OK Here’s MY story. I designed my wedding ring while monitoring a project, I got stuck with midnight shifts. I drew the ring and took the drawing to a goldsmith to have it poured and finished. The diamonds came from a place in New York, it was a large supplier to jewelers. Each stone was to be 1/3 carat so total weight would be 1 carat and cut from the same stone making color exactly match. 1/3 carat diamonds are still small enough that slight flaws do not show well and the price drops drastically for stones with SI (Slight Imperfections), plus the color was not a great issue since they were being mounted in a yellow gold ring. (Lower quality diamonds are slightly yellowed , not to be confused with a YELLOW diamond). I ordered 3 SI grade, H color, Round 57 facet Cut stones- $1250.00 for all three.

The supplier would not ship directly to me but only to a bonded/insured jeweler. Once delivered I had 5 days to have them shipped back or to pay for them. A jeweler I knew took delivery of them and called me when they arrived and I said I would be right down. They opened them while I was on my way and had them laid out when I walked in. They all looked sheepishly at me. I took out my lupe and looked, looked again, then looked at the other 2. Same thing NO flaws, and I use a 16x lupe instead of a 10x since I am half blind. LOL . I asked for a piece of black velvet, they knew then that I thought they were Cubics or something manmade and they smiled and handed me the velvet. They were real. I asked for a color paper, they handed me one already folded ready for diamonds. They were the color of AIR!

The gemologist walked up and put his hands behind his back and just watched, as were the owner and a sales person. I asked, “So what’s up with these? These are CLEARLY not what I ordered.” The owner looked at the gemologist and gave a nod as to say it was OK to explain. The gemologist said, “You are exactly right. These stones were mis-labled prior to shipment, we are prepared to offer you $800 over the cost for you to refuse them and he would find another set of stones for me.. Now, they were offering me $800 to walk away? They must be worth a lot more. The gemologist bumped the offer up to $1000 but I still was not biting on the offer yet. I asked if they had a high power stereo scope and the gemologist took me back to a room with a 600x scope where I looked at the stones and could see NO flaws and any of them until the gemologist pointed out a very tiny place in the bottom point that had what looked like a fingerprint smear, the other two we never found anything. The color was at least a D or better in color. The gemologist said they realized the mistake and the owner knew if I turned them down then HE had 5 days to send the diamonds or the payment—HE was NOT sending the diamonds back and had told the staff he was willing to offer a premium to get them. As you can see, I kept them. Probably a mistake but I can always sell them (unless I mess them up! LOL) In the sunlight they are RED, BLUE, GREEN. YELLOW.... LOTS of 'fire' in them....