Diamond damaged during sizing?

[Adlers]

I have client who sold a 1 carat princess cut to a customer in a v tip head. The customer wore it on honeymoon fell down , got scraped up , and diamond came out of setting. They e mailed my client and asked what to do. She told them to bring it back to her so she could inspect it and reset it. They in turn took it to a major retail chain who reset it into a standard 4 prong setting, AT NO CHARGE. The customer has now brought it back to my client to get sized, the bench jeweler sized it and noticed that the prong was bent. Upon inspection he noticed the fracture from point to culet. The customer is trying to say that this had been done during sizing. Any opinions on this issue?

 

[ame]

To me, it sounds like it happened during the fall but since they gave her a new setting free, that sounds suspicious.

 

[Kaleigh]

The client told the customer to bring it back to her so that she could inspect it and reset it. They instead went to another retailor and had the stone reset. This is where the problem lies for the customer, IMHO. They should have taken it to your client instead of the other retailor.

 

[aljdewey]

Date: 5/18/2005 4:16:42 PM
Author:Adlers
I have client who sold a 1 carat princess cut to a customer in a v tip head. The customer wore it on honeymoon fell down , got scraped up , and diamond came out of setting. They e mailed my client and asked what to do. She told them to bring it back to her so she could inspect it and reset it. They in turn took it to a major retail chain who reset it into a standard 4 prong setting, AT NO CHARGE. The customer has now brought it back to my client to get sized, the bench jeweler sized it and noticed that the prong was bent. Upon inspection he noticed the fracture from point to culet. The customer is trying to say that this had been done during sizing. Any opinions on this issue?

Something doesn't sound right here. Your client said "bring it back so we can inspect it and reset it."

So, when customer finally comes back in to your client (after a side trip to major jewelry chain), why would your client's bench jeweler do *anything* to it without inspecting it first....especially knowing that the client had reported a mishap with the stone?

I agree that it muddies the waters that the customer let someone else (major retail chain) touch it instead, but that is ancillary. Even if the customer hadn't done so, the jeweler would still be faced with this dilemma because they didn't inspect the piece to make sure there's no damage BEFORE doing any work to it....and this would seem ESPECIALLY true of a princess cut, which is far more prone to possible damage at the points.

My opinion....I think your client could be on the hook for it unless you can substantiate that the damage had to have happened during resetting.

On a side note.......I don't know of ANY major chain that does work for free.....none of them. They don't typically have those types of relationships with return clients the way small local jewelers may. A few years ago, we bought earrings for a friend of mine at a major chain, and even though we PAID for the earrings from THEM, we still had to pay another $40 to change the posts to threaded. I'm having a hard time buying that the setting was "free".

 

[Adlers]

I agree that this is an issue, it was handed off at the clients house and should have had a more thorough examination. It seems to me the free charge is abit suspicious though. It will be a coin flip I think.

 

[denverappraiser]

No jeweler doing work for the chain store could set a princess cut diamond with that amount of damage without knowing about it and complaining loudly. Failure to mention this is a HUGE oversight on several people’s parts. When a client comes in and asks you to reset a previously broken stone you make absolutely certain that they know that it’s already broken. Most will simply decline the job for this reason. For lack of this complaint, I think it’s only reasonable to assume that it was not broken at the time the chain jeweler set it and the fall was not the source of the damage.

Jeweler #2 (your client) should have inspected the piece as soon as it came to them and they definitely should not have done this at their house. They also should have done the inspection prior to doing the sizing job because now they are the last person to have worked on the piece. A chip from the girdle to the culet isn’t that hard to spot. No jeweler with any savvy at all will even touch a piece with this much damage unless they know the customer is aware of it. As with the above, most will flatly decline the job because of it.

I see the possible damage sources as:
#1 The setter
#2 The client during the period between giving it to the two jewelers.
#3 The sizer.

There’s no way to know at this point although a skilled appraiser may be able to examine the prong and the diamond and make a pretty good assessment about when and why the damage occured. I recommend that the consumer file an insurance claim immediately based on the #2 assumption above. It will probably be approved but it’s not a shoe in. Even if approved, the company may decide to go after one or both of the jewelers but at least the consumer will be out of the loop. I further recommend your client carefully review their take-in and bench procedures. They’ve put themselves into a very uncomfortable position here. This kind of thing can get very very expensive and now is a good time to clean up their act.

The free setting is a big red flag. As Dave said, there’s more to this story.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ISA NAJA
Independent Appraisals in Denver

 

[Adlers]

This client sells out of her home . She works by appointment only and does quite well. I believe the mistake was by the individual not bringing it back to her for further inspection. I , myself, in 22 years have never seen a solitaire going down one size chip a center. The jeweler made a mistake by not catching it earlier. The client of mine made a simple mistake not checking it out thoroughly before the " hand off".

 

[denverappraiser]

Simple mistakes can be the ones that bite the hardest. I agree that your client is probably innocent and that the consumer seems to have made a dumb decision. Good take-in proceedures for a home based business are at least as important as in a storefront or mail order operation. A huge percentage of the problems between consumers and jewelers, jewelers and tradeshops, wholesalers and retailers, clients and appraisers and similar relationships where merchandise changes hands casually could be avoided by zealous attention to this tiny detail.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ISA NAJA
Independent Appraisals in Denver