GIA Decides on Overhaul

[pricescope]

IDEX Online: GIA Decides on Overhaul:

• Abolishes Diamond Industry Donations
• Cancels Rapaport Exclusivity
• Free Verification Services

Full article

 

[windowshopper]

well that''s confidence inspiring............................i wonder how many people will submit their stones for verification. who should be doing that is the question?

 

[Serg]

Very good direction for GIA. It could help save market part in future.
Leonid, Thanks for link

 

[strmrdr]

kewl, glad to see GIA moving to deal with this.
It looks like a large step in the right direction.
They still need to release information on the extent of the curruption.
Do owners of say a 2ct stone need to be worried?
Or was it limited totaly to larger goods.

The cert verification is a good offer but until we know how far down the problem went we dont know if we need to use the verification service.

 

[belle]

it all sounds good but there''s a whole lot of broken glass that needs to be cleaned up and i don''t think one sweep of the broom is going to do it. i will give them credit for making the attempt though.

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

Date: 11/21/2005 9:13:38 AM
Author: strmrdr
kewl, glad to see GIA moving to deal with this.
It looks like a large step in the right direction.
They still need to release information on the extent of the curruption.
Do owners of say a 2ct stone need to be worried?
Or was it limited totaly to larger goods.

The cert verification is a good offer but until we know how far down the problem went we dont know if we need to use the verification service.

The problem for the crooks Storm is that they had to be able to know who was going to grade their stone - and then be able to be sure their stone was going to that grader.

It seems obvious that this could only ever occur in the case of very rare high clarity large stones (plus 20ct), or very unusualy - say a fancy blue, or 10ct orange maybe.

The other factor that leads me to think this way is that the $ benefit for the bribers is measured in many thousands - even hundreds of thousands of $''s. So 10% to the bribee becomes a worthwhile enducement to sell their soul.

I doubt even a 5ct DIF stone would be attractive enough, or rare enough within the lab to be sure that it would go to an identifyable bribee.

I do not know - but i expect we will find the bribee''s were long term - and maybe even nearing retirement.
I would bet that we are talking about much less than 1,000 cases.

 

[WinkHPD]

Date: 11/21/2005 9:13:38 AM
Author: strmrdr
kewl, glad to see GIA moving to deal with this.
It looks like a large step in the right direction.
They still need to release information on the extent of the curruption.
Do owners of say a 2ct stone need to be worried?
Or was it limited totaly to larger goods.

The cert verification is a good offer but until we know how far down the problem went we dont know if we need to use the verification service.

Storm,

I don''t think we know that yet, and we dealers certainly need to know the names of the vendors involved so that we can check our stones from those companies to be sure that we do not have "tainted" stones in our inventories. (Thank goodness we have virtually no GIA stones in our inventory anymore!)

We have not been told the extent of the fraudulant grading, nor the names of the players, so at this point we are all pretty much in the dark as to what actually happened or did not happen. It could well be that there is more smoke than fire, or it could be that the blaze was pretty smoke free and more extensive than we think.

Enquiring minds want to know!

Wink

 

[WinkHPD]

Gary is probably right though, I doubt that many of us average to small vendors have anything to worry about, nor do our clients, but we need to know who what when why and where so that we can reassure our sure to be nervous clients!

Wink

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

I have been thinking about the demotion of President - CEO Bill Boyajian / or the promotion of Chairman to Exceutive Chairman's position in an active role above Bill.

I think this is sad. The things like allowing "honour donations" etc - even if they were Bill's idea (not sure they were or were not his idea) - they must have been approved by the Board of Governors – that is the normal responsibility for such decisions.

And if anyone was aware of actual deliberate bribery / false grades etc and had any evidence – it certainly was not coming out – so it seems unfair to blame Bill. If Bill is to blame – then willl all the diamondtaires on the Board also resign? Will the governors who also sit on other competing lab’s Boards be asked questions?

Bill has guided and grown GIA. He has done what he is employed to do as well as I can imagine anyone could.

I would like to give and account from personal experience of his hard working efficiency, and why I think GIA is making a mistake.

I have had a number of dealings with him over the years - once during a meeting the penny dropped that I was part of a group of possible cut grading competitors - I saw how assertive and aggressive he can be. At the time we did the Pricescope Lab Grading Survey Bill was very helpful - he had the lab jumping and responding to queiries he raised and looking at actual data records on the actual graders reports etc, and while he tried some politics to change our direction - he did an excellent and diplomatic job.

Most recently I raised a complaint about some commercial dealings on one of my associates behalf. As it happened the Lab bribery press releases came out just after my complaint email was sent to Bill - he responded within hours to say he would look into it - he did - and got a pretty good understanding of a complex situation, and replied in a couple of emails over a day or 2. This was when he was under the most pressure I imagine anyone could face.

In general I know there are plenty of people who have had a run in with him over various issue – but then who has not.

So, for the record – I think GIA might throw the baby out with the bath water.

Lab Grading Survey

 

[robbe]

it is surprising and disturbing to see how all of you are shy and reserved on this issue.
gia reports in large numbers overstated because of bribery...
i think it is a scandal. i think that a non profit organization such as the gia should never have accepted donations coming from their own clients, submitters of diamonds in massive quantities donating millions of dollars...
not only is this a scandal, it is ridiculous when you read what regulars on this forum have posted since years about gia.
let it be known; gia is known and reputed not because the quality of its work, not because of its ethics, not because of its integrity; gia is known today because of the marketing that they have in place. this marketing is possible thanks to the millions of dollars of donations from the gem industry. there is where the circle closes...untill shit hit the fan.
regards, robbe

 

[solange]

This scandal is really upsetting. GIA graded stones are priced higher than those graded by most other labs simply because it was believed that their standards were higher. It has been stated here that dealers often do not send their stones to the GIA because the other labs are softer on grading.

Now that their reputation is tainted, does the GIA report carry as much weight?

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

Date: 11/23/2005 11:07:12 AM
Author: robbe
it is surprising and disturbing to see how all of you are shy and reserved on this issue.
gia reports in large numbers overstated because of bribery...
i think it is a scandal. i think that a non profit organization such as the gia should never have accepted donations coming from their own clients, submitters of diamonds in massive quantities donating millions of dollars...
not only is this a scandal, it is ridiculous when you read what regulars on this forum have posted since years about gia.
let it be known; gia is known and reputed not because the quality of its work, not because of its ethics, not because of its integrity; gia is known today because of the marketing that they have in place. this marketing is possible thanks to the millions of dollars of donations from the gem industry. there is where the circle closes...untill shit hit the fan.
regards, robbe

Robbe you have very often posted the list of donors and made those claims. I never disagreed with the idea that they should not do that.
How many stones do you believe are involved? My bet is it between 100 and 1,000 only.

GIA is not strong because of its marketing - it is strong because it has educated so many people in the industry. Call it GIA brain washing if you like - but if GIA did not educate people in USA - who would have?

 

[robbe]

mr garry, you asked ''How many stones do you believe are involved?''.
i know it is much more than what you said. also, this has not been done with very large stones only. 1 ct, 2cts also.
another dealer who used to buy regularly from me once called me saying that if i would need an upgrade at the gia, he could have it ''arranged''. i remember he sounded very proud...at first i thought it was a joke, but the person was serious.
this is about 4 years ago and it has been going on for quite some time.

it is true and i agree with you when you write ''it is strong because it has educated so many people in the industry''.
nonetheless when this or that diamond company donates $ 1,000,000 to the gia then this money has to go somewhere...

i am not happy about this scandal because it severly affects consumer confidence.
if consumer confidence is afffected, then my business is affected too.
therefore, we industry leaders should say nothing or as least as possible, right? or is this the impression i got when i noticed the absense of debate about this issue on this forum??

i receive phonecalls from some of my clients, jewelers who ask me whether the gia certified stones they bought from me were submitted to gia by me or someone else...because to them it could make a difference.
it doesn''t look good and i cannot hide my dissapointment.

robbe

 

[Art Nouveau]

I missed the original post regarding the GIA grading scandal because I was on vacation. I am surprised there are not more consumers responding. Isn''t anyone concerned that the GIA cert for their diamond might have been upgraded due to bribery and their stone is actually a lower grade and therefore is worth less? Since GIA did not name any names, how is a consumer to know if their diamond should be sent back to GIA for regrading? Has anyone called GIA regarding this issue? If you call them with a certificate number, will they be able to trace who originally submitted the diamond and let you know if the stone should be resubmitted to verify the certifcate?

AN

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

You can do this - they are offering a free service.
somewhere on www.gia.edu

 

[strmrdr]

https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/gia-grading-scandal-my-take-on-it.36502/

I did some research into some of the top PS vendors policies for buying diamonds for stock.
So im not too worried about it at this point but GIA had better come clean.

 

[Art Nouveau]

From the info I can find on the web, it looks like the NY GIA lab was involved in the grading report bribery scandal. GIA has fired the employees who took the bribes and informed the culprit companies that their diamonds wil no longer be accepted for grading. Howewver, I am disappointed that GIA did not reveal any names. In order to regain the confidence of the public, they should have come clean. If you cannot trust a GIA report, whose report can you trust?