Massively overpriced ring

Rockchick71

My daughter and her boyfriend were "persuaded" on impulse to purchase a ring from a trader operating in an antiques centre on Saturday. They paid £1200. It's not an engagement ring as such, more of a commitment ring. Today the local auction house has valued the ring at up to £300. It is sapphire and diamonds as described, but they were led to believe that they were underpaying for the ring!

The retailer has indicated in a phone call that he wont give them their money back. They bought two rings, and for the other ring he did indicate at the time of the sale that they could return it. They didnt think to ask if this also applied to this one.  All thoughts, especially any wording that they might use, gratefully received! 

born_again

Why do they want to return it?

Is it just because a auction house has valued it lower?

End of the day, it was a in person purchase so no real comeback. As they could have just walked away. 

Olinda99

in general, if you buy something 'on premises' you have no rights to return it - unless, of course, the store has a returns policy eg M&S

That said, the trader is not allowed to mislead you so it depends on exactly what was said by the trader when they said 'underpaying'

grandadgolfer

It may be a 100 years old antique ring but the auction house have just valued it scrap value

Sandtree

Take any ring from the high street to an auction house and you'd be lucky to get 25% of its price and often it'd be much less.

Any item is worth what someone is willing to pay for it and where you market it will have an impact that's why antique dealers buy at auctions and then sell on to their clients with a markup. 

As long as the ring matches the description they were given, which you state it does, then it was their choice alone to decide if they thought it was worth the price or not. No dealer is going to tell you that they think you're paying over the odds for something.

Rockchick71

@Olinda99
Thanks, I have asked them to write down exactly what was said about returns

TonyMMM

Sounds about right ..... usual mark up on jewellery is 300-400% over the value of the materials.
They paid a retail price, the auction house is looking at basic scrap value.

Rockchick71

@TonyMMM thanks so much for this, so it looks as though the price is probably about right. 

The other part of this is that they changed their minds about a purchase that they felt very pressured into..but there seems to be little that can be done about that :-( 

TonyMMM

They could go to a decent independent jeweller and ask for an insurance valuation ( which they will pay for) .... that should give them a value based on a retail replacement.

TELLIT01

There is a massive difference between retail price and the price for selling.  They were told a price and accepted that price so on the face of it the vendor has done nothing wrong.  I would never expect to get anything close to even half of my money back if I sold jewellery so soon after buying it. 

My wife has been fortunate with a couple of purchases over the years.  An opal bracelet purchased for £100 was valued at just under £1000 for insurance purposes - she would not get that if she tried to sell it. 

mattyprice4004

Sounds like normal jewellery markup to me - and if they got suckered into a sales pitch it's not really the trader's problem. 
They're not entitled to a return / refund if the sale took place face to face.