This is already the case because for international orders, mike doesn't fund the coins until they arrive. One could just tell him the coins got lost and would have a batch of unfunded coins.

Insuring a tracked letter for up to €100 costs €1.50 from where I send. I offer this option for shipments cointaining 3 or more coins. This is roughly 30% of shipping cost for the orders I process of this kind.

Being able to send unfunded coins would reduce the shipping cost even further (no tracking necessary), for example for a batch of 3 to 5 coins from €5 to €1.50. This is substantial: it would reduce the per-coin cost for the customer by BTC 0.11 (3 coins), BTC 0.07 (5 coins).

I guess this depends on the cost on Mikes side to manage lost unfunded coins and his willingness to offer this. If it's too much hassle risk of having unfunded coins in circulation I can understand and will just go with insured letters or carry the risk of loss myself and accept a higher price for the customer.

I think it would set a bad precedent if coins (with official holograms) were originally funded by anyone other than yourself. 

Casascius coins rely on trust - trust in you - and any unfunded coins making their way into the wild could harm this.

are there ANY type 1 bitcoins left?
seriously interested in ~20 of them.

There are 5,401 active 1 BTC v1 coins in circulation. 

Hi Cas

Have you many of the BTC10 rounds left that have the gold "B"? I see you are running low on the normal version of the coin and I don't want to miss out on the gold plated version

Thanks

Good idea.  I mainly thought of adding links so people could buy with fiat, but people buying with BTC from a local seller and saving on shipping is something I'll promote as well.

Slab-a-dab-dab:

that's a good idea, if you touch them with your hands they start looking old and not as shinny

I think the oils from our hands acts as a catalyst to the tarnishing.  Probably gives it a more unique patina, but either way the tarnishing is inevitable on brass.  Unless you strip it of oils and give it a lacquer coat or airtight capsules.

Importing 100 Brass Tokens with Hologram to Germany

So my 100 1-BTC casascius coins had been held at the customs office in Hamburg because the German Post wasn't able to declare them (reason given: no invoice attached to outside of package).

I went there to declare it myself. After "getting a number", the usual procedure when dealing with german bureaucracy. My number was called and a girl in her twenties showed me the package and asked what was in it. I said it cointained Brass Holograms with no monetary value and pointed to the customs number on Mikes invoice.

She told me to open the package (which was actually 3 packages inside of each other, Mike packed it really well). I put the 2 heavy rolls of 50 Coins onto the table: "here we go.". She looked at them and saying I should sit down and wait, she would check. She went to the backroom.

While waiting it dawned on me she was actually doing her job and probably googling bitcoin. I wasn't wrong: after 25 minutes she came back with a printout of the order form casascius.com. She had entered "100" into the first text-box (1 BTC Casascius Coin). She asked me how much 1 Bitcoin was worth and I told her: "currently you can get about €11 for one".

OH SHIT!

My fear was unfounded: since she had already read that Mike would load them after I had received them it wasn't very hard to convince her that what I actually had bought were blanks. (Not ocrrect, since the blanks don't have holograms. She could've had me right there!). However she kept asking how much I had payed. I argued that I knew Mike and he had given me the coins as a present and I would load the up myself.

So she went to the backroom again (she said she had talked to higher-ups before and would have to do so again) for another 20 minutes. She came back with a calculation of value: 100 * BTC 0.05 * 11 €/BTC = 55€ + 30.82 € shipping (yes, you have to pay import sales tax on the shipping!!!) = BTC 85.82. That would be 7% = €6.11 please. (She even had a printout of some exchange site to back up the 11€ exchange rate.)

PHEW!

So I payed up and asked wether our business was now conducted, put another 1 BTC coin I had with me on the counter and stated it clearly wouldn't be considered a bribe if I gave her this coin. I saw her hand make a micro-move towards the coin before she had to say: "Sorry, I'm not allowed to, but thanks a lot!"

So I guess some people at the Customs office in Hamburg might be looking into Bitcoin now

Problematic points where:

• The invoice Mike sent me couldn't be used because it was "proforma" (didn't get around to ask what could be improved)
• It says "gift" on the Customs Declaration... then why did I have an invoice?
• I didn't have documentation of any payment. (Actually I could've pointed to a BTC 112 transaction but that wouldn't have been advisable)
• The "Blanks" on Mikes order page have no hologram, the ones I imported however, do.

needless to say: I'm reselling Casascius Series 1 physical bitcoins (1 BTC) using my thread here (bitmit escrow is too hot a potato currently)