In an effort to ensure complete disclosure and in reaction to the mandate from the collecting public, any time a MEARS employee (not limited to those offering opinions) consigns an item to an auction, for which we have been retained to offer an opinion, that item will be listed clearly as such in the 'Items at Auction' until such time that this practice becomes commonplace for that auction house. This is done to ensure that a potential bidder is afforded the opportunity to understand the source of both the item and the organization offering that opinion. When a MEARS employee consigns an item to an auction house, for whom we have been retained to support, that employee does not have the option of having that item listed only with a personal letter in order to avoid disclosure.

Because of the unique relationship our Policy Director has with respect to our employees and the auction houses they provide services to, under no circumstances will our Policy Director consign any item to any auction house MEARS provides services to for the duration of the time he serves in that position.

When a MEARS employee consigns an item to an auction house we have been retained to support, that item will be evaluated the same way as any other item we review, however in that specific instance the auction house will not be charged for the evaluation of that item. It would be a conflict of interest for MEARS to charge an auction house for any such item.