Question on eBay Vendor & "Natural" Alexandrite

[pokerface]

What is the deal with the ebay vendor oldtreasures333? I see a number of complaints filed with BBB but the vendor still has a 100% positive feedback rating on ebay. I suspect - though of course I don't know - that the vendor is choosing to refund customers rather than leave up any negative rating. If you look through the thousands of listings, SO many of them are suspect: bright orange sapphires listed as "natural," modern cut center stones placed in antique settings, and hundreds of "natural" alexandrites with obviously photoshopped color change. Are most of these not really natural? Are they all fracture-filled? Given the sheer quantity of alexandrites they have for sale, I don't think there's much chance of any particular one of them to be a good deal. I read a prior thread where the vendor was mentioned but the PS-er who made a purchase never got a lab report. @LD @Bron357

 

[Voodoo Child]

Buying Alexandrite off of eBay is like buying gas station sushi: It’s always a bad idea. Occasionally someone gets a great deal on a beautiful piece (Bron’s bracelet for example) but that is the exception, not the norm. If you’re going to drop the $$$ for Alexandrite, you should always try to view it in person, verify their return policy, and insist on a report from a reputable lab. That’s what I did when I bought my wife’s center stone.

 

[pokerface]

Yup, 100% correct. I am just asking what the likely scenario is with the stones sold by this vendor. I am not an expert, but most do not appear to be usual synthetic corundum-type fakes, so I'm wondering what they could be. I don't think there's any reasonable chance of them being the real deal.

 

[Bron357]

My 5 cents.
Ive been buying on eBay for 18 years now.
Yes I have bought from oldtreasures333, I know it was 2 vintage watches and a pair of earrings and maybe a pendant / chain? I can’t speak for the other 96,000 odd transaction but mine were as described.
oldtreasures333 is a liquidator/ pawn shop. They get their stock from lots of sources and they have ALOT of listings.
I can’t comment on BBB ratings but I know how eBay works.
oldtreasures333 has had over 96,000 positive transactions for that 100% score. Sales that are cancelled dont show in those numbers but refunds and returns can still count and with their comments and ratings. So it’s unlikely, but not impossible, that there are hundreds of returns / refunds not showing as sales. The eBay numbers indicate that thousands of sales resulted in happy buyers.

ebay is run by metrics and bots. eBay runs on successful sales so eBay can get their fee. Sales that don’t proceed, for whatever reason, means no fees for eBay and eBay doesn’t like that. In fact sellers who have too many returns/ refunds get their selling privileges limited and/or withdrawn.

Back to oldtreasures333.
I don’t like their listing style. I don’t like sellers who promote items with wording like “Val $10,000” because it’s misleading. Many, many MANY sellers use this listing style to get clicks and sales.
And I also don’t like the emphasis on natural as if that also means untreated. Experienced buyers know that natural and natural with glass filling and/or BE diffusion are vastly different. However an ebay seller is still entitled to refer to the gemstone as natural, because it still is, whether or not the gem is in fact highly treated. Buyer beware.
As for their Alexandrite selection, well, firstly they, like others, refer to any colour chrysoberyl as Alexandrite. Their more expensive offerings are awful examples of colour change Alexandrite in that the colour is muddy and the change marginal but nevertheless they can and do use the Alexandrite label.
Their smaller Alex gem offerings, a lot by auction, are not much better. They are poorer quality Alexandrite, the clarity more opaque than transparent and in some cases the colour change, if shown, is barely there. Being small size, highly included and with a marginal colour change doesnt make them fake or even desirable but it should make them cheap. A buyer decides if they think the item is to their satisfaction by buying or bidding up to what they think a fair price.
While I have bought an expensive Alexandrite bracelet from eBay, it’s not for everyone. My Alexandrite bracelet via auction listing was uncertified (but not from this seller) that it was my choice to bid as I saw fit as I knew it was uncertified and there are big risks around a lack of certification.
ebay can be fantastic and it can be terrible. if in doubt avoid.

 

[pokerface]

What about the specific example I linked to? I sent the seller an email and he stated the alexandrite is untreated as well as natural. I know that you can't say for sure from a picture, but if this were a natural, untreated alexandrite, it would be worth somewhere between $10,000-$20,000. It's a catch-22 because the seller can't be both knowledgable enough to declare it a natural stone as well as foolish enough to sell it for less than a 10th of its value. So what's the most likely scenario? Fracture filling? Some new treatment we should be aware of? Highly manipulated photos with the stone having little or no color change? I have never seen natural alexandrite in this bright green color.

 

[Lisa Loves Shiny]

I peruse Ebay and have viewed this vendors auctions for years. I would never buy from him. I suspect the Alexandrite will be real, will be a weak green/yellow color, included, and will have a slight color change to orange/brown. These are the types of Alexandrites you used to be able to purchase from vendors like Multicolour gems a few years back. They were very inexpensive as expected and not the quality or price of their more expensive Alexandrites.

I miss Toolhaus. That was a great tool to determine actual Ebay vendor feedback.

 

[Django74th]

I purchased a ring from this seller and can’t recommend him unfortunately. He uses a ton of color saturation effects to improve the appearance — if you find a picture of a yellow sapphire in his store, for example, you’ll see what I mean. The ring I purchased had oval stones crammed into round settings and one of the stones was chipped. I should have returned it (I will say he has a decent return policy) but I didn’t… now I stare at it and try my best to see it as a learning experience and not feel ridiculous for not listening to my gut. Luckily, it was pretty inexpensive.

 

[Bron357]

Ok, found the listing.
whether or not the colour has been manipulated I can’t say but plenty of their other listings show pretty ugly colour in Alexandrites so I’d assume that’s how it looks under their studio photography conditions.
Alexandrite are difficult to photograph due to their reaction to different light wavelengths. It can be nigh impossible to replicate what the eye sees in a photo unless the image and/or lighting is adjusted.
My Alexandrite bracelet is accurate with daylight colour, mostly, but I can’t replicate the incandescent colour reliably because I find different light bulbs, literally, give me a different colour. Candlelight will give me the red/purple but unfortunately I don’t live a life lit by candlelight. In fact these days finding an incandescent light is rare, mostly LED.
This particular Alexandrite is toning towards the green yellow than green blue so that’s considered a negative. Most obvious though is it’s very poor colour change, it’s barely showing any purple, it’s almost looks the same as the daylight photo. 2nd photo is supposed to be showing it’s colour change.
The money in Alexandrite is in the best green blue daylight colour transforming, as close to 100% change as possible, to red / purple. Any tinges of yellow or brown or olive in daylight colour is a negative as is any murky brown, orange, grey tones in incandescent and any change under 75% is a negative.
so that Alexandrite is a pretty daylight colour but not much else.

 

[Bron357]

My wee Alexandrite ring on the other hand is nigh impossible to photograph the daylight colour. All my photos are done with my iPhone so thats not what changes.
it can look dark green, blue green or even virtually blue.

 

[pokerface]

Here are the photos showing the "color change." It is the same photo. Every gem facet reflection is the same. I at least find these colors attractive, even if they are not top colors for alexandrite. I am confused by the suggestion the the color change would be to orange/brown - I mean, @Lisa Loves Shiny is probably correct, but I would think that any customer wanting green and violet/green would be unhappy with orange. I can understand color manipulation in order to reflect what the eye sees, but not when it's used to make a gem look better than it is - then it's deceitful.

 

[Lisa Loves Shiny]

Here are the photos showing the "color change." It is the same photo. Every gem facet reflection is the same. I at least find these colors attractive, even if they are not top colors for alexandrite. I am confused by the suggestion the the color change would be to orange/brown - I mean, @Lisa Loves Shiny is probably correct, but I would think that any customer wanting green and violet/green would be unhappy with orange. I can understand color manipulation in order to reflect what the eye sees, but not when it's used to make a gem look better than it is - then it's deceitful.

IMHO all the Alexandrites I owned showed a much more exaggerated and beautiful color change in photos than in real life. We can only speculate on the photos.

 

[LD]

What about the specific example I linked to? I sent the seller an email and he stated the alexandrite is untreated as well as natural. I know that you can't say for sure from a picture, but if this were a natural, untreated alexandrite, it would be worth somewhere between $10,000-$20,000. It's a catch-22 because the seller can't be both knowledgable enough to declare it a natural stone as well as foolish enough to sell it for less than a 10th of its value. So what's the most likely scenario? Fracture filling? Some new treatment we should be aware of? Highly manipulated photos with the stone having little or no color change? I have never seen natural alexandrite in this bright green color.

Disclaimer: i haven’t looked at this EBay seller

however, If that’s an Alex I’ll eat my hat! Colours are totally wrong (even allowing for the difficulty of photographing Alex). Bear in mind that it’s the green in Alex that’s almost impossible to capture accurately. That means this is either photoshopped or a simulant of some description etc.

Somebody who has tons of Alex for sale is suspect. It’s easy to “buy off” unhappy customers by giving a full refund, perhaps letting them keep the stone, a big discount on other stones etc etc.

Don’t forget Alex is valued by both colourways etc. Most Alex for sale at the moment has muddy or unattractive colours. Unless it’s an emerald green during the day (not yellow, not mint green) and a purple at night (not brown) - see my avatar for the purple you want to see, it’s a very poor quality Alex and even a 2ct stone without the “best” colour change is like buying a blue sapphire that looks black.

in terms of treatment ….. Alex is NEVER treated so if it’s being sold as “untreated” and that’s being used as a selling point that tells you something about the seller.
Here’s what the green should look like in a rare photo I managed to capture the colour. It’s still not an accurate representation but you can see how different it is from the photos you’ve posted.

Look at it this way … Alex is one of the most valuable stones to buy BUT like everything else there are good examples where you pay $$$$$$$$$ and then there’s poor stones. At the moment there’s very little in terms of good stones unfortunately

Lastly, EBay is awash with Alex that isn’t good or real. Save your money and step away from EBay for this particular gemstone!

 

[pokerface]

FYI alexandrite CAN be clarity-enhanced. Here's an article on the subject, which includes a picture of a GIA report on a clarity-enhanced alex.

 

[LD]

Well that’s a new one on me. That is totally unacceptable for an Alex and incredibly depressing especially as this dates back to 2018 and look at the size of it! I’m so so so unhappy to see this but at this point I’m thanking my lucky stars that nearly all of mine have reputable lab reports and were bought at least 10 or more years ago. What I am going to do is reach out to a few Alex experts I know to see if I can find out how widespread this is. I have a feeling it’s not too much of a problem only because Alex is a type 2 gemstone which means inclusions are normal and eye clean pieces rarer so if there was a sudden influx of large eye clean Alex this would have been commented on more widely (although I appreciate that was a very small stone in the GIA report BUT the colour looks excellent which is why I think it may have been done).

I thought of something else as to why that seller may not have many negatives. How many people do you know (outside PS) who sends their gems to a REPUTABLE lab for confirmation? Especially as some labs won’t report on a gem that’s set already. Depending on the lab it can take weeks to turnaround (and that’s not including the shipping time to you) so most people will leave feedback based on what they see when they open the package! Not sure if this seller offers lab reports but I wonder who he uses?

BTW does that setting look vintage to you? To me it looks more modern so I’m wondering if by saying “vintage” the seller thinks it adds weight to it being an Alex. How many times do we see a thread saying “my grandmothers Alex ring” etc!

 

[LD]

My 5 cents.
Ive been buying on eBay for 18 years now.
Yes I have bought from oldtreasures333, I know it was 2 vintage watches and a pair of earrings and maybe a pendant / chain? I can’t speak for the other 96,000 odd transaction but mine were as described.
oldtreasures333 is a liquidator/ pawn shop. They get their stock from lots of sources and they have ALOT of listings.
I can’t comment on BBB ratings but I know how eBay works.
oldtreasures333 has had over 96,000 positive transactions for that 100% score. Sales that are cancelled dont show in those numbers but refunds and returns can still count and with their comments and ratings. So it’s unlikely, but not impossible, that there are hundreds of returns / refunds not showing as sales. The eBay numbers indicate that thousands of sales resulted in happy buyers.

ebay is run by metrics and bots. eBay runs on successful sales so eBay can get their fee. Sales that don’t proceed, for whatever reason, means no fees for eBay and eBay doesn’t like that. In fact sellers who have too many returns/ refunds get their selling privileges limited and/or withdrawn.

Back to oldtreasures333.
I don’t like their listing style. I don’t like sellers who promote items with wording like “Val $10,000” because it’s misleading. Many, many MANY sellers use this listing style to get clicks and sales.
And I also don’t like the emphasis on natural as if that also means untreated. Experienced buyers know that natural and natural with glass filling and/or BE diffusion are vastly different. However an ebay seller is still entitled to refer to the gemstone as natural, because it still is, whether or not the gem is in fact highly treated. Buyer beware.
As for their Alexandrite selection, well, firstly they, like others, refer to any colour chrysoberyl as Alexandrite. Their more expensive offerings are awful examples of colour change Alexandrite in that the colour is muddy and the change marginal but nevertheless they can and do use the Alexandrite label.
Their smaller Alex gem offerings, a lot by auction, are not much better. They are poorer quality Alexandrite, the clarity more opaque than transparent and in some cases the colour change, if shown, is barely there. Being small size, highly included and with a marginal colour change doesnt make them fake or even desirable but it should make them cheap. A buyer decides if they think the item is to their satisfaction by buying or bidding up to what they think a fair price.
While I have bought an expensive Alexandrite bracelet from eBay, it’s not for everyone. My Alexandrite bracelet via auction listing was uncertified (but not from this seller) that it was my choice to bid as I saw fit as I knew it was uncertified and there are big risks around a lack of certification.
ebay can be fantastic and it can be terrible. if in doubt avoid.

100% agree and this is the first time I’ve seen somebody with a gorgeous bracelet. I’ve got one too but you don’t often see them (and when you do they’re normally stuffed full of crap Alex). Yours looks beautiful and a fantastic find x

 

[LD]

@pokerface I’ve reached out to a few Alex experts regarding treatments and they are aware that very occasionally an Alex might be oiled - in the same way an Emerald might be. It is usually Indian Alex but it’s not a common practice which is reassuring.