Transparency

LOTTEDS JEWELRY · BUY-BACK & FEES

What comes off, and why.
Before you decide anything.

Not a purchase. An investment in love.

Seven named deductions. No line called “other”. Four of them shrink as you stay with us. And a written quote before you commit to anything.

The short version
① Every deduction has a name. ② Your tier reduces four of them. ③ You get a written quote before you send anything. ④ If our quote and the reality disagree, you can walk away — and we pay the return postage. ⑤ Everything we charge is capped at 60% of what you paid — your buy-back base never falls below 40%, whichever route the piece takes.

1 · The seven deductions

There are exactly seven. Five of them apply whenever you sell a piece back. Two of them only appear if something has actually gone wrong with your jewellery.

# Deduction What it actually covers Set by us? When
1 Handling fee Metal purity assay, gemstone re-verification, ultrasonic clean, rhodium re-plating, re-photography and re-listing, unpacking video record, customer service, and the upkeep of your Asset File. Yes
→ reduced by tier 		every time
2 Return shipping International carrier plus transport insurance on the declared value. Insurance is not optional on high-value pieces. Yes
→ reduced by tier 		every time
3 Customs duty & import tax Charged by the customs authority when your piece crosses back into the country where our facility is. Passed through at the exact amount on the receipt. We do not add a margin. No
authority sets it 		every time
4 Packaging & certificate New box, new pouch, a re-issued certificate card and number plate. Your piece number itself never changes. Yes
→ reduced by tier 		every time
5a Transfer fee The bank charge for sending money across a border. Yes
→ reduced by tier 		cash only
5b Currency conversion The spread between the buy rate and the sell rate on the day. No
the bank sets it 		cash only
6 Repair charge Deep scratches into the metal, a distorted shank, a missing stone, a broken link. At cost, with the workshop receipt. No
actual cost 		if damaged
7 Re-certification Original certificate lost, or authenticity in question — the piece goes to an independent lab. No
actual cost 		if needed
Why we separate “set by us” from “not set by us” — we can only discount what we price. Items 3, 5b, 6 and 7 are pass-through costs: a customs authority, a bank, a workshop or a laboratory charges them, and we forward the receipt with no markup. Discounting those would mean paying your tax bill out of our own pocket, and that is how a buy-back promise quietly dies. So we discount the four we control instead.

2 · Your tier reduces four of them

Tiers rise with what you have actually spent with us — never with referrals, never with a sign-up fee, never with a deposit. Points are simple: $1 spent = 10 points.

Tier Points from 1 · Handling fee 2 · Return shipping 4 · Packaging 5a · Transfer fee
L1 · Beginning
on your first purchase 		0 100% 100% 100% 100%
L2 · Companion
$480 spent 		4,800 90% 100% 50% 100%
L3 · Devoted
$1,360 spent 		13,600 75% 50% 0% 0%
L4 · Legacy
$3,200 spent 		32,000 60% 0% 0% 0%
The three pass-through items never change with tier — customs duty & import tax (3), currency conversion (5b), repair (6) and re-certification (7) are the same at L1 and L4. We would rather tell you that plainly than let you expect a discount that cannot exist.

And your statutory rights never change either. The EU 14-day right of withdrawal, the 2-year legal guarantee, and your right to a remedy when we have described something wrongly apply identically at every tier. A tier can add to them. A tier can never take away from them.

3 · Quote first. Then you decide.

Nobody should send a ring across a border and hope for a fair number. So the process runs in this order — and you can stop it at step 2.

1

You ask

Enter your piece number and we pull up everything we hold on it: the price you actually paid, your tier, the date of purchase and the piece's full specification.

2

We quote — in writing

Within 48 hours you receive a written quote listing every single deduction with its exact amount. Not a percentage. Not a range. An amount.

3

You accept, then send

Only after you accept do you post the piece. If the quote is lower than you hoped, you simply do not send it. No fee, no obligation, nothing owed.

4

We inspect, and honour it

If the piece matches what you described, we pay the quoted number. If inspection finds something you did not know about, we re-quote — and you may decline and have the piece returned to you at our cost.

4 · Where the piece goes decides two of the numbers

This is the least glamorous section of this page and the most important one. The country a piece is sent back to determines deductions 2 and 3 — and duty on jewellery is not small.

Today — one facility

All buy-backs are currently processed at our facility in China. That is a fact, and it has a cost: the piece re-enters the country and import charges apply.

Jewellery and precious stones are classified in the highest band of China's import tax schedule for personal postal items — a 50% combined rate on the declared value, and that is before any commercial-clearance duty or VAT if the shipment is treated as goods rather than a personal effect. On many pieces this single line costs more than all the others combined.

Next — regional returns

We are working towards regional return points in the United States and the European Union. When a piece can be received locally, it never crosses a border on its way back to us, and deductions 2 and 3 both fall to zero.

We are not going to promise you a date we do not control. We will tell you the moment it changes, and this page will be the first thing we update.

There is a third route, and it is the one we are pursuing

A piece that was exported from China and is coming back may be admissible under returned-goods relief rather than as a fresh import — in which case the import charge can fall to zero. That is not a loophole; it is the ordinary treatment for goods that never changed hands outside the country of origin.

Whether it is available to us depends on one thing we have not yet confirmed: whether our shipments carry a formal export record. Many pieces leave as consolidated parcels with no per-item customs entry, and without that entry there is nothing to match a returning piece against.

We are having this checked with a licensed broker. Until it is settled, we are not going to print a number we cannot stand behind — which is why the calculator above lets you switch between the routes and see for yourself what is at stake.

And here is the arithmetic, plainly — on the personal-postal channel the four deductions alone come to a little over 100% of the price you paid. Handling plus shipping plus packaging plus the 50% import charge is more than the piece cost. A buy-back base of zero is not a policy we chose; it is what the tax schedule produces. Which is exactly why we are not launching this page until the returned-goods route is either confirmed or ruled out.

5 · Run your own numbers

Set the price you paid, how long you have held it, your tier and where the piece would go. The figures below use our published rates and pass-through estimates.

Store Credit

stays in your account · grows with time

—
—
Cash

paid out · capped at what you paid

—
—
Illustrative rates. Handling fee base rate 30% of the price paid, discounted by tier (L1 100% · L2 90% · L3 75% · L4 60%). Return shipping $60 + insurance (2% of the price paid, never discounted), halved from L3 and waived at L4. Packaging & re-issued certificate $30, halved at L2 and waived from L3. Transfer fee $25, waived from L3. Currency conversion 1.5% on cash only. Customs duty & import tax 22.04% on our formal-import route, 50% as a personal postal item, 0% on returned-goods relief and 0% at a US/EU return point. Total deductions we charge are capped at 60% of what you paid — so the buy-back base never falls below 40%. The floor is funded by the buy-back reserve that is already part of your purchase price. Store Credit grows 5% for each year held, reaches 125% at year five, and is capped at 130% from year six. Cash never grows and is capped at the price you paid. Your own piece's exact numbers come from your written quote.

6 · What we never charge for

Never on the invoice

  • Depreciation. We do not discount a piece for the years you wore it.
  • Age. A five-year-old piece is not worth less to us than a new one.
  • Storage. Once it is with us, it is our problem.
  • Insurance while the piece is in our hands.
  • Valuation and appraisal — always free, always included.
  • Routine customer service and the upkeep of your Asset File.
  • Our own resale paperwork — tax reporting, re-listing administration, the cost of finding the piece its next owner.

Where the law says we cannot charge you

  • The cost of returning a piece inside the EU 14-day right of withdrawal.
  • Repairs covered by the 2-year legal guarantee or by any implied warranty in your state or country.
  • Anything arising from an error in our own description — and in that case we bear both directions of postage.
  • We may never shorten a statutory right by putting you in a higher tier — so a tier can only ever add.

7 · The rules, in plain words

  • Seven deductions, all named. There is no line item called “other”, and there never will be one.
  • Four shrink with your tier; four cannot. We mark which is which on every single line, every single time.
  • You see the exact amount before you send anything. Decline the quote and nothing is owed.
  • Store Credit grows, cash does not. Credit earns 5% for each year held and reaches 130% of the buy-back base. Cash is capped at what you paid — so nobody can buy, hold, and arbitrage us.
  • Pass-through costs are shown with their receipts. Customs, banks, workshops and laboratories get what they charge. Nothing is added on top.
  • If the stone can be verified, we say so. If it cannot, we do not claim it.

Prototype · 2026-10-09 · rates illustrative pending final sign-off · customs treatment to be confirmed with a licensed broker · LOTTEDS JEWELRY