What the heck!!!

[jewelfreak]

My best friend just dropped off my b-day gifts, and she gave me a gorgeous pair of sterling silver oval amethyst studs from JTV. Awesome! Great quality with red flashes and everything. Now, I know these couldn't have been terribly expesive, but thay are wonderful. Why is it when I spend hundreds on an item from JTV I get garbage?
I returned that iolite ring I told you all about with all the black spots, and they just sent me a replacement. They were nice enough to give me 20% off of it and overnight ship it, but now this one is FULL of white, needle - like inclusons.
Is it just my luck, cuz everything my friend gets is perfect! GRRRRRRRRRRR!!!
Sorry. I just needed to vent.

[mystylady]

Jeez! So sorry Jewel... what a bummer. I don't know why that happens sometimes. With me, third time's always been a charm when I've had to return... <brightens> Or You Can Have YOUR FRIEND ORDER THE RING AND IT'LL BE PERFECT! No, really though, you should call them on the phone and speak to Customer service... explain your plight and that you'd appreciate if they would personally "oversee" the re-shipment of your ring... that's how I got my Tanzie on the third try... I spoke to someone and asked them to personally make sure that what went out would be something that THEY would die for, so to speak! If you can get someone on your side it really helps, and it's not hard to do because not one time have I ever had a bad experience returning/exchanging at JTV! Good Luck Sweetie!
The earrings sound fantabulous!

[jewelfreak]

I have spoken with customer service SO many times, and they are truly nice. But it seems no matter what I do, I still get screwed. I think I will give this a third try, but if they don't get it right this time, any orders I make in the future will be one shot only - they don't get it right, I return it. No second chances. GRRRRRR!!!

[mystylady]

There there, it's frustrating, I know. I have a feeling that this time you're gonna get the best ring EVER!

What's the item number so I can look it up? It sounds gorgeous!!!

Good Luck!

[jewelfreak]

No, I did not give it a third try. I wore the second ring on Sunday because I figured I might as well since I couldn't return it till Monday anyway. Well, halfway through the day, I look down and one of the tanzies are missing! I was pissed! So i will definately NOT be exchanging for the third. It gets better, too. After the clearnace special, I ordered a pair of amethyst and pink tourmaline earrings and a citrine and chrome diopside ring for about 30 bones apiece after 15% discounts. I open the earrings, and the first thing I see, clear as day is that one of the tourmalines is missing - not even in the bag! It was SOOOOOOO obvious that I can't even understand why somebody shipped them! And the ring was only okay. The design and color of the stones is gorgeous, but one of the chromes has a big inclusion, and the band part of the ring is crooked compared to the top. I'll hold onto that one cuz you can't tell and it was SO cheap, but still. Luckily, I called JTV and they are sending me out a new pair of earrings for free, and I don't even have to send the other pair back (I figure I'll get them repaired since they were free and give them as a gift), but still. I am so dissapointed in JTV I can't even tell you. Out of all of the gold pieces I've ordered from JTV, I have literally only kept three items because of things like this, and two of the items I kept are still not perfect. The last jewelry item I will order from them will be a gold necklace I've been wanting, and the only reason I will take a chance on that is because there are no stones to lose, and after that I will never order jewelry from them again. I may order some mixed facets or something, but thats it. This really sucks because I love watching JTV, it really helps me to wind down after work, but it will be pointless to watch since I no longer feel secure in ordering anything.
I feel bad for JTV because they are losing a good customer. I buy jewelry at least once a month, sometimes up to four times a month, but unfortunately, I will have to spend my money elsewhere from now on. I really wish that they understood that if they put a few serious quality control people on their payroll, the inverstment would come back to them hundred fold becuase then people like me would still be buying from them, instead of losing out on bussiness. It's not like this has only happened to me once and all of my other prchases have been fine, I have dealt with this runaround four times now, and have ultimately returned each of those items for refund because my replacement pieces were no better or worse than the originals.

[jewelfreak]

No, really though, you should call them on the phone and speak to Customer service... explain your plight and that you'd appreciate if they would personally "oversee" the re-shipment of your ring... that's how I got my Tanzie on the third try... I spoke to someone and asked them to personally make sure that what went out would be something that THEY would die for, so to speak!
----------------------------------------------
I tried what you sugggested, but here's what the cust. service rep said - that they used to have what they called "liasons" who would personally go get and inspect your replacement item, but they no longer have those.

I think that if JTV needed to cut costs somewhere, that was the wrong way to do it!!!

[francesca]

They are going to HAVE to sharpen up on this. There is a such a limited number of first time buyers now, business is only going to grow on repeat customers.

Sorry you've had such awful luck. When the piece is a good one, the deals are so amazing!! GRRRRRR!

[FAKE N BAKE]

I will find out tomorrow about the liasons,Ive been there since we started the company and Ive never heard of this postion!!But I will see how they handle cs issues!!I will get back to in a few days Jewel,since I have to work so late tomorrow night,but I will find out for you.

[mystylady]

Wow Misty that's nice of you! I'm sure Jewel will appreciate it!

Jewel, looks like you have the "big guns" in your holster now! ;-) Good deal! I hope all works out in the end!
It would be a shame for them to not have you as a customer...

[jewelfreak]

Thanks for checking on that for me Misty, I really appreciate it, exspecially since I don't WANT to stop ordering. Maybe the customer service rep was full-of-you-know-what about the liasons. Though I don't know why she would even bother to mention it if it wasn't true. Lord knows.
So I must ask, most of you have not had problems like this, or at least not repeatedly?
At first I thought it was just the diamond pieces with all the tiny stones, so I stopped ordering them, and only ordered items with larger or less stones, but yet still the same problems. Now I am to the point I will order only all gold pieces with no stones, or else nothing at all. My purchasing options are beginning to grow limited!!! What are you guys ordering that have been good?
Hopefully Misty can get word to the right people so I can feel confident about ordering again.

[mystylady]

I'm sure she's gonna try...she said she would!
I've only purchased one jewelry piece from JTV, the Marquise and Diamond Tanzie ring for my daughter for Christmas and I personally loved it, but she never wears it... when she got it sized down she said that they left an annoying ridge on the band and she thinks too much time has gone by to bring it back for them to fix. It was the Christmas before last and she just told me about it last Monday! I told her I'd take it back...but she changed the subject... hmmmmmmmm. I probably should press her for more information. She's SO careful of other people's feelings... especially mine. I'm such the lucky Mom! She would NEVER volunteer the info if a stone fell out b/c she would think I'd be upset. Remember I saw the same ring at the Jewelry Store for $350? And the one from JTV had nicer Tanzies??? Darker and prettier?
Other than that I've only purchased loose faceted parcels. I've had really great luck so far and <oooooohhh!> Chrissy asked me what I want for Mother's Day and I said "A Mixed Faceted Gemstone Parcel, Any Size!" So I'll keep you posted! It seems like I’ve had a better time of it with JTV so far but I think your luck’s about to change, Jewel! Don’t know why.
Here's a kewl story about a recent adventure Chrissy and I just had!
Since she's a Step-Mom (almost) I'm going to get her a new fish for her Marine Aquarium! (saltwater)! It's got a Coral Reef and everything in it! Two Mondays ago, she bought a new tank with an Oak stand!! We went and got it by ourselves... It's gigantic, it's a 55 gallon tank! Then we had to TRANSFER EVERYTHING FROM HER EXISTING 40-GALLON TANK INTO THE 55 GALLON ONE! Where the old one used to be! OK, this is not just "refill and go"! It not only weighed like 500 pounds, It's like a delicate ecosystem where the tanks have to be "equalized" and the "Live Rock" (Actual pieces of Coral Reef with all KINDS of creatures living in/on/through it) have to be CARRREEEFULLLLLY moved into Rubbermaid buckets, all livestock gently placed in buckets too, water tested to be sure all was well... (it was "WHEW!") Then the "Live Sand", which is just like the sand in the Ocean, full of little shrimpy beings and you name it had to be Iy yi yi moved over and everything put back into it's new "Digs"... She's got the coolest "Coral Banded Boxing Shrimp" named "Harry", some cleaner shrimp, some "Turbo Snails", and the weirdest thing EVER... A Green Brittle Star. It's like an enormous green starfish that's over 15 inches from tentacle to tentacle <brrrrrr> and he/she/it has bright yellow "spikes" all over its legs. It's a voracious predator so she has no fish. Well she doesn’t anymore... kind of like if you had a "quicksand box" when you were growing up and you wound up being an only child...eventually.
To give you an idea, she named it “Green Death”! lol
All in all it took us over 12 hours to do! She named us the "Supreme Dream Aqua Team"! Woof Woof Woof!
My dilemma is what kind of fish do I get that Green Death won’t find as a “tasty appetizer”? The fish store’s no help... they told her “oh it’ll be fine” Won’t get that big... (that was 10+ inches ago!) Docile... a real “gem” of a specimen. Really. Trust me.
OMGarsh I found a link to a picture of it... you have to see this to believe it! Copy and paste this but beware! It’s not for the faint of heart! Remember this is a BIG TANK IT’S IN! BTW that’s not it’s “shadow” underneath it... hmmmm looks like another kind of “normal” starfish.

SPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMwww.oceanviewenterprise.com/inverts/Green-Brittle-Star.jpg

Weird, huh?
There I go again, off topic and on a whole nother tangent! Please excuse me, I’m either delirious or sleep deprived or both...

[francesca]

I love tropical fish! I would never have the sticktoitiveness to look after an eco-system like that, though. Wow!

As for Green Death . . . . have you googled for any brittle star chowder recipes?
Ha ha ha ha! Don't throw sand and seawater, I'm kidding! Can she donate him to an aquarium anywhere nearby? He sounds awful big to have in a civilian sized tank.

Jewelfreak, the network is completely hit or miss. Man, you seem to have a fatal attraction for the misses!

I've purchased jewelry and mixed parcels. The mixed parcels NEVER lived up to the billing, for me, so I just haven't bothered for a couple of years now. Mystylady is almost selling me on taking another stab at it! Her enthusiasm is infectious!!

The jewelry items that I kept were satisfactory to me for having good color and well-made mountings.

[jewelfreak]

Green Death!!!! I almost pissed my pants! Sounds like a pet my skull-loving, motorcycle-painting, monster truck-driving husband would love!!!!
Mysty - the picture was great - I didn't expect it to be so spindly-legged. Very cool. I noticed another starfish in the tank in the pic, so obviously it doesn't eat othere stars, well, come to think of it, the little guy was just lying there.... Hmmm.... J/K
Maybe you could get her another kind of starfish. She can put little green and pink tropical swimming trunks on it and call it Patrick!!! LOL
Yeah, I guess I do have a knack for picking the JTV "misses". I am currently working on my husband to buy me the gold necklace from JTV that I originally saw in a mall in downtown Cleveland for twice the price, as a replacement for my iolite and tanzanite nightmare of a birthday gift. We shall see.

[jewelfreak]

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mystylady:
There there, it's frustrating, I know. I have a feeling that this time you're gonna get the best ring EVER!

What's the item number so I can look it up? It sounds gorgeous!!!

Good Luck!
www.tvtalkshows.com/board/showpost.php?p=1492875
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Here is the item number of the lovely ring/birthday gift that "got away".
ALC145
They sell this in amethyst as the center stone with iolite marquis, too for only $99. I thought about ordering that one instead, cuz I figured I wouldn't have to worry about the amethyst having inclusions, but I don't think that version is as pretty. And then the stone fell out of the replacement, and I decided it was bad workmanship and nomatter what I did I would get screwed, so I quickly nixed that idea.

[francesca]

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ALC145
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Too bad it was such a dud! :' ) VERY cool design.

[mystylady]

What a pretty ring! What a bummer that things went so wrong.
I suggested elsewhere that maybe getting the prongs tightened right off the bat would help keep our gems safe and sound and in their mountings where they belong, not on the floor for some three year old to find at the grocery store "ooooh loook" and then *gulp* yum that was good! <cringe>
(from mailbox to jewelry store don't pass the finger, don't collect 149.99)
I wonder what really happens to all the gems that we lose???
I think it was smart to pass on the Amethyst and here's why:
In my opinion Amethyst can be really "iffy" because they sometimes do have inclusions, zoning and banding and can also be either really light or too dark and dull looking when set in jewelry and they can also fade in the sunlight, which makes them look washed out. Now this is just one of several of my personal experience with mounted amethysts... I set a pair of the most amazing, sparkely, dark but not too dark grapey purple with red/pink flashes, pear shaped Amethysts (from Uraguay) into earring castings (6X4 mm) and in no time they looked dull and lifeless; purple flat and not a wink of a sparkle. I took them out of the settings (after that the castings are never the same , btw) and cleaned them up and the gems got sparkley again but were lighter! Not a lot but I noticed.
Out of all of my loose Amethysts, let's say 120 stones (a conservative number), less than 50 are "noteworthy", less than 20 are "gemmy". I consider Amethyst to be one of my biggest "consolation" gems: you get them in your MFGP's but you're not going to return the parcel because of some "unworthy Amethysts" when "in the Mix" was a 2.80 carat Ruby that was verbally appraised for close to $3,000 bones when you paid $199.99 for the whole thing! Not to mention all of the gem-quality Swiss Blue's, the Green Tourmalines, that one knock out Columbian Emerald, even a HUGE Top Gem Morganite and a 22 CARAT PEAR SHAPED SWISS BLUE! 22 CARATS!!! It's got a NERVOUS SYSTEM it's so big! so where was I? Oh yeah... so IMHO setting an amethyst looks good until you actually wear it, even a few times. Am I the only one with this opinion? Don't get me wrong though. The really great ones are superb... they just don't "hold the look" well once out of the gem jar, again, IMHO.

[jewelfreak]

The only amethyst I have besides the earrings I just got is a carat and a half or so trillion in a fairly simple mounting my mom bought me when I was about thirteen. It came from a very upscale store in my area called John Rich Jewelers, and that was around when the trillion first came out - very unusual for its time. I have had it for many years now, and it is still as dark and perfect as it was when it was first bought. I thought an amethyst was just an amethyst until I read your post, but apparently not. I guess there is something to be said for getting items from an upscale store. It must be a higher quality stone. The best part about it is that since it was one of the first trillions, it is not cut the way they cut them now. It has a lot less facets than the modern ones. It only has ten facets in all - and three of those are on the culet. I think it may be woth some moohlah someday, but even if it doesn't go up in value, it is really neat to have a stone that is a piece of lapidary history, if you know what I mean. Kind of like an old mine cut diamond!

[mystylady]

Wowza! That's really cool, Jewel! Do you wear it often? It sounds.... beautiful and different! I can't imagine a Trillion with only 10 facets and three of them on the CULET! How? Like at an angle? Are you counting the Table and the Girdle as facets?...I can't picture it! Is it really "sparkely???" I bet it was a cut that only one Lapidary did... like Rex Bernard's Phantasm and Phantasm II cuts. He probably did countless hours of research and practicing to get it so that it caught the light "just right"! Huh! Only 10 facets! I wish I could see it! Maybe you could take a close up of it and put it in your online album!
You're right about the Moolah! Hang onto that baby!!!
"Back in the Day" Gemstones weren't bought in bulk the way they are now, most certainly not by high-end Jewelers. I bet that Lapidary sold that cut to only a select few!
Lucky you times ten!

[Hellfire]

Cool story on the aquarium! It makes me want to run out and buy a green death;)

[jewelfreak]

Okay, you caught me. I DID count the table, but not the girdle. There are only three facets to the pavillion, one for each side if the triangle. Then, at the very point, there is a tiny facet at the very bottom of each side, creating a three sided culet. It is not extremely sparkly like the new trillions, but it does have a lot of life. I know the ring was only about $125, and that was about 13 years ago. But the jeweler it came from pretty much only deals in one only items or limited or small-run items. At fiirst I thought it had more facets at the crown on the corners where the facet on each side of the triangle meet, but it turns out that those facets on the crown are just curved, and only look like there is another facet until closer inspection. Now my facet count may be a little off, since I counted it fairly quickly and in a dimmish room, but there are absololutely no more than twenty facets, and that is a major stretch. Yes, I will take some pics of my jewelry, including that and post them the same place where I had the contest pics. I will let you all know when.
So, Mysty, do you really think that is just a special cut? I just assumed it was the first incarnation of the trillion.

[mystylady]

I can picture it now! Oooh pretty! I couldn't think of how a trillion culet could have three facets...duh! Some times I suffer from "brain freeze"... no really!
<smacks self on forehead*** ouch!> Of course the facets would be where the pavillion meets the culet! It's a THREE SIDED STONE TRISHYPOOOO!

It sounds beautiful! I don't know much at all about the "first generation" of the Trillion cut but it sounds like he broke some serious Gemstone Ground! Some of the best, most relevant and informative Gemology books that I've read were written in the 1950's, 1960's era and not only have no mention of the Trillion cut, there's no references to Tanzanites either, at least if the book was written before '69 or '70 or later even, cuz even tho it was discovered in 1967, Tanzanite was virtually unknown until the mid 1970's when Tiffany & Co. took an interest in it! The Trillion cut is much much newer than that though. Sounds like a cool research topic! ...looks like I'm goin' Google'n!
I made out a list of the "TOP TEN THINGS I WANT TO DO BEFORE I DIE" which sounds morbid in a way but really isn't. Getting my Gemology Certification is one of them!!! I realize it's not going to just fall into my lap; I have to make it happen.
You heard it here first, folks! I am posting a new thread on that very topic, so start getting your lists ready!!!
luv ya's! gonna start the cool dude thread then it's off to Google to research the Trillion cut! I don't know enough about it right now to say much about it, except to say that, after the Portugese Round cut, it's my second favorite so I SHOULD know more about it, right?! Thanks for the inspiration, Jewel!

[jewelfreak]

Oh, one more thing I forgot to post about my trillion - it is lazer cut, not cut in the usual way. Don't know if this will help your research or not, Mysty.