Hi Jonathan,

This is Sandra writing. Just thought I'd write you the epilogue to my diamond purchase.

The diamonds arrived. We were very happy with them, as you know. The ring is on my finger and I had already taken it to an independent appraiser here in Vancouver.  Her first words, as she looked at it were "well I see you went for quality". She also said that we were her first clients to buy the stones over the Internet and the first to seem confident in their purchase.  She looked at the AGS certificates and the diamonds and said, "You got what you paid for, and then some."

A couple of weeks later, on the spur of the moment, when I was passing Birks [the high end jewelry store in Canada], I stopped in to show the ring to a saleswoman who had spent a lot of time with me when I was looking and who I might have bought from if the price had not been so outrageously high.

Boy did I get a surprise.  She did not take the loss of a sale in good grace at all.  She grudgingly admitted that the diamonds looked good. When I told her I had AGS certificates for them  (something I never would have gotten from Birks), she said AGS was an organization you paid to belong to and that "you tell them what the stones should be and that's what they put down".

Well that floored me.  In all the time Charles  and I spent on the internet, looking at sites, reading both complaints and compliments on the chat rooms, never did we see a complaint against AGS; so if there is something crooked going on it must be a very well kept secret.

Here is what my appraiser said in response to that:

I feel that you're probably right about the clerk trying to make you second-guess your purchase.  I find this sort of attitude very harmful to the jewelry industry and unfortunately it seems to happen far too frequently.  The American Gem Society and GIA Gem Trade Laboratory certificates are issued using the strictest grading standards.  As I mentioned when you were in, my certificate of choice is the HRD (Hoge Raad Voor Diamant) certificate using the grading standards of the Diamond High Council of Antwerp....but I must admit that my preference is personal due to the format of the certificates and because each cert bears the signature of two diamond graders.  The AGS (my favorite American cert) and GIA are every bit as strict in their grading. I think you should feel very confident about your purchase.

In the conclusion all I can say is that I trust my eyes. I have looked at these stones in all kinds of light. They have incredible white light return. They never go dark. In sunlight the the colored light return kicks in and the stones throw off rainbow colored rays of light. I can't judge what the scintillation is like because I've never compared them to any stones of similar quality. Hopefully one day I'll make it into your store and I can compare. In the meantime I'm still a happy customer.

Thanks again,