MSE News: OFT takes action against gold-buying firms

Former_MSE_Guy

This is the discussion thread for the following MSE News Story:

"A probe found many companies gave a tiny window for consumers to reject the often low valuation for their jewellery ..."

Read the full story:
OFT takes action against gold-buying firms

blades123

How can these companies get away with offering so little for gold? Surley there must be a way to avoid these middle men and take your gold straight to the people who deals with gold itself.

If you don't need the money and you have gold you don't need, one option is to take your gold down to your local jewellers and get them to melt it and create a new ring or something

Lawrence_Chard

It is worth repeating the advice we give on our websites:
Know What You Have Got - Do Some Homework
Either weigh your gold items (in grams) or get somebody with a suitable weighing scale to do it for you. It could be worth asking a friendly local jeweller to do this for you (offer to pay).
Know the gold content (purity in carats (cts.) or as a percentage. Pure gold is 24 carat, therefore 9 ct is 9/24 = 37.5% pure.
Look Up the Spot Gold Price in pounds (if you are in the UK).
Work out the intrinsic (theoretical) value. (Aren't you glad you paid attention during maths lessons in school?). Some other websites will do this for you, we have not got around to adding this facility to ours yet.
Shop Around
The proportion of the intrinsic value you are offered will vary from less than 10% upwards.
Most buyers will tell you a price, possibly approximate. Avoid any who cannot or will not.
You will probably get a better price if you have everything sorted, weighed and clearly labelled.
If posting gold scrap, send a list and keep a copy. Making a photocopy or taking a photograph of the lot is also sensible.
Be Careful - some Pitfalls & Traps
Beware! Some dealers advertise to pay 10% to 30% more than the actual value or similar misleading and dishonest claims.
Some of the biggest advertisers are the worst payers.
Many of the newly sprung up buyers are "Cowboys".
Some of the "post your gold to us" operators are very new, and use sharp practices.
Some scrap by post companies will take 28 days to return your gold if you decide not to sell.
Some postal gold companies will charge for things like removing a watch movement (we heard £10 from one source), and they are often not capable of putting it back if you decide not to sell.
If you only know the weight in ounces, don't forget that gold is weighed in troy ounces, not normal avoirdupois ounces.
If posting gold, make sure you know who you have sent it to. Some buyers do not enclose their address details when sending your cheque (to make it harder for you to request its return in time).
Transparency
Try to deal with somebody straightforward who will tell you important information such as how much per gram they pay.

Pembroke

blades123 wrote: »

How can these companies get away with offering so little for gold? Surley there must be a way to avoid these middle men and take your gold straight to the people who deals with gold itself.

If you don't need the money and you have gold you don't need, one option is to take your gold down to your local jewellers and get them to melt it and create a new ring or something

The TV adverts don't come cheap so once they've removed all their 'expenses' for adverts, websites etc. the return to the seller isn't as much as the spot price or a company that get's it's business by word of mouth. As you say your local jeweller is probably the best bet although they are unlikely to have the facilities to melt it themselves these days.

[Deleted User]

Obviously, people getting ripped off by these companies have neither economic sense; nor have the ever heard of money saving expert.com where decent companies are listed.

steveindevon

MSE has a nerve reporting this like a 'knight in shining armour' after Martins visit to GMTV when he blatently and positively promoted a gold comparision web site which is a scam and a front for a single gold buying company (who funnily enough are always the number one comparrison). Do your homework Martin!!! The postal gold industry is largely corrupt but you effectively gave them credibility that morning.