# Stone removal in front of the client: the standard Gold & Silver Company created<\/p>\n
A ring inherited from your grandmother, an old-fashioned solitaire, a signet ring set with a stone whose nature nobody knows. When the time comes to sell a gold jewel, one question always comes back: what happens to the stone? For a long time, the answer given by gold-buying counters was silence. The jewel left whole, the stone vanished into the melt, and the client never knew whether it had been worth anything.<\/p>\n
Fifteen years ago, Gold & Silver Company put an end to that practice by creating a simple gesture: removing the stones from the jewel in front of the client and handing them back in person. This standard, born in Dottignies, is now used as a selling point by gold-buying operators across Europe. Here is why it changes everything for the seller.<\/p>\n
A set jewel is made up of two distinct values: the precious metal of the setting and the stone or stones it holds. Gold buying concerns only the first. The setting is weighed, its fineness is verified, and its price is calculated per gram according to the carat, 22K, 18K, 14K or 9K, on the basis of the current gold price. The stone follows an entirely different logic: nature, size, purity, market demand.<\/p>\n
When a counter buys the jewel whole without distinguishing between these two values, the seller gives up the stone for zero euros. In most cases the loss is modest. But it takes only one well-sized diamond, one natural sapphire or one antique emerald for the shortfall to far exceed the value of the metal. The problem is that the seller will never know.<\/p>\n
From our field experience at Gold & Silver Company, we often find that clients do not know what their stones are worth, and that is precisely what made the old practice so comfortable for certain buyers. Fifteen years ago, gold-buying brands were still few in number. Several of them bought the entire jewel without stating whether the set stones had any value. Nothing illegal about it, but a complete information imbalance, at the seller’s expense.<\/p>\n
We chose another path: extracting the stones in front of the client, returning them immediately, then weighing and paying for the setting for what it is, precious metal at its true fineness. This gesture, which we named stone removal in front of the client, became our counter rule. Fifteen years later, the advice to have gems removed before selling appears in most resale guides. The standard has prevailed. We created it.<\/p>\n
The principle works in three stages, all carried out before your eyes, at the counter. Our experts first examine the jewel and identify the set stones. They then extract them one by one, using the appropriate workshop tools, without damaging them. The stones are handed back to you in person, immediately: they never leave your field of vision and they leave with you.<\/p>\n
Finally comes the weighing of the setting, cleared of every foreign element. This is a technical point that matters: a stone left in place distorts the announced gold weight, and a buyer who weighs a set jewel with the stone included must apply an arbitrary discount to compensate. By removing the stones first, the metal alone is weighed, it is paid at its real weight per gram, and the calculation becomes verifiable by the client. Explaining before selling, understanding before buying: that is our entire approach.<\/p>\n
Not all stones are equal, and honesty requires saying so plainly. Small shoulder diamonds, cubic zirconia, coloured glass and most synthetic stones have practically no resale value. Returning them to the client costs them nothing, but leaves them free to do as they wish: keep them, have them remounted, pass them on.<\/p>\n
Conversely, a natural diamond of half a carat or more, a sapphire, a ruby or a quality emerald can be worth more than the setting that holds them. At Gold & Silver Company, diamond expertise<\/a> is part of the trade: if an extracted stone justifies it, our gemmologists can assess it and, where appropriate, offer you a separate buy-back at its own value. The stone is no longer an unknown absorbed into the price of the metal: it becomes an identified value, which you decide to sell or not.<\/p>\n Once the stones have been removed, the price calculation leaves no room for vagueness. The metal is tested, its fineness established, 22 carats, 18 carats, 14 carats or 9 carats, then weighed in front of you on a certified scale. The corresponding price per gram is displayed publicly and indexed to the live market price. You can redo the multiplication yourself: real weight multiplied by the observed carat price.<\/p>\n This transparency is possible only because the two values have been physically separated. It is the difference between a global offer made by eye, \u00ab\u00a0I’ll give you this much for the lot\u00a0\u00bb, and a breakdown the seller understands line by line. Our Belgian and French clients regularly tell us that this moment, the weighing of the bare metal after the stones have been returned, is the moment when trust is decided.<\/p>\nThe setting is paid by weight and fineness, without approximation<\/h2>\n
Why a foundry can afford this transparency<\/h2>\n