All precious metals must be of the minimum legal fineness or the article cannot be hallmarked. Platinum - all articles with a component to be described as platinum in which the total weight of all metal is over 0. Grams will need to be hallmarked. Silver - all items with a composant to be described. As silver is a precious metal it must be hallmarked by an independent third-party Assay Office to guarantee that the precious metal is of the fineness stated.
All precious metals must be of the minimum legal fineness or the article cannot be hallmarked. Platinum - all articles with a component to be described as platinum in which the total weight of all metal is over 0. Grams will need to be hallmarked. Silver - all items with a composant to be described. As silver is a precious metal it must be hallmarked by an independent third-party Assay Office to guarantee that the precious metal is of the fineness stated.
All precious metals must be of the minimum legal fineness or the article cannot be hallmarked. Platinum - all articles with a component to be described as platinum in which the total weight of all metal is over 0. Grams will need to be hallmarked. Silver - all items with a composant to be described. As silver is a precious metal it must be hallmarked by an independent third-party Assay Office to guarantee that the precious metal is of the fineness stated.
All precious metals must be of the minimum legal fineness or the article cannot be hallmarked. Platinum - all articles with a component to be described as platinum in which the total weight of all metal is over 0. Grams will need to be hallmarked. Silver - all items with a composant to be described. As silver is a precious metal it must be hallmarked by an independent third-party Assay Office to guarantee that the precious metal is of the fineness stated.
Copyright:
Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
Download as pdf or txt
You are on page 1/ 2
WHAT NEEDS TO BE HALLMARKED?
Anything which is to be described as silver, gold, palladium or platinum must be hallmarked if it is to be SOLD as such, unless it falls beneath the appropriate exemption weight. All precious metals must be of the minimum legal fineness or the article cannot be hallmarked. Precious metals below the minimum fineness cannot be regarded as a base Metal. Exemption Weights The total weight of metal in the article (ie excluding stones or other non metal parts). Standard exemption weights are: Platinum - All articles with a component to be described as platinum in which the total weight of all metal is over 0.5 grams will need to be hallmarked. Gold - All articles with a component to be described as gold in which the total weight of all metal is over 1 gram will need to be hallmarked. Silver - All articles with a component to be described as silver in which the total weight of all metal is over 7.78 grams will need to be hallmarked. Palladium - All articles with a component to be described as palladium in which the total weight of all metal is over 1 gram will need to be hallmarked. (introduced in 2009). Nowhere else in the world are consumers more highly protected than in the UK. The UK is one of only a few countries
in the world that have compulsory statutory hallmarking. This means that every item sold as precious metal, i.e. gold, silver or platinum must have been tested and hallmarked by an independent third-party Assay Office to guarantee that the precious metal is of the fineness stated. The law applies to everything SOLD in the UK , regardless of where it may have been manufactured. The only exemptions are items that fall beneath the specified weight thresholds which are 1 gram for gold, 7.78 grams for silver and 0.5 grams for platinum. Any manufacturer can apply, for example, the 925 stamp to Sterling Silver jewellery. This does not guarantee quality and it is illegal to describe something that is to be sold as Silver.
MIXED METAL Historically the Hallmarking Act has prevented the Assay Offices from hallmarking items made of a mixture of precious and base metals, and the regulations for mixed precious metal items have been very restricting. This has resulted in misleading descriptions because if a precious metal item is not hallmarked then it cannot be described as such. Significant anomalies have arisen, particularly for expensive items such as 18ct Gold and Stainless Steel watches which have had to be described as yellow metal and stainless steel.
