Important Books & Manuscripts

Conditions of Sale and Business 1. (a) Bloomsbury Auctions Limited trading as Bloomsbury Auctions ("the Auctioneer") sells as agent for the seller (except where otherwise stated) and as such is not responsible for any default by buyer or seller. (b) The Seller warrants to the Auctioneer and to the buyer that he is the true owner or is properly authorised to sell the property by the true owner and is able to transfer good and marketable title to the property free from any third party claims. 2. (a) The highest bidder to be the buyer. If during the auction the Auctioneer considers that a dispute has arisen he has absolute authority to settle it or re-offer the lot. The Auctioneer may at his sole discretion determine the advance of bidding or refuse a bid, divide any lot, combine any two or more lots or withdraw any lot without prior notice. (b) Where goods are bought at auction by a buyer who has entered into an agreement with another or others that the other or others (or some of them) shall abstain from bidding for the goods and the buyer or other party or one of the other parties is a dealer as defined in the Auction (Biddings Agreement Act 1927) the buyer warrants that the goods are bought bona fide on a joint account. 3. The buyer shall pay the price at which a lot is knocked down by the Auctioneer to the buyer ("the hammer price") together with a premium of 22% of the first £300,000 of the hammer price of each lot and 10% thereafter, hereafter collectively referred to as "the total sum due". By making any bid the buyer acknowledges that his attention has been drawn to the fact that on the sale of any lot the Auctioneer will receive from the seller commission at its usual rates in addition to the said premium and assents to the Auctioneers receiving the said Commission. 4. (a) The buyer shall forthwith upon the purchase give in his name and permanent address together with proof of identity and pay to the Auctioneer immediately after the conclusion of the auction the total sum due. (b) The buyer may be required to pay down during the course of the sale the whole or any part of the total sum due, and if he fails to do so after such request the lot or lots may at the Auctioneer's absolute discretion be put up again and resold immediately. (c) The buyer shall at his own expense take away any lot or lots purchased no later than five working days after the auction day. (d) The Auctioneer may at his discretion agree credit terms with a buyer and extend the time limits for collection in special cases but otherwise payment shall be deemed to have been made only after the Auctioneer has received cash or a sterling banker's draft or the buyer's cheque has been cleared. (e) All sums due to the Auctioneer shall be paid as shown and he reserves the right to charge interest which shall accrue at the rate of 4% over such base lending rate of National Westminster Bank Plc as shall be in force at the date that interest becomes due, such sum to be calculated per annum from day to day on all amounts due but unpaid. This right shall be exercisable without prejudice to any other right of the Auctioneer. 5. (a) If the buyer fails to pay for or take away any lot or lots pursuant to clause 4 or breaches any other condition of that clause the Auctioneer as agent for the seller shall be entitled after consultation with the seller to exercise one or other of the following rights: (i) Rescind the sale of that or any other lots sold to the buyer who defaults and re-sell the lot or lots whereupon the defaulting buyer shall pay to the Auctioneer any shortfall between the proceeds of that sale after deduction of costs of re-sale and the total sum due. Any surplus shall belong to the seller. (ii) Proceed for damages for breach of contract. (b) Without prejudice to the Auctioneer's rights hereunder if any lot or lots are not collected within five days or such longer period as the Auctioneer may have agreed otherwise, the Auctioneer may charge the buyer a storage charge up to £1.00 per lot per day. (c) Ownership of the lot purchased shall not pass to the buyer until he has paid to the Auctioneer the total sum due but the risk in the lot passes to the buyer on the fall of the hammer. 6. (a) The seller shall be entitled to place a reserve on any lot and the Auctioneer shall have the right to bid on behalf of the seller for any lot on which a reserve has been placed. A seller may not bid on any lot on which he has placed a reserve. (b) Where any lot fails to sell, the Auctioneer shall notify the seller accordingly. The seller shall be requested to make arrangements either to collect the lot or re-offer the lot for sale; if re-offered standard selling commission is always 15% and the vendor may be asked to pay any special expenses incurred in cataloguing the lot. (c) If such arrangements are not made within seven days of the notification the Auctioneer is empowered to sell the lot without reserve by auction or by private treaty and to receive from the seller the normal selling commission and special expenses. 7. Any representation or statement by the Auctioneer in any catalogue, brochure or advertisement of forthcoming sales as to authorship, attribution, genuineness, origin, date, age, provenance, condition or estimated selling price is a statement of opinion only. Every person interested should exercise and rely on his own judgement as to such matters and neither the Auctioneer nor his servants or agents are responsible for the correctness of such opinions. No warranty whatsoever is given by the Auctioneer or the seller in respect of any lot and any express or implied warranties are hereby excluded. 8. No warranty is given by the Auctioneer, its servants or agents, to the seller as to the authorship, attribution, genuineness, origin, date, provenance, condition or value of any lot and any express or implied warranties in respect of such matters are excluded. The seller acknowledges and agrees that the Auctioneer owes no duty to the seller or the buyer in respect of such matters and indemnifies the Auctioneer against any liability howsoever arising in respect of any inaccuracies in such information and against all costs and expenses incurred by the Auctioneer in dealing with any claim arising in that respect. 9. (a) Notwithstanding any other terms of these conditions, if within fourteen days of the sale the Auctioneer has received from the buyer of any lot notice in writing that in his view the lot is a deliberate forgery and within fourteen days after such notification the buyer returns the same to the Auctioneer in the same condition as at the time of the sale and satisfies the Auctioneer that considered in the light of the entry in the catalogue the lot is a deliberate forgery then the sale of the lot will be rescinded and the purchase price of the same refunded. "A deliberate forgery" means a lot made with intention to deceive. (b) A buyer's claim under this condition shall be limited to any amount paid to the Auctioneer for the lot and for the purpose of this condition the buyer shall be the person to whom the original invoice was made out by the Auctioneer. 10. Lots may be removed during the sale after full settlement in accordance with 4(d) hereof. 11. All goods delivered to the Auctioneer's premises will be deemed to be delivered for sale by auction unless otherwise stated in writing and will be catalogued and sold at the Auctioneer's discretion and accepted by the Auctioneer subject to all these conditions. By delivering the goods to the auctioneer for inclusion in his auction sales each seller acknowledges that he or it accepts and agrees to all the conditions. 12. (a) Unless otherwise instructed in writing all goods on the Auctioneer's premises and in their custody will be held insured against the risk of fire, burglary, water damage and accidental breakage or damage for which insurance the Auctioneer will charge a premium of £1.50 per £100 (minimum £2.50). The value of the goods so covered will be the hammer price, or in the case of unsold lots the best bid, or in the case of loss or damage prior to the sale that which the specialist staff of the Auctioneer shall in their absolute discretion estimate to be the auction value of such goods. (b) The Auctioneer shall not be responsible for loss or damage to goods of any kind whether caused by negligence or otherwise unless goods are covered by insurance effected by the Auctioneer as provided for in clause 12(a) above. (c) Any liability of the Auctioneer for any claim arising from loss or damage of any kind in respect of goods whether caused by negligence or otherwise including any claims for conversion will be limited to the amount of insurance cover effected in accordance with the provisions of clause 12(a) above. 13. The Auctioneer shall remit the proceeds of the sale to the seller no later than twenty-eight days after the day of the auction provided that the Auctioneer has received the total sum due from the buyer. In all other cases the Auctioneer will remit the proceeds of the sale to the seller within seven days of the receipt by the Auctioneer of the total sum due. The Auctioneer will not be deemed to have received the total sum due until after any cheque delivered by the buyer has been cleared. In the event of the Auctioneer exercising his right to rescind the sale his obligation to the seller hereunder lapses. 14. In the case of the seller withdrawing instructions to the Auctioneer to sell any lot or lots the Auctioneer may in this event charge the seller such cancellation charges as may be deemed necessary by the Auctioneer to compensate the Auctioneer for all expenses and other losses involved in or resulting from such cancellation and without limitation to the above such compensation shall be not less than the vendor's commission and the buyer's premium chargeable on the middle estimate of the auction price of the lot or lots withdrawn and any other expenses incurred in respect of the lot or lots. 15. The Auctioneer's current standard notices and information will apply to any contract with the Auctioneer as if incorporated herein. 16. The Auctioneer accepts no responsibility in connection with the commissioning of their staff to bid for any lots. Reserves and commissions given by telephone are accepted at sender's risk and must be confirmed in writing before the date of sale. 17. These conditions shall be governed by and construed in accordance with English Law. NOTICES AND INFORMATION Description and Condition of Lots Prospective buyers must satisfy themselves concerning the condition of the goods and the matters referred to in the catalogue description, in accordance with section 7 of the Conditions of Sale and Business. Solely as a convenience, Bloomsbury Auctions may provide condition reports. Many items are of an age or nature which precludes their being in perfect condition and some descriptions in the catalogue, or given by way of condition report (made either orally or in writing), make reference to damage and/or restoration. We provide this information for guidance only and the absence of such a reference does not imply that an item is free from defects or restoration, nor does a reference to particular defects imply the absence of any others. Collation of Books If, on collation, any NAMED items in this catalogue prove defective, in text or illustration, the purchaser may reject the lot provided he returns it within fourteen days stating the defect in writing. This however will not apply in the case of un-named items, periodicals, autograph letters, manuscripts, music, maps, atlases, prints or drawings, nor in respect of damage to bindings, stains, foxing, marginal wormholes or other defects not affecting the completeness of the text, nor in respect of lack of list of plates, inserted advertisements, cancels or subsequently published volumes, supplements, appendices or plates or error in the enumerating of the plates, nor in respect of defects mentioned in the catalogue or announced at the time of sale. Storage Charges Purchasers are advised that a storage charge of £1.00 per lot per day may be levied on all purchases not cleared within five working days of the sale. Commission Bids If instructed we will execute bids and advise intending purchasers. This service is free. Lots will always be bought as cheaply as is allowed by other bids and such reserves as are on our books. Commissions, where placed by telephone, are accepted only at the sender's risk and must be confirmed before the sale in writing. Shipping We offer an in-house packing and shipping facility. For information please contact Jason Baxter on 020 7495 9495 or via email: shipping@bloomsburyauctions.com. PLEASE NOTE: * We may remove glass and/or frames from framed lots unless instructed otherwise. * We may recommend specialist art handlers for certain valuable or extremely heavy lots. * Items that are shipped outside of the United Kingdom may be opened by overseas customs and resealed without repacking. * Dispatch will be via our nominated couriers unless otherwise specified. * P.O. Box addresses are not accepted by couriers for international shipment. Export Licences A licence from the Museums, Libraries & Archives Council will be required before items of certain kinds may be exported from the United Kingdom. Any item containing ivory will require a CITES licence before it can be exported from the EU. Payment Customers are requested to pay in cash, by credit card (Visa or Mastercard, 3% surcharge), UK debit card, or to have established a credit reference with us before the sale, so that purchases may be removed. For purchases over £300 Overseas customers are asked to provide a banker's draft drawn on a UK bank if they wish to clear books immediately after a sale. Commission Rates Vendors. The commission payable by the vendor on the hammer price is 12.5% for property in excess of £3,000 and 15% below that amount. Special rates are negotiable on single items of the value of £10,000 and over. Our commission on manuscripts, prints, drawings, atlases, maps, photographs, music, and Hebrew material is 15%. Buyers. A buyers' premium is payable at the rate of 22% of the first £300,000 of the hammer price of each lot and 10% thereafter. The diamond symbol following a lot number indicates that Bloomsbury Auctions has a financial interest, direct or indirect, in the lot in question, above & beyond the seller's commission or buyer's premium. Artist's Resale Rights ("Droit de Suite") Lots marked with an alpha symbol (±) are subject to the Artist's Resale Right Law. The buyer agrees to pay Bloomsbury Auctions an amount equal to the resale royalty and we will pay such amount to the artist's collecting agent. Resale royalty applies where the Hammer price is 1,000 Euros or more and the amount cannot be more than 12,500 Euros per lot. The amount is calculated as follows: Royalty For the portion of the Hammer Price (in Euros) 4.00% up to 50,000 3.00% between 50,000.01 and 200,000 1.00% between 200,000.01 and 350,000 0.50% between 350,000.01 and 500,000 0.25% in excess of 500,000 Invoices will, as usual, be issued in Pounds Sterling. For the purposes of calculating the resale royalty the Pounds Sterling/Euro rate of exchange will be the European Central Bank reference rate on the day of the sale. VAT Zero-rated items such as books, unframed maps and albums are not subject to VAT on the buyer's premium. Eligible items such as manuscripts, prints, photographs, drawings, framed maps, paintings, pens and other objects are subject to VAT on the buyer's premium as part of the auctioneers margin scheme at a rate of 20%. This will be invoiced at a rate inclusive of premium and VAT. Seller's commission and other charges will also be invoiced at a VAT inclusive rate in the case of the sale of eligible items. Lots which are daggered () in the catalogue are subject to VAT on the hammer price as well as the buyer's premium. Lots marked with an asterisk (*) have been imported from outside the EU to be sold at auction, and therefore the buyer must pay the import at a rate of 5% on the hammer and 20% on the buyer's premium. Valuations We undertake valuations for Probate and Insurance, fees being agreed by prior arrangement. If items are subsequently consigned for sale, the fees will be refunded. Annual Catalogue Subscriptions Full Subscription UK and Europe £600 USA and elsewhere £650 London Book Sales UK and Europe £200 USA and elsewhere £250 All Book Sales UK and Europe £380 USA and elsewhere £450 Maps & Atlases UK and Europe £20 USA and elsewhere £30 London Visual Arts Sales UK and Europe £100 USA and elsewhere £150 All Visual Arts Sales UK and Europe £160 USA and elsewhere £200 All Photographs Sales UK and Europe £40 USA and elsewhere £60 Opening hours: We are open Monday to Friday 9.30am to 5.30pm

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