Gday, this sounds like a question for me
Firstly, if you aren't a PSA member then you need to join as a member. You can choose either $120 US for one year, or $220 US for two years. This gets you submission privileges as well as free gradings (6 for the one year, and 12 for the two year) and a bunch of other stuff (access to pop reports for the time period etc).
Then comes the grading costs. You need to factor in insured shipping to the US for your cards. Ranges anywhere from $20 - $50 for insured, which gives you a tracking number and you can tell when it gets delivered to PSA.
Next the grading fees. You have a few different choices here. They have their stock standard grading charges, starting at $10 US per card for 35 day service. Or you can wait for their specials. My favourite is the $13US for 5 day submission - quick turnarounds and reasonably priced. Extra good for expensive cards. Second favourite is the $5US for 45 day submission special. Cheap as chips, 45 days is a real killer though. Factor in 10 days approx to ship there, 45 days submission, plus a week to get back, you can be without your cards for in excess of 2 months. Patience is a real necessity on that submission special.
Next factor in the submission is the return shipping to you. Up to 10 items is really expensive, which is why I will normally do a large submission each time to keep the shipping costs down.
Pacific Rim $US
up to 10 items $ 36.40
11 - 20 items $ 40.80
21 - 30 items $ 48.00
31 - 40 items $ 55.20
41 - 60 items $ 67.23
Over 60 items $ 1.12 per card
The other thing to take note of PSA - you need to submit each type of card on a seperate submission form. So you can't have patch cards, regular sized cards, tallboys and crossovers from other grading companies on the one submission. You need to submit each on their own submission form, and pay return shipping for submission form. Hence why it is not worth sending 1 or 2 cards for grading.
So that's the break down. I worked out for a 30 card sub, it was approx $10-$12 AUD per card on the $5US cheap special (can't remember exactly) and the $13 US special worked out at $20 - $21 AUD per card. Obviously with the exchange rate being so good now this should change.
I happen to have a PSA membership, and will probably submit on the next $5 submission. If you are interested in sending some cards, I am more than happy to submit them for you. I can even take a look at the cards before sending them if you have a minimum grade in mind (I normally won't send anything unless I think it is a PSA 9 or better). Most of the time i'm pretty spot on, have been known to miss occasionally (a PSA 5 that I still can't see anything wrong with!).
Hope this info helps you out! Feel free to PM or email me if you need any more info.
Cheers
Graham
