I proposed to my girlfriend last night.
While it wasn't particularly special or romantic (wanted to propose before we left for a mini-vacation this weekend, but it rained last night), it was definately a surprise for her, which I think was the better way to go. Had I decided to do something special, she would've been tipped off immediately, and it would have been less of a surprise.
Anyway, this review is long overdue, so I just wanted to thank my jeweller for being so helpful throughout the entire process. I purchased my first stone near the end of April (1.013, F, VS2), and took it over to the appraiser immediately (Jim Krol, Birmingham MI). He confirmed that I did indeed have an excellent quality stone. I then got thinking I wanted a larger stone... so over the course of another week or so, I had my jewe show me a few other stones as well. In all cases, including the original stone I purchased, she was completely accomodating in my requests. I had noticed that a few of the certs they had on their website were slightly lower-resolution scans, so I had a hard time making out the inclusion plot. She rescanned each cert (I believe 2 or 3) at a much higher resolution and emailed them to me. At one point, I asked her to act as my eyes and give me her opinion of the stones. I believe her response was honest and objective. She didn't try to steer me towards one stone or another, just highlighting the benefits of each and allowing me to decide which factors were important to me.
By this point, I had broken down and showed my girlfriend the 1.013 stone I purchased and told her I was considering a slightly larger stone. While she didn't object, she was concerned about if the larger stone would look just as good as the 1.013. I didn't want her to have the "What-if's" about her ring, so I wanted to see both stones at the same time, which proved rather difficult as I couldn't afford to have both stones charged to my credit card. So what we did was a pre-purchase appraisal, where the new stone was sent to my appraiser, and I could bring mine in to compare. So, two weeks after I had purchased the first stone, we were back in Jim's office and he confirmed the stone was excellent, and his assessment matched my jewellers's: both stones were excellent, and we couldn't go wrong with either.
The deal was, if I had decided I liked the larger stone, I could send back the smaller stone in it's place, and half the shipping would get credited back to my purchase of the stone (since one stone went back, and their site mentions that return shipping fees are the client's responsibility). However, Jim was a little uncomfortable sending the smaller stone back, because I had physically taken that out of his office and he didn't feel comfortable taking personal responsibility for that stone. Even though this was inconvenient for me, it was also completely understandable. So, I had to do some credit card juggling to charge the second stone as well and send back the first one myself. However, that all went fine, they received the original stone within a few days and credited back my card within the next two days.
The only real major problems I had were with my credit card companies, not my jeweller. Because I had to split up the second stone over two credit cards, I had a hell of a time getting the amounts approved and what not. My jeweller would go to charge my cards, and even though I had just called in to authorize a large charge, the charge would get declined. To make it worse, every time I called the credit card guys back, I'd get someone different with slightly different answer to what the problem was. Finally, I had my jeweller on my cell phone and my credit card company on my girlfriend's cell phone.
My jeweller was patient throughout, and we finally had everything resolved. I walked out of Jim's office with an amazing 1.186 F VS2 stone.
My correspondence with my jeweller was both via email and over the phone. Admittedly, I emailed her quite often over the two weeks and I think I called my jeweller almost as often as I emailed. I was starting to feel like a burden.
However, they were always very helpful in their emails and over the phone. It was a much difference experience than most (not all) of the local jewelry shops I went to, where even after telling them what kind of stone I was interested in (showing that I was a *serious* and educated customer) I was hard pressed to get the same amount of service or information. Then again, about half the places I went to were mall shops, and the local jewelers were much more friendly and informative.
If I had to have one complaint about my jeweller it would have to be that their return shipping policy is a little vague. On their site, it states "Upon receipt and inspection of your undamaged purchase, credit will be issued minus shipping fees". I had to pay a small return fee (I believe $30) on top of the $20 to ship the stone via USPS registered mail. While this wasn't unreasonable at all, it was just a surprise that I didn't realize. Now that I think about it, I think at one point in a very early conversation I had with my jeweller over the phone before I purchased my first stone, she did mention that fee but it slipped my mind and it wasn't clearly documented anywhere on the website. Again, this is just a small complaint, and I didn't want this review to be completely one sided.
Regardless, my jeweller still gets an "A" in my book. AND, since my stone was cert'd in April 2005, my jeweller has agreed to help me get the new AGS cert for it as soon as I'm ready!
I'd also like to recommend my local jeweler, Lewis Jeweler's in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I think they were a little disappointed that I didn't ultimately choose to purchase the stone from them, but they remained just as helpful and professional with the setting and mounting regardless. The setting I purchased was a Scott Kay setting, and it took about 3 weeks to get in. I was told it would take 2-3 days to mount in the setting. I wanted it before this weekend, because we would be out of town. Long story short, the ring arrived this Thursday at noon, and I walked out the door with the ring 20 minutes before they closed that same Thursday evening.
I was just so impressed that they were so willing to accomodate my needs and short timeframe, even when I didn't buy the stone from them.
Finally, for anyone in SE Michigan, I highly recommend Jim Krol from Birmingham Gemological Services. Though he's usually rushed when speaking with him over the phone, once you get in to his office you have his complete and undivided attention. When we were in his office working out the purchase of the second stone, I believe we were there for almost two hours, and the whole time he was very understanding and kept my girlfriend entertained with personal stories and diamond/jewelry knowledge while I wrestled with my credit card companies. When I went in with my first stone, I had asked so many questions that he let me behind his desk and allowed me to play "appraiser" letting me use his tools while he told me what I should look for. He even tested me a bit.
Yes, I know pictures are missing, but the ring is on mygirlfriend's fiance's hand now and I'm going to have a hard time getting it off to take pictures. I'll see what I can do over the weekend.
I originally had the funds to buy a ring at the end of 2004, before I had discovered PriceScope, but because I went out of the country for a month, those funds were gone. It was probably the best thing that could have happened, because otherwise I would have probably purchased an average stone for the same price I paid for this outstanding one with everyone's help here. Thanks again to everyone at PriceScope for being so helpful and informative, and making me feel 100% satisfied with my decisions and purchase.
Anyway, this review is long overdue, so I just wanted to thank my jeweller for being so helpful throughout the entire process. I purchased my first stone near the end of April (1.013, F, VS2), and took it over to the appraiser immediately (Jim Krol, Birmingham MI). He confirmed that I did indeed have an excellent quality stone. I then got thinking I wanted a larger stone... so over the course of another week or so, I had my jewe show me a few other stones as well. In all cases, including the original stone I purchased, she was completely accomodating in my requests. I had noticed that a few of the certs they had on their website were slightly lower-resolution scans, so I had a hard time making out the inclusion plot. She rescanned each cert (I believe 2 or 3) at a much higher resolution and emailed them to me. At one point, I asked her to act as my eyes and give me her opinion of the stones. I believe her response was honest and objective. She didn't try to steer me towards one stone or another, just highlighting the benefits of each and allowing me to decide which factors were important to me.
By this point, I had broken down and showed my girlfriend the 1.013 stone I purchased and told her I was considering a slightly larger stone. While she didn't object, she was concerned about if the larger stone would look just as good as the 1.013. I didn't want her to have the "What-if's" about her ring, so I wanted to see both stones at the same time, which proved rather difficult as I couldn't afford to have both stones charged to my credit card. So what we did was a pre-purchase appraisal, where the new stone was sent to my appraiser, and I could bring mine in to compare. So, two weeks after I had purchased the first stone, we were back in Jim's office and he confirmed the stone was excellent, and his assessment matched my jewellers's: both stones were excellent, and we couldn't go wrong with either.
The deal was, if I had decided I liked the larger stone, I could send back the smaller stone in it's place, and half the shipping would get credited back to my purchase of the stone (since one stone went back, and their site mentions that return shipping fees are the client's responsibility). However, Jim was a little uncomfortable sending the smaller stone back, because I had physically taken that out of his office and he didn't feel comfortable taking personal responsibility for that stone. Even though this was inconvenient for me, it was also completely understandable. So, I had to do some credit card juggling to charge the second stone as well and send back the first one myself. However, that all went fine, they received the original stone within a few days and credited back my card within the next two days.
The only real major problems I had were with my credit card companies, not my jeweller. Because I had to split up the second stone over two credit cards, I had a hell of a time getting the amounts approved and what not. My jeweller would go to charge my cards, and even though I had just called in to authorize a large charge, the charge would get declined. To make it worse, every time I called the credit card guys back, I'd get someone different with slightly different answer to what the problem was. Finally, I had my jeweller on my cell phone and my credit card company on my girlfriend's cell phone.
My correspondence with my jeweller was both via email and over the phone. Admittedly, I emailed her quite often over the two weeks and I think I called my jeweller almost as often as I emailed. I was starting to feel like a burden.
If I had to have one complaint about my jeweller it would have to be that their return shipping policy is a little vague. On their site, it states "Upon receipt and inspection of your undamaged purchase, credit will be issued minus shipping fees". I had to pay a small return fee (I believe $30) on top of the $20 to ship the stone via USPS registered mail. While this wasn't unreasonable at all, it was just a surprise that I didn't realize. Now that I think about it, I think at one point in a very early conversation I had with my jeweller over the phone before I purchased my first stone, she did mention that fee but it slipped my mind and it wasn't clearly documented anywhere on the website. Again, this is just a small complaint, and I didn't want this review to be completely one sided.
Regardless, my jeweller still gets an "A" in my book. AND, since my stone was cert'd in April 2005, my jeweller has agreed to help me get the new AGS cert for it as soon as I'm ready!
I'd also like to recommend my local jeweler, Lewis Jeweler's in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I think they were a little disappointed that I didn't ultimately choose to purchase the stone from them, but they remained just as helpful and professional with the setting and mounting regardless. The setting I purchased was a Scott Kay setting, and it took about 3 weeks to get in. I was told it would take 2-3 days to mount in the setting. I wanted it before this weekend, because we would be out of town. Long story short, the ring arrived this Thursday at noon, and I walked out the door with the ring 20 minutes before they closed that same Thursday evening.
Finally, for anyone in SE Michigan, I highly recommend Jim Krol from Birmingham Gemological Services. Though he's usually rushed when speaking with him over the phone, once you get in to his office you have his complete and undivided attention. When we were in his office working out the purchase of the second stone, I believe we were there for almost two hours, and the whole time he was very understanding and kept my girlfriend entertained with personal stories and diamond/jewelry knowledge while I wrestled with my credit card companies. When I went in with my first stone, I had asked so many questions that he let me behind his desk and allowed me to play "appraiser" letting me use his tools while he told me what I should look for. He even tested me a bit.
Yes, I know pictures are missing, but the ring is on my
I originally had the funds to buy a ring at the end of 2004, before I had discovered PriceScope, but because I went out of the country for a month, those funds were gone. It was probably the best thing that could have happened, because otherwise I would have probably purchased an average stone for the same price I paid for this outstanding one with everyone's help here. Thanks again to everyone at PriceScope for being so helpful and informative, and making me feel 100% satisfied with my decisions and purchase.
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