Do I have any stance against a company who sold a diamond to me that is 4 grades lower in quality than stated?
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Do I have any stance against a company who sold a diamond to me that is 4 grades lower in quality than stated?
I bought a diamond engagement ring online. The company I bought it from stated
the diamond is SI1 clarity. My jeweler says it is more of an I1 or an I2 and
showed me another SI1/SI2 diamond as a comparison. The company will not provide
me with any paperwork showing the EGL lab report that it was supposedly graded
on. What do I do?
Asked on October 8, 2016 under Business Law, Pennsylvania
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 8 years ago | Contributor
You can sue them: you would sue based on fraud (lying about a material, or important fact, to get you to enter into the sale) and breach of contract (violating the agreement as to what they would sell you). In the course of the lawsuit, you could use the legal mechanisms or procedures of "discovery," such as document production requests and written questions ("interrogatories") to get the paperwork and other information/evidence from them; and you could also submit your own evidence, such as by having a gemologist or experienced jeweler testify for you that he/she examined the stone and found it to not be SI1 clarity. If you can convince the court that it is more likely than not that (i.e. by a "preponderance of the evidence") that the stone is not what they advertised and you paid for, you could force them to take the stone back and refund your money, or else get monetary compensation, such as the difference in value between the stone you paid for and the stone you got.
Unfortunately, only if you sue, can you force them to provide information and hold them accountable; and lawsuits take time and cost money. Depending on the difference in value beween what you thought you were gettting and what you did get, it may or may not be economically worthwhile to take legal action.
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