Wow - Very Dismayed with Whiteflash experience

[pyramid]

I'm so confused by all the responses that this makes sense.

You buy a new car. You trade in your old car and lay out cash for the rest. You have now purchased a car for $20,000, paid $15,000 in cash, and the dealer has received your old car, worth $5000 (probably plus some as they're going to make money when they sell it) and your $15,000 in cash. You and the dealer agree that you can trade in the car you just bought down the line for $15,000.
I
Three years later you go back into the dealer and you want to trade in your car.
By
Dealer now says you will only get $10,000 for your car, because you didn't pay the full amount for the first one.

Except you did. You lost $15,000 in cash plus your old car, and the dealer gained $15,000 in cash plus your old car.
7
So now, the dealer is saying that they get your old car for free, because they gave you the money last time, so now they need to collect it from you this time - except YOU GAVE THEM YOUR CAR FOR IT.

The only way this possibly works is if you got some kind of ACTUAL discount - a cash discount - that you did not provide anything in exchange for. If you gave them something in exchange for the money, that is double dipping.

Frankly, this has encouraged me not to do business with this vendor, at all - and I'm confused by the rabid defense of a policy that was NOT stated, nor does it make ANY sense, nor is it FAIR to the consumer, and further that you're all telling her what she SHOULD have done instead so as to not be in this situation, when I think it's pretty clear that she did not anticipate this situation.

I think she is being ripped off for the $1600 and change and I eagerly anticipate Whiteflash's explanation of how they can receive a diamond, provide a cash value for it, and then refuse to recognize that cash value in a later transaction - while they still have either the stone or the money from the sale of the stone.

No what they are giving is only $15000 back in trade up what she paid in cash but not the full $20000 which was the original price of the car. If she keeps the current ring she loses nothing and gained a better as in bigger probably diamond by trading in her old one. This does not carry forward into a second purchase though where only the money they received from her as income in their sales ledger is available for re-use in another upgrade. They did a favour in a separate deal off the books for the second-hand diamond.

If the customer then wants to upgrade that diamond again and loose the money they gave her in the diamond that is up to the customer and nothing to do with the company or Whiteflash. She was given money by them she gave a diamond not money.

 

[MollyMalone]

I find it interesting that WF has not weighed in on this.

Pepper's OP was posted at ~ 10 PM EDT on Friday night (I personally don't expect vendors to be at our beck and call 24/7 or even over the weekend). And were I Texas Leaguer, I'd want to review Whiteflash's business records, emails, etc. before responding.

Houston got pounded by the convergence of Patricia and another storm; a college friend tells me it's still raining heavily there & rain is expected to continue into tomorrow; there are lots of bayous and rivers-creeks in the metro Houston area that have flooded their banks; people were told to not drive and a number of roads remain closed due to flooding; there are scattered power outages in the area.
I sure hope TL has a life outside of Whiteflash, but even if he wanted to offer an informed-meaningful response over the weekend, getting to WF's office may have been/may still be impossible or an iffy situation.

 

[Coralfish]

This does not carry forward into a second purchase though where only the money they received from her as income in their sales ledger is available for re-use in another upgrade.

That is a nicely crafted policy, but it seems to be your own as there is no mention of it on the T & C.

They did a favour in a separate deal off the books for the second-hand diamond.

No - they bought an ideal cut diamond at 70% or less of what they expected to sell for it. With its not very old certificate I doubt it took a 'hit' as a second hand diamond, and would have neither been marketed or sold as such, just like the thousands of other upgrade stones on retailers' books. I don't think it was a favour or any especial hardship for them, and I expect they, relatively soon after accepting it into inventory, cleared a profit of 20-30% on the stone. If she had sold it back to BG she would have been out one shipping fee to them and that's it. If she'd been aware of till-now-unspoken WF 'policy' she would doubtless have swallowed the shipping fee and returned it for the cheque. All WF had to do was say 'no'. No one does anyone a 'favour' in the diamond business.

I can't believe this issue is even up for debate! Clearly WF should have passed her onto someone higher in the food chain when the OP asked and this thread wouldn't even have arisen. WF have a great reputation and this seems to be a rare customer service error. I'm sure this will be straightened out to both parties' mutual satisfaction very quickly.

ETA - further to Molly's post, this is obviously why they haven't responded as of yet. Let's stop antagonising the OP and let the resolution occur which it clearly will.

 

[kb1gra]

This does not carry forward into a second purchase though where only the money they received from her as income in their sales ledger is available for re-use in another upgrade.

That is a nicely crafted policy, but it seems to be your own as there is no mention of it on the T & C.

They did a favour in a separate deal off the books for the second-hand diamond.

No - they bought an ideal cut diamond at 70% or less of what they expected to sell for it. With its not very old certificate I doubt it took a 'hit' as a second hand diamond, and would have neither been marketed or sold as such, just like the thousands of other upgrade stones on retailers' books. I don't think it was a favour or any especial hardship for them, and I expect they, relatively soon after accepting it into inventory, cleared a profit of 20-30% on the stone. If she had sold it back to BG she would have been out one shipping fee to them and that's it. If she'd been aware of till-now-unspoken WF 'policy' she would doubtless have swallowed the shipping fee and returned it for the cheque. All WF had to do was say 'no'. No one does anyone a 'favour' in the diamond business.

I can't believe this issue is even up for debate! Clearly WF should have passed her onto someone higher in the food chain when the OP asked and this thread wouldn't even have arisen. WF have a great reputation and this seems to be a rare customer service error. I'm sure this will be straightened out to both parties' mutual satisfaction very quickly.

ETA - further to Molly's post, this is obviously why they haven't responded as of yet. Let's stop antagonising the OP and let the resolution occur which it clearly will.

I'm quite sure the deal was not 'off the books' because it's on the customer's invoice and somehow they had to account for an extra inventory item for sale, so I'm sure this was documented.

I'm hoping that both parties come to a resolution that satisfies both. I feel really bad for the OP that she feels the way she does and I understand it. Similarly, I wish the best for whiteflash with the bad weather and hope all are safe and well.

 

[Texas Leaguer]

Whew! I am still catching my breath.

PepperT, You are correct that you should have been offered full trade credit for the value of the diamond you purchased. Whether your purchase was made with cash, credit card, store credit, trade allowance, whatever.

The circumstances of the transaction were a little bit out of the ordinary, and as such you aparently received some incorrect information for which I sincerely apologize.

I have not had time to look at the entire thread. It seems like some folks may be pointing out some unclear aspects of our buyback/tradeup policy. I will study those and respond in time.

Meanwhile, PepperT, I will be in touch with you personally on Monday to clear up any miscommunication and to provide whatever assistance you need from here.

Thank you Karl for the heads up. I normally login on saturdays (sure wish I had) but I was busy preparing my house for a big rain event. Fortunately it looks like my location has been spared the brunt of it.

Thanks to all for your comments. Whether positive or negative, they are all important in helping us to improve.

 

[kb1gra]

Whew! I am still catching my breath.

PepperT, You are correct that you should have been offered full trade credit for the value of the diamond you purchased. Whether your purchase was made with cash, credit card, store credit, trade allowance, whatever.

The circumstances of the transaction were a little bit out of the ordinary, and as such you aparently received some incorrect information for which I sincerely apologize.

I have not had time to look at the entire thread. It seems like some folks may be pointing out some unclear aspects of our buyback/tradeup policy. I will study those and respond in time.

Meanwhile, PepperT, I will be in touch with you personally on Monday to clear up any miscommunication and to provide whatever assistance you need from here.

Thank you Karl for the heads up. I normally login on saturdays (sure wish I had) but I was busy preparing my house for a big rain event. Fortunately it looks like my location has been spared the brunt of it.

Thanks to all for your comments. Whether positive or negative, they are all important in helping us to improve.

Thanks very much for your classy response and I'm really glad to hear this was a misunderstanding.

Kudos to you and I hope you and yours are well after the storm.

 

[kenny]

... I was busy preparing my house for a big rain event. Fortunately it looks like my location has been spared the brunt of it.

I'm very glad for this Bryan.

 

[MarionC]

Wow, I couldn't quite read everything in this thread, but I'm glad it's going to be OK. We have good vendors.
That said, our vendors are business people. I tend to think of them more as my buddies - which they are in a sense.
Many of them have helped me get high quality stones, and for that I am grateful. The B&M world is a little less accommodating there : )

However, I had an experience recently which has led me to this conclusion: People, read the fine print.
I know that this thread is not quite about that, but felt this was a good place to post.
When I tried to trade up a diamond recently -not with WF!- I discovered much to my surprise that there was very fine print saying that a trade-up was "at their discretion" and since my stone had come from a particular supplier, I could only trade-up with a stone from that same supplier and unfortunately that suppliers did not have the cut I was looking for. So all that drooling over the big stones on their website was for naught. But that is their right, and as I said, our vendors want to make us happy, but they also want to turn a profit.
So what I learned was - read the fine print, be clear with your expectations, and get it in writing.

edit-sorry TL, forgot to say my thoughts are with you during this flooding and glad you see you were spared the brunt of it.

 

[Tekate]

TexasLeaguer: I find your response to be magnanimous and you are a class act.. after reading the whole thread I was confused as hell, but I DO know I would do business with your company anytime. And my kids live in Austin and they say the rain was horrible but needed!

peace.

 

[pyramid]

Well then I was wrong, good that Bryan was not affected badly by the floods and good news for the original poster.

While on the topic I asked Vera at Whiteflash about getting a photo of the feather in my diamond and she said they did not show magnified shots because it made buyers view the inclusion as worse that it is really. The bit that confused me though was when I said well if a feather is a crack then I want to see. She said she had never in all the years she had worked in that line of work ever heard a feather being called a crack. Now how many times has that been said on here? Do the staff not get so bogged down by diamond features as Pricescopers is it just a sales thing. Has Texas Leaguer only heard feather called crack on Pricescope too? Other websites or laypeople speak of cracks or fissures in diamond so I found it hard to believe she had never heard that said before in 30 years.

 

[16ocean]

it seems as PepperT is going to get some resolution on her trade in/ future upgrade dilemma so that is a good thing.

I too was in the camp of

Kb1gra
and
“Once you have an ACA, to me, regardless of how you paid for it be it in a truckload of pennies, your firstborn child, cold hard cash, labor exchange - whatever - you own an ACA that is covered under the 100% lifetime trade up like any other ACA that you own as the original purchaser.
To me, they bought the stone from her, applied that CASH to her CASH purchase, and she owns an ACA that was paid for in full, which she is now being told is not worth what she paid for it on trade up - meanwhile Whiteflash acquired a stone that had value of some kind, that they are now saying, has no value in the transaction and they must recoup that value on tradeup.”


that is how I would have read the policy . . .

 

[pyramid]

This does not carry forward into a second purchase though where only the money they received from her as income in their sales ledger is available for re-use in another upgrade.

That is a nicely crafted policy, but it seems to be your own as there is no mention of it on the T & C.

They did a favour in a separate deal off the books for the second-hand diamond.

No - they bought an ideal cut diamond at 70% or less of what they expected to sell for it. With its not very old certificate I doubt it took a 'hit' as a second hand diamond, and would have neither been marketed or sold as such, just like the thousands of other upgrade stones on retailers' books. I don't think it was a favour or any especial hardship for them, and I expect they, relatively soon after accepting it into inventory, cleared a profit of 20-30% on the stone. If she had sold it back to BG she would have been out one shipping fee to them and that's it. If she'd been aware of till-now-unspoken WF 'policy' she would doubtless have swallowed the shipping fee and returned it for the cheque. All WF had to do was say 'no'. No one does anyone a 'favour' in the diamond business.

I can't believe this issue is even up for debate! Clearly WF should save passed her onto someone higher in the food chain when the OP asked and this thread wouldn't even have arisen. WF have a great reputation and this seems to be a rare customer service error. I'm sure this will be straightened out to both parties' mutual satisfaction very quickly.

ETA - further to Molly's post, this is obviously why they haven't responded as of yet. Let's stop antagonising the OP and let the resolution occur which it clearly will.

Let's stop antagonising the OP.

I can hardly believe you wrote that, so much for my trying to help.

Well like others before me I am signing out of Pricescope for the last time and the reason is this ganging up on people culture. This place is totally different now, it doesn't bother me in that I won't cry over it but I am just fed up with the way some are so superior in their own minds that they can be director and tell other posters to stop posting now on what they FEEL is happening. Antagonising, never my intention so you got that one all wrong Ms Director. Really had enough and no I am not looking for a response as this is the last post ever, not worried what you say or think it is a free internet board and Coralfish you are not the Moderator.

 

[Rockinruby]

Whew! I am still catching my breath.

PepperT, You are correct that you should have been offered full trade credit for the value of the diamond you purchased. Whether your purchase was made with cash, credit card, store credit, trade allowance, whatever.

The circumstances of the transaction were a little bit out of the ordinary, and as such you aparently received some incorrect information for which I sincerely apologize.

I have not had time to look at the entire thread. It seems like some folks may be pointing out some unclear aspects of our buyback/tradeup policy. I will study those and respond in time.

Meanwhile, PepperT, I will be in touch with you personally on Monday to clear up any miscommunication and to provide whatever assistance you need from here.

Thank you Karl for the heads up. I normally login on saturdays (sure wish I had) but I was busy preparing my house for a big rain event. Fortunately it looks like my location has been spared the brunt of it.

Thanks to all for your comments. Whether positive or negative, they are all important in helping us to improve.

Glad you have been spared some of the more serious flooding. Thanks for responding and clearing up some of the confusion regarding policy. I have been following this thread and appreciate your professional response to PepperT.

 

[Texas Leaguer]

I've now had a few minutes to read through the thread. PepperT, Kb1gra, Karl and others accurately interpreted our policies. It seems the confusing thing to many people - and unfortunately to some within our own company - is the conflating of two different policies. The policy regarding buying back (or allowing trade in) on diamonds from outside our inventory is seperate and distinct from our simple 100% LIfetime Trade Up benefit which applies to any in-house diamond purchased from us.

Kenny is right when he says it is a little challenging to write policy that is simple and clear but covers a wide range of scenarios. We have tried to evolve our policies and the accompanying messaging to remove the "fine print". NOBODY likes to find themselves in a position of being denied an expected benefit on some minor technicality.

At this time I am not sure that there is need to edit the wording on either of the policies, but I would be open to suggestions. (please email me directly at [email protected]) Anything we can do to make them more clear (without making them unnecessarily wordy), would be worthwhile.

Surely though, this is a teaching moment for our staff that will get our full and immediate attention. We have an incredible team that are empowered and trusted to make judgments and decisions on their own. In the course of growing and evolving we sometimes make the mistake of thinking that everyone is on the same page, only to find out that we have to circle back and get ourselves in synch!

Thank you to those who have posted personal well wishes. My neighborhood was flooded in the historic Memorial Day floods earlier this year and I have been living in trepidation of a repeat performance for the last 48 hours. It looks like I have been spared this time. I can fully sympathize with those that are not so lucky.

 

[PepperT]

Texas Leaguer,

Thank you!

Thanks for taking the time to respond with all the weather conditions down your way. I hope things continue to be alright.

I do look forward to proceeding with a diamond upgrade with Whiteflash!

 

[pyramid]

Coralfish

I am sorry, my apologies, I think I was too quick to jump to conclusions.

 

[Coralfish]

Hi Pyramid

No worries. You are obviously a very valued member here and for good reason. I too apologise if my comments came out harshly, that would never be my intention. Best wishes to you.

 

[Karl_K]

Thank you Karl for the heads up. I normally login on saturdays (sure wish I had) but I was busy preparing my house for a big rain event. Fortunately it looks like my location has been spared the brunt of it.

Your welcome.
Glad to hear your house is ok and pray for all in the area affected by the storm.

 

[WillyDiamond]

I find it interesting that WF has not weighed in on this.

Pepper's OP was posted at ~ 10 PM EDT on Friday night (I personally don't expect vendors to be at our beck and call 24/7 or even over the weekend). And were I Texas Leaguer, I'd want to review Whiteflash's business records, emails, etc. before responding.

Houston got pounded by the convergence of Patricia and another storm; a college friend tells me it's still raining heavily there & rain is expected to continue into tomorrow; there are lots of bayous and rivers-creeks in the metro Houston area that have flooded their banks; people were told to not drive and a number of roads remain closed due to flooding; there are scattered power outages in the area.
I sure hope TL has a life outside of Whiteflash, but even if he wanted to offer an informed-meaningful response over the weekend, getting to WF's office may have been/may still be impossible or an iffy situation.

Thank you Molly for your preciseness.

 

[AprilBaby]

Class act Texas ranger!

 

[diamondseeker2006]

I was out of town until this evening and am very glad Bryan was able to see the thread and straighten out the error. All I can say is that they have been great in all my many trade-ins, and I do realize mistakes can be made. I hope the OP can forgive and enjoy her wonderful diamond knowing the full value minus discounts and shipping can be applied to an upgrade. WF is a great company with good policies and it seems that this was a rare situation and the confusion was because the sales people were the ones who misinterpreted the policies, not that something was unstated in the policies.

I do want to say one thing to the OP, though, in case it might help someone else with a diamond they want to sell prior to buying a diamond with another vendor. Hearts and arrows diamonds (or ideal cut diamonds) such as those from WF, BG, and GOG are pretty easy to resell here. There was a good chance you could have sold that diamond for 75-80% of your original purchase price. You list on loupetroop.com or other resale site, and then list on the pre-loved forum here. The only scenario where that doesn't happen is if the diamond has unusual specs such as I1 clarity or a very low color or something. Stones D-J and VS-SI usually sell here. The other scenario where it might not work is if a stone was bought when prices were high and then the person tried to sell when they went back down. That is rare but does happen. I recently bought a diamond on pre-loved that was like that, but the guy did end up getting 75% of what he paid even though the prices went down from his time of purchase (it was ideal cut and not even classified as H&A). It was still better than the buyback amount he would have received. In your case the diamond value wouldn't cause you to gain a huge amount by listing yourself, but again, for others reading the thread, it is very possible to get 75% or more for ideal cut or H&A diamonds selling yourself.

 

[thecat]

I'm glad it's a positive for both TL's rain and OP's upgrade situations.

 

[m-2-b]

I'm glad to hear that WF will be remedying the situation. From my personal experience, customer satisfaction is very important to them!