By Rocco Clayfield, trading as GoldPaid; the business incorporated as GOLDPAID LTD (company 17382540) on 5 August 2026 · Published · updated
Got the piece in front of you? Get a figure for it
Send a photo of the piece and any stamp on WhatsApp. We will reply with a rough estimate for it. No obligation, and nothing needs posting.
No WhatsApp? Call 07944 014111, 8am to 9pm.
Not sure what the mark says? Use the hallmark lookup. Final offers depend on inspection, item weight, purity, hallmarks, stones, non-gold components, condition and the live precious-metal market.
What is the spot price of gold?
The London Bullion Market Association sets a reference price for gold twice daily, at 10:30 and 15:00 London time. The live spot price moves continuously between fixes as banks, refiners and large traders buy and sell at wholesale. Most market data feeds show this live spot in US dollars per troy ounce. Convert to GBP using the live exchange rate.
Spot is a wholesale price for delivery of 999 fine bullion in standard form factors (good delivery bars, kilo bars). A homeowner with a 9ct ring is not in that market directly. The route to that market is the scrap refining cycle.
What is the scrap price of gold?
Scrap price is the figure a UK buyer offers per gram of your alloy, calculated backwards from the spot price after the buyer covers their costs. Those costs are: the refining process to recover the gold from the alloy, the recovery yield (the refiner returns slightly less than 100% of the theoretical gold content, depending on the metal), the dealer’s working-capital cost (the buyer pays you today and waits weeks for the refiner to settle), the dealer’s operating cost, and a modest profit margin.
Add those together and you get the gap between spot and the offered scrap price.
| Component of the gap | Typical size on solid carat gold | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Refining cost | Low single digits per cent, higher on 9ct and plated material | The chemistry that recovers pure gold from the alloy |
| Recovery yield | Losses of parts per thousand | The refiner returns slightly less than the theoretical gold content |
| Working-capital lag | Feeds into the dealer margin | The buyer pays you today and settles with the refiner weeks later |
| Dealer margin | Set by each buyer, and the part that varies most | Operating costs, postal cover, free tracked returns and profit |
| Total gap below the gold content | A few per cent on solid carat gold; wider at many buyers | Larger on plated or low-yield material |
How much does refining cost?
For high-carat solid gold, the refining cost is in the low single digits per cent. For low-carat or plated material, it can be much higher per gram of recovered gold. The full route from the sorting tray to a refined bar is set out in what happens to your gold after you sell it.
What is the recovery yield?
Refiners recover slightly less than the theoretical gold content of the alloy. The losses are tiny (parts per thousand for solid carat gold) but they are not zero. For plated material the recovery yield is more variable because the gold layer is thin and inconsistent.
Why does the working-capital lag cost the buyer money?
When a buyer pays you, they pay against the spot price now. The metal then sits in transit to the refiner, sits with the refiner during processing, and settles weeks later. During that window the price could move up or down. The buyer typically hedges this with a forward contract or by holding a small inventory, both of which have a cost. That cost feeds into the dealer margin.
What is a fair dealer margin?
The dealer margin covers the buyer’s rent, staff, XRF equipment, postal cover, customer service, the prepaid Royal Mail labels, the free tracked returns on declined parcels, and the profit needed to keep the business running. It is a real cost. A buyer claiming zero dealer margin is either not telling the truth or running an unsustainable model.
Dealer margins vary widely between buyers. Operating costs are roughly the same whatever a parcel weighs, so some buyers take a bigger share of a 5g parcel than of a 100g one. At GoldPaid, refining, assay, handling and margin together come out of the gap between the metal value and the figure offered, and the written offer shows the weight and purity behind it.
What does “we pay 98% of spot” really mean?
Advertisements that quote 95% or 98% of spot for scrap gold usually mean that share of the gold content, after the carat decimal, not of the item’s total weight. 98% of spot on the gold inside a 9ct ring is about 37% of the spot price per gram of the ring. Read the small print, then compare the offered £-per-gram by carat against the calculated £-per-gram by carat (spot ÷ 31.1035 × carat decimal).
How do you check a scrap offer against spot?
- Take the live spot in GBP per troy ounce from a market data source such as the LBMA or kitco.
- Divide by 31.1035 to get GBP per gram of pure gold.
- Multiply by the carat decimal of your piece (0.375, 0.585, 0.750, 0.916, 0.999).
- This is the raw recovered-gold value per gram. A buyer’s offer sits below this figure once refining and costs are covered. Hold any offer up against the same number.
- Multiply by the weight of your piece for an indicative scrap value to compare with the written valuation.
Why is the gap sometimes bigger than expected?
A bigger-than-expected gap usually has a reason: the piece is plated rather than solid, the carat stamp does not match the actual alloy, stones add weight that is not gold, watch movements or springs add non-gold mass, or the piece has been previously repaired with a different-carat solder. The XRF report shows the actual alloy. The written valuation explains the deductions.
Where the buyer has applied a wider margin without explanation, that is the moment to walk away and post the parcel to a buyer who will show the maths.
Does selling by post close the gap?
A postal buyer has no shopfront or window stock to pay for, which is one reason a postal rate can sit closer to the metal value. The XRF test, the written valuation and the bank transfer route work the same. Your parcel travels on Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed, tracked and signed for. Royal Mail cover may be available up to £2,500 depending on the postal method and cover level used. GoldPaid can confirm the appropriate postal option before you post. If the lot may be worth more than £2,500, tell us first and we can split it across more than one prepaid label at no charge. A postal buyer’s offer sits closer to the metal value for that reason, and GoldPaid’s written offer shows the weight, the purity and the figure behind it.
See how to sell gold by post and our gold price per gram by carat explained guide. Two honest buyers can still land on very different figures from these same components, which is set out in why gold recycling prices differ between buyers.
How should you read any gold offer?
Spot and scrap are two sides of the same market. One is the wholesale reference, the other is the retail offer after honest costs. The gap is not a trick. It is arithmetic. Once you can do the calculation, you can read any offer in any window in the country and judge it on the maths. That is the protection. Anyone who refuses to walk you through the components is not someone you should be selling to. If you are already holding a figure from a buyer and want to test it, was my gold offer fair runs the same arithmetic as a five-step check, with the percentage bands to read the answer against.