Plated Goods Disclosure — The FTC Rule on Marking Plated Jewellery
Plated Goods Disclosure — The FTC Rule on Marking Plated Jewellery
How U.S. trade law distinguishes plated, filled, and rolled-gold work from solid precious metal
Plated goods disclosure is the requirement under the United States Federal Trade Commission Jewellery Guides that any item of jewellery whose precious-metal surface is a plating or cladding rather than a solid alloy be marked clearly with the plating thickness, the base metal, and the plating process. The rule sits inside Title 16 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Part 23 — the FTC's Guides for the Jewelry, Precious Metals, and Pewter Industries — and is the legal basis on which terms such as gold electroplate, gold-filled, rolled gold plate, and vermeil are policed in the American trade.
Why the rule exists
The disclosure rule exists to prevent consumer deception. A plated piece may look identical at retail to a solid-gold piece, yet the gold content can be a thousandth of the mass of an equivalent karat-gold item and the wear life shorter by orders of magnitude. By compelling marking and accurate description, the FTC framework forces the trade to distinguish solid precious-metal goods from plated and clad goods at the point of sale. The rule applies to advertising and packaging as well as to the article itself.
The principal categories
The FTC Guides recognise several distinct classes of plated and clad goods, each with specific thickness and base-metal requirements. Gold electroplate denotes a base-metal article electroplated with a minimum of 0.175 micrometres of gold of at least 10 karat fineness; heavy gold electroplate requires a minimum of 2.5 micrometres. Gold-filled and rolled gold plate denote mechanically bonded gold layers, with gold-filled requiring a layer of at least 1/20 of the article's total weight at 10 karat or finer, and rolled gold plate any thinner mechanically bonded layer that must be marked with its fraction and karat. Vermeil denotes sterling silver electroplated with a minimum of 2.5 micrometres of gold at 10 karat or finer.
Each category requires its own form of disclosure. The marking must include the karat and the descriptor — 1/20 12K G.F., 14K H.G.E., vermeil, and so on — and the disclosure may not imply that a plated piece is solid karat gold.
Enforcement and trade practice
Violations of the FTC Guides can result in enforcement actions, including consent orders, monetary penalties under related statutes, and injunctive relief. In practice, the bulk of compliance is handled at the trade-association level through AGTA, JVC, and the Jewelers Vigilance Committee, with the FTC pursuing enforcement against egregious cases of misrepresentation. Major retailers and platforms enforce the rules contractually with their suppliers, and laboratory testing of plating thickness is routine in disputes.
The disclosure standard is the foundation on which the United States plated-jewellery trade operates and informs labelling practice in jurisdictions across North America. Other markets — the United Kingdom, the European Union, Japan — have their own equivalent frameworks, often hallmark-based, but the FTC scheme is the working reference for goods sold to American consumers.
Why it matters at retail
For the retail jeweller, the practical effect of the rule is that any plated or filled piece must be described accurately to the customer and marked accurately on the article. Gold-tone, gold-coloured, and gold-finished are not acceptable substitutes for the proper FTC categorisation. For the consumer, the marking is the disclosure that allows informed comparison between solid karat gold, gold-filled, and electroplated pieces at the point of purchase.