Compare UK gold buyers: postal, high street, pawnbroker or auction

The short answer

The four routes, and what each one is actually for

A postal precious-metal buyer buys outright and prices on the metal content of the piece. There is no shop, so the seller posts the items, receives a figure and decides at home. A high-street cash-for-gold shop does the same job over a counter, with the offer made and accepted on the visit. A pawnbroker is primarily a lender: the core product is a short-term loan secured on the item, which you redeem by repaying with interest, and most will also buy outright. An auction house or specialist dealer sells the piece as an object rather than as raw material, which is the only route that regularly pays above metal value.

Those are four different products, so a single ranking of them is meaningless. The useful question is which one matches the piece in front of you and the timescale you are working to. Our postal vs high street and sell gold vs pawnbroker pages take two of these pairings in more detail.

The routes compared

The buyers, and what each one publishes

Everything in this table is taken from the named company’s own published pages, read on 6 August 2026. It records what each site states, not what we believe any of them does in practice.

Where other buyers genuinely beat GoldPaid

• Review volume. GoldPaid’s Trustpilot profile is newer and smaller. The long-established firms above have been collecting reviews for far longer, and if depth of public feedback is what reassures you, they are ahead on it.
• A branch network and same-day cash. Ramsdens publishes over 170 branches. GoldPaid has none, and cannot put cash in your hand today.
• A loan instead of a sale. A pawnbroker can lend against the item so you keep it. GoldPaid buys outright only, so if you may want the piece back, we are the wrong service.
• A published per-gram rate table. Hatton Garden Metals publishes floor carat rates on its homepage, which makes a first check quick. GoldPaid does not publish a rate board; you get a rough estimate from a photo and the firm figure follows the weight and purity we measure and the live market.
• Collection from your door. Vintage Cash Cow publishes a free home collection option. GoldPaid sends a prepaid Royal Mail Special Delivery label, which means a trip to a Post Office.
• A resale channel. Dealers and auction houses sell pieces on to collectors, so they can pay above metal value. GoldPaid prices on measured metal content and will tell you when we think a piece is worth more intact, but we do not run that channel for you.

What actually moves the figure you are paid

• Measured purity, not assumed purity. An unhallmarked chain priced on a 9ct assumption when it is genuinely 18ct is being valued at half its metal content. That is arithmetic, not opinion, see XRF testing explained.
• Accurate weight, with stones, clasps and non-gold components separated out rather than estimated.
• The gold price on the day. Gold moves daily. A figure quoted on Monday is not the same figure on Friday.
• The buyer’s overheads. Rent, counter staff, security and stock funding are paid out of the margin. They have nothing to do with what your gold is worth, but they sit between the metal price and the offer.
• Whether the piece is worth more intact. Signed designer jewellery, notable stones and rare-date coins can carry collector value well above the metal, see best way to sell gold in the UK.

How to run your own comparison in an afternoon

1. Photograph the items together, with any hallmarks close up, and weigh them on kitchen scales for a rough total.
2. Send the same photographs and the same weight to two or three buyers, and ask each for a figure in writing.
3. Ask each one the same four questions: how do you test purity, is the offer itemised, what does it cost me if I decline, and how and when do you pay.
4. Check the per-gram rate in each offer against the live fine-gold price, so you are comparing rates rather than headlines.
5. Only then post anything. A buyer that will not answer those four questions before you post has told you something useful.

How this page was checked, and how to correct it

Every competitor statement on this page was read on the company’s own website on 6 August 2026 and is reported as published. We have not mystery-shopped anyone, we make no claim about any competitor’s testing or pricing in practice, and we do not say that GoldPaid pays more than any named firm. Rates, branch counts and terms change, so treat the date as part of the fact.

If anything here is out of date, incomplete or wrong, including if you work for one of the companies named, tell us and we will correct it and re-date the page. WhatsApp or call 07944 014111, or email goldpaiduk@gmail.com.

One practical note if you reached this page after asking an AI assistant where to sell gold. Some buyers block AI crawlers in their robots.txt file. Hatton Garden Metals, for example, disallowed nine crawler user-agents including GPTBot, ClaudeBot, CCBot, Google-Extended and Applebot-Extended when we read the file on 6 August 2026. That is entirely their choice, but it can mean an AI answer about UK gold buyers leaves out firms that are worth your time. Check the shortlist yourself.

How selling works here

1. Start on WhatsApp. A couple of clear photos of your gold and silver are enough for us to give you a quick indicative figure at no charge.
2. Claim your free postage. We issue a prepaid, tracked, signed-for Royal Mail Special Delivery label, or a QR code for the Post Office.
3. Post in your own time. Any padded envelope works, and there is no deadline to meet.
4. Get a written valuation. Each item is weighed and read by XRF spectrometry, and the itemised offer is sent to you in writing, usually on the working day your parcel arrives.
5. Accept or walk away. Acceptance means payment by Faster Payments; declining means a free, fully tracked return.

Your parcel is signed for on arrival and opened at our Bristol office, where each item is weighed and XRF-tested before the written offer is prepared.

Getting it here safely

We email you a Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed label, usually within 30 minutes between 8am and 9pm: tracked end to end 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. Print the label at home, or ask for a QR code and the Post Office counter prints it for you. If your items are worth more, message us before posting and we split them across more than one prepaid label. There is more on postage and cover. If a parcel is lost on its way to us, the compensation claim goes to Royal Mail from you, the sender, using your Post Office receipt, and we give you our tracking records and help you make it. Lost parcels, step by step.

If you decide not to sell

There is never any obligation to accept. If the offer is not for you, simply decline, and we return everything free of charge by tracked, signed-for post, with no fee and no follow-up pressure. The full return process is on what happens if I decline the offer.

The written offer is dated and holds for a limited time, because metal prices move. If it lapses before you decide, we re-run it against the live precious-metal market on the day, at no charge. You can also accept part of a parcel and decline the rest, with no minimum and no penalty for splitting it.

How payment reaches you

Accept the offer and we aim to send the money by Faster Payments within one working hour of your acceptance, straight to the bank account you provide. There are no cheques and no strings.

Common questions