The Jewellery Channel

Background

The Jewellery Channel (TJC) is part of the Vaibhav Global Limited (VGL) group. The company mines and handcrafts many of the products sold on its TV networks, hence its claim to cut out the "middleman" and to attempt to undercut high-street prices.

On 14 January 2008, The Jewellery Channel moved from Teddington Studios to new purpose-built studios in Middlesex, simultaneously switching to widescreen-format broadcasting. It plans to broadcast in HDTV in the future.

On 11 April 2008, The Jewellery Channel launched delivery to the Republic of Ireland for the first time.

Product offering

TJC sells a wide variety of gemstone jewellery, loose gemstones, watches, fashion jewellery and simulated gemstone pieces. They are one of the eight sightholders of the Tanzanite One mine.

They also sell their own jewellery brands:

They also have collaborated with some of the world famous brands:

The channel holds themed days such as 'Tanzanite Day'. It also holds discount days where it reduces the final auction prices by 10% or 17.5% (the latter the equivalent to the UK 17.5% VAT charge).

The firm launched an additional channel, TJC Gold, in October 2012 to offer more expensive gold and platinum collections. It runs for six hours a day.

Website

TJC's website offers their full catalogue of products (approximately 15,000 items), online rising auctions, on-air auction products and web offers not available on-air; TJC's channel can be watched from the website. The TJC blog includes information on products, jewellery trends, interviews with guests, exclusive promotions and backstage 'gossip'. Its Facebook page which offers similar content to their blog, and also offers consumers the chance to interact with them.

There is also an educational section offering consumers additional information on gemstones - Gemopedia. Other educational guides include a diamond buying guide and ring size guide.

Customer service

TJC has a UK call centre which operates seven days a week from 9am - 6pm. The call centre is based in Hampton Hill, north west London. A personal shopping service is also available, and an online chat function is available on their website. Consumers watching the channel live can call in and speak to the presenter.

The company offers a 30-day money back guarantee.

Regulation

The Jewellery Channel (TJC) has been censured by the Advertising Standards Authority the following times since 2007/8

The Jewellery Channel was fined £3,200 by Trading Standards for making false claims about the treatment of a gemstone product sold through its TV channel. After complaints were made, the channel discovered that it had been selling jewellery described as natural 'pink topaz’, when in fact it was colourless topaz sprayed pink.

Auction date, 25 Aug 2013: The ASA received a complaint as to whether an auction starting price was misleading and exaggerated the item’s value. Although the Jewellery Channel attributes no worth or value to the starting price, the ASA upheld the complaint on the grounds that, in this case, most viewers would infer that the opening figure represented a genuine valuation of the ring, and therefore the final reduced price was a genuine saving.

Platform availability

The Jewellery Channel (TJC) is available on Sky 24 hours a day. On 22 November 2009, The Jewellery Channel was added to Freesat on channel 815.

The channel was also carried on Freeview channel 44 between 7pm and 9pm between December 2007 and May 2008. The channel was replaced with a second Gems TV stream, which itself ceased in April 2009 as it was used for extended hours of CNN. On 21 September 2011, The Jewellery Channel returned to Freeview on channel 60. On 19 September 2012, The Jewellery Channel moved to Freeview channel 49 as part of a reshuffle of the EPG.

The Jewellery Channel also simulcasts on 5USA between 6am and 12pm, allowing the channel to be available to viewers Virgin Media and TalkTalk TV, in addition to Freesat, Freeview and Sky.