our current customers, that we do not publish on the web for privacy reasons. You may use that new email address for future communications with us, but if you use it to spam us, we will block your future attempts to contact us at that email address. This is necessary to separate spam from our customer's emails, so that we do not have to search through mountains of spam to find email from our customers. Our Customers always come first!

We cannot reply to every solicitation we get and still focus on excellent customer service.

Also, it could also be possible that our spam blocker blocked your message and it was not read by our staff. This could have happened if you were trying to sell us something or to solicit us in other some way, but sometimes it just happens for no reason at all (?) so we do sift through the spam emails from time to time to see if this has happened.

Another reason we may not have replied to you is that you may have typed in the wrong Email address or replied to an email from us with an outdated address that we no longer use. Our server is set to permanently delete any emails sent to our domain without the proper email address due to spam problems.

We do change our contact Email address at times, due to the need to delete mailboxes with spam overloads, so please re-check this page for our current Email address before attempting future communications.

Thank You for your understanding and patience.

Buying From Private Individuals | Getting Collectibles Information | Emailing Us | Ordering | Please Inquire & Backorder Notes

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