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What is the treatment for a gemstone?
Gemstone treatment is a legal practice in the jewellery industry meant to enhance colour and clarity and often hide defects in a natural gemstone.
Due to significant financial benefits, it has become a standard approach for most jewellery industry representatives, from prominent jewellery houses to your local jeweller.
On regulated markets, it is a legal requirement that sellers disclose such treatments, which are not always identifiable by the untrained eye and are sometimes difficult to identify, even by experts.
This is meant to protect consumers who, without such disclosure, could believe that a gemstone is of higher quality and value.
Some markets provide jewellery Consumer rights guidelines regulating disclosure and care requirements to protect sellers and consumers.
This is the case of the Federal Trade Commission in the United States.
Buyer beware!!!
Some treatments are temporary, even in normal jewellery use conditions.
This means that the effects of the treatment will fade away with severe consequences, including breakage on soft impact, diminished resale value and loss of quality over time.
For this reason, treated gems may require special care.
For the most up-to-date guidance, please consult the G.I.A. website.
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Ask for and read the Certification before looking at your future jewellery purchase. Without a written guarantee, you have no after-sale protection if the stone proves to be damaged and treated to hide the defect.
You can't tell if a gemstone is treated or not on the spot by using a magnifier, even if you are a jeweller.
Identifying a treatment is a complex process; only a gemologist conducting an analysis in a lab environment can give a definitive answer.
Primarily, look for any treatments applied to the gemstone that can hide defects/damages, such as fillers or colourants.
This characteristic should be easy to identify and put in plain terms: whether the gemstone has or has not had any treatments, and if yes, what kind of treatments are involved.
Although it is mandatory, under FTC regulations, to disclose the treatments/alterations done to a gemstone, most jewellers prefer not to discuss this with their customers, especially before a purchase.
Instead, after the sale is final, they will issue a fine print disclaimer on the certification provided, absolving them of any responsibility.