Complaint Review: Kay Jewelers

My fiance' and I went to Kay Jewelers on May 26th to purchase a wedding band for me and a gift for my mother. When the sale finally took place the clerk stated that they would have the polishing on my engagement ring fixed and have the ring rhodium plated for free.

My engagement ring came from a small independant jeweler in San Francisco and my fiance' took three months looking though loose stones & settings until he found the one he purchased for me two years ago. Since our wedding was then four weeks away we figured it would save us a trip to another jeweler if we just let Kay handle it.

The clerk stated that the ring would be taken to their Douglasville store, which is only 40 minutes away, and never stated that the ring would be shipped via DHL (which sent the package from Marietta GA to Clinton Field Ohio only to return to GA). I assumed that they used a courier.

Four days later I recieved a call from the store's general manager, Richmond, stating that the ring had been lost by DHL. Two hours later my finace' and I went to Kay Jewelers to discuss the issue and had the unfortunate experience of dealing with Richmond face to face. Not only was the man rude, but he also acted like we lost a pair of shoes and stated that we could just pick something out of his showcase (except for Kay does not sell the same quality & clarity that my stone was, nor did they have a stone that was the same size). Basically they wanted us to pick out something that was smaller & less quality.

Since my finace' had spent so much time at the jewelers in San Fran, the owners in the end sold the ring to him for the wholesale price. While at Kay Jewelers the clerk asked my finance' how much he paid for the ring and he gave her the exact amount he paid for it.

Now that the ring is lost Kay Jewelers is only willing to replace the ring up to amount that my fiance' provided them, even though the San Fran store has provided Kay with a detailed invoice stating how much the ring would have actually cost retail price.

To top it all off, since the store did not carry the same size stone I previously had we asked if we could have the stone that was a .10 carat larger and we were told NO.

This is now three weeks later and we have gone up the chain of command only to find more rude and inconsiderate people. Our wedding is next week and I do not have an engagement or wedding ring. Today we heard from Richmond that they would have one stone brought in the end of this week that is the same size & clarity of my old stone and we can take it or leave it. We are still trying to get them to order the setting that I had. Each time we talk with them the story changes (just last week they were bringing in at least 5 different stones for us to choose from and now we will have one option)

I also spoke with DHL and found out that there was no insurance purchased for the shipment and the package was labled as a high theft item. Since the package suddenly went missing at Clinton Field in Ohio (DHL hub) I am going to guess that it was stolen. DHL has at the very least attempted to find the package and has called me every day to give me an update of thier efforts. I can not say the same for Kay since they will not even apologize for my loss nor call us back. They did not loose the ring themseleves, but the ring was in thier care and they have not taken any steps to rectify the situation.

I have since returned all items I have purchased from them and so have many of my family members that made recent purchases at various locations.

Erica
Marietta, Georgia
U.S.A.