Jewellery store 'rip off'

A woman feels ripped off after buying what she thought was designer sterling silver jewellery from a city store only to discover it was fake.
Fiona Rowe says she bought a bracelet labelled as sterling silver from Goddess Jewellery in Grey St, Tauranga.
The bracelet was purported to be from the iconic Tiffany & Co range, famous for its duck-egg blue boxes and inspiring the movie Breakfast At Tiffany's.
Mrs Rowe, a visitor from Wanganui, bought the bracelet on January 29 but it later broke.
She took it to Wanganui jeweller Richard Sheppard to be fixed, only to be told the bracelet was not sterling silver and was made mostly from nickel.
"He looked at it and tested it and said it's nickel, it's not worth five bucks," she told the Bay of Plenty Times Weekend.
Mrs Rowe said the bracelet carried the .925 stamp, indicating it was solid sterling silver.
The instructions in the box also stated, "Thank you for selecting this sterling silver gift from Tiffany & Co."
The discovery left Mrs Rowe feeling ripped off. "It's only because it broke that I found out."
Frustrated, Mrs Rowe tried to contact Goddess Jewellery but found the telephone number on its website was disconnected.
"They haven't known there was a problem because I haven't spoken to them since I got it [the bracelet]," she said.
She then contacted the Bay of Plenty Times Weekend.
The Wanganui jeweller who examined the bracelet said there might have been silver in the bracelet but it was not a high percentage. He refused to fix it for Mrs Rowe, saying the poor quality of the metal meant he was not able to do a satisfactory job.
He said the responsibility lay with the person selling the jewellery to have it correctly labelled and not misrepresented.
"It happens all the time, shoppers should be vigilant to this type of thing."
Tauranga manufacturing jeweller David Peet said he was aware jewellery labelled as Tiffany & Co was being sold here.
"I'm surprised they haven't been pulled over for it," he said.
He himself had tried to sell a piece of authentic Tiffany & Co jewellery on Trade Me and was told to remove the item because he did not have the paperwork to verify its authenticity.
The business said it bought the jewellery on the understanding they were authentic sterling silver Tiffany & Co items.
"All of the designer factories now are located in China," said Samantha Martin, of Goddess Jewellery. "We bring labels into New Zealand that are not in New Zealand," she said.
She said the fact Mrs Rowe's bracelet was not sterling silver may indicate a faulty piece of jewellery had slipped through.
"Occasionally, very occasionally, the odd rogue piece comes in."
But Tiffany & Co Sydney public relations and marketing manager Michaela Langley said under no circumstances would there ever be Tiffany & Co "seconds" jewellery anywhere around the world.
"The only place that you can purchase Tiffany & Co jewellery is through our stores. The only store in New Zealand which sells genuine Tiffany & Co merchandise is the Duty Free store in Auckland."
The store offered to give Mrs Rowe a replacement or full refund on the bracelet.
After obtaining legal advice, the store refused an offer from the Bay of Plenty Times Weekend to have some of the Tiffany & Co items it was selling independently tested to ensure their authenticity.
Instead, Samantha Martin said she got each of the items tested in Auckland - the results confirming they were sterling silver.
However, she would not release the results, saying they were being held by her lawyer, or provide the name of the jeweller who conducted the tests.
In relation to the disconnected phone lines, she said they went down for 10 days after the family moved house on January 20.