Mike
Must read before selling your gold to The Gold Center
The following is based on my personal experience with only (facts) stated while leaving my personal opinions out! I called The Gold Center when I moved to Naples just over 2 months ago to ask if they could pay me .99% of spot price for my gold, that I am a dealer who is new in town. They agreed so I proceeded to bring my gold to them and was a bit disappointed at the final weight of my gold after melting but gave them the benefit of the doubt and brought gold a second time which I had my wife pick up the money later that day and was even a little shocked as it was about $800 less on (about 10 troy oz) than I expected, and, once again I gave them the benefit of the doubt, bringing gold yet a third time. This transaction was the straw that broke the camels back! Because of my poor experience with them melting my gold and then assaying it, I requested that they test the gold on the spot without melting it and pay me the agreed .99 % based on their findings which they did. The payout for the 114 grams seemed about right to me so I thought nothing of it until I got home and checked the current spot price and to my surprise, I was not paid .99 percent of spot. I then called and spoke with whom I later found out was actually the owner and he told me (with an attitude) that I was paid .95% and that my gold tested slightly less than they thought. In my head, I was thinking, "you paid me .95% (before) you found out my gold content was slightly less than you thought". "When did you all decide to not pay me .99% and why wasn't I informed right there on the spot??" To add insult to injury, "literally", I did the exact calculation after we ended our call and discovered that they in fact did not even pay me the 95% as I was told over the phone, they instead paid me less than 91.5%. At this point, I am pretty much livid and shocked that such a big and successful company would take my money like this and then lie to my face about it. So, what did I do, I called and spoke to whom at that moment, I did not know he was actually the owner. As I started to explain what had happened, I was immediately met with a wall of defense and resistance, even to the point of (blaming me) for what happened. Anyway, the call ended with the owner telling me to "just take my gold somewhere else". I was shocked to believe that an employee of a large company would ever speak to a customer like this until I discovered later that it was actually the owner of the Gold Center! One of the things that was so shocking to me is that I stayed calm and respectful during that call without accusing, only stating facts and informed him that all I wanted was for the Gold Center to just make it right which they arrogantly declined, telling me to "Just bring your gold somewhere else".