PSA Investing $200 Million Due to Demand, Extending Turnaround Time
After experiencing what they have called unprecedented demand for their services, Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA) just announced a round of new investment and changes to their process. Which, unfortunately, means an increase in turnaround times and a new minimum for their value bulk service level.
This is the second time since the first of the year that PSA has made changes to their services.
Turnaround Times Increase and Move to a Range of Days
Starting May 14, 2026, PSA has increased its turnaround times for all of its service levels. According to their webpage announcing the changes, they will also move to an estimated completion range of days, rather than a specific number.
For example, the Value Bulk service level was formerly 95 days. With the changes, that time frame has been changed to reflect a range of 140 to 160 business days for the new turnaround time.
PSA President Ryan Hoge was recently on the Sports Cards Nonsense podcast to discuss the grading and the current state of the hobby, where he talked about some upcoming changes.
"We've had our highest submission days in four years," Hoge said. "We're not seeing any signs of slowdown on the horizon."
The information posted to PSA's website highlighted that these new turnaround times only affect submissions started from May 14. Any orders already entered into the system prior to that date will be graded and returned within the old turnaround times.
PSA Increases Minimum Card Requirement for Value Bulk
The other big change announced by PSA is to the Value Bulk service level. The Value Bulk service level is the cheapest option to grade your cards. However, you do need to join their Collector's Club to take advantage of the lowest grading cost.
Aside from requiring a membership, there was a 20-card minimum to be able to submit through the Bulk Value service level. But according to the information released today, submitters will be required to submit a minimum of 50 cards.
PSA will be extending current Collectors Club memberships by three months for no charge.
Collectors Investing $200 Million Into Operations
PSA also discussed the financial investment they plan on making over the next year and a half. According to PSA, they are putting $200 million into three different aspects of its business: infrastructure, technology, and expertise.
Expertise is the one that may affect turnaround times the most. They said that they want to scale their workforce and specialized training programs, theoretically, to bring more graders on board. There are more than 370 current positions open, and they hope to create 700 more by the end of the year.
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After graduating from the University of North Dakota in 2008, Cole worked as an advertising copywriter until shifting to print journalism a few years later. Managing three weekly newspapers in the Dakotas, Cole won numerous awards from the North Dakota Newspaper Association including Best of the Dakotas and, their top award, General Excellence. He returned to collecting in 2021 and has since combined his passion for writing with his love of cards. Cole also writes for the Sports Cards Nonsense newsletter and has made guest appearances on multiple sports card collecting podcasts including Sports Cards Nonsense, and the Eephus Baseball Cards Podcast. IG: coleryan411 X: @colebenz