About Us

Contents

• Summary (about us)
• Mail Order
  
• The Staff
• Timeline (history of Quicktest) 
• History of the Gold & Silver Buyer's Handbook

About us: summary

Contact: 01923 220206 or info@quicktest.co.uk 

QUICKTEST manufactures the QUICKTEST and TROYTEST brands of tester for  gold and silver  (and other white metals: platinum, Palladium, steel); they are used by every major chain of jewellers and pawnbrokers in the UK, over 650 stores. That is why these testers are regarded as the 'industry standard', they are even used for training at the Birmingham Assay Office.

Our straight-talking style tells you exactly why a product is good, and if it's not good we tell you that too, see our many information articles (magnifiers,  scales,  gem testers,  UV lights, etc.) We publish the definitive guide, The Gold and Silver Buyer's Handbook (see the  reviews); 

Next Day Delivery service available.  Visitors welcome  by appointment.

MAIL ORDER

We have been selling by mail since 1986. We are small enough to be able to follow every order and to know about every product; we are large enough to actually stock the items (97% of items are in stock at any one time).

Most mail order companies take items off the shelf then simply put them in a box and post them.  We don't do that, we check the goods before dispatch!   As a result, we provide award-winning service, see our feedback.

MEET THE STAFF 

Raffi: the 'boss', founder of Quicktest, designer of this website, writer of articles, knows most things about the products and most things-technical. 

Sandra:  Office Manager. In charge of orders from wholesalers and the big chains of stores. Knows about most products and all suppliers.  If you own (or buy for) more than five stores, go straight to Sandra. 

Diana: production, calibration and quality control, returns, order processing for retail orders. If you have a query about a dispatch or about a returned item; if you need advice about stock or delivery times, then Diana is your person. 

Audra: anything that has been 'produced' (e.g. acids, testing sets) or assembled or packed, you have Audra to thank. She knows everything about the warehouse. 

Bernice: sales, troubleshooting (or, as she jokes, "trouble-making"). It is Bernice (and Raffi) you will see at the exhibitions.

Freelancers: Karen, bookkeeper, complicated accounts queries must wait for Karen, please allow a few days for a reply.  Phil, marketing/SEO, if you think you need to speak to Phil, I will ask him if wants to speak to you.  Stephen, general software support. Jasper, photography. 

Timeline

The background. QUICKTEST was founded by Raffi Katz. In the 1970s / early 1980s he worked in a jobbing workshop for jewellery, then a retail jewellers, a watch company and a scrap/bullion company. All of this came in useful for his book, The Gold & Silver Buyer's Handbook. 

Raffi would take time off from his job at a jewellers in London's Leicester Square to work at antiques fairs. He sold jewellers' loupes, weighing machines (spring balances) and Troytest acid testers to the antiques traders; he dabbled in microscopes, binoculars and telescopes. 

These were also the early days of selling by mail. With an advert it Exchange & Mart, the  mailing list grew until it had dozens of customers and mail order sales grew to several orders per month - all from Raffi's tiny flat in North London.

1986 is when QUICKTEST officially comes into being. This iss the year Raffi produces the first QUICKTEST acid tester for testing gold and silver; this is the year that seesthe first edition of The Gold & Silver Buyer's Handbook; (by Raffi Katz); also the year QUICKTEST is registered for VAT.

Late 1980s.  Mail Order is not the main part of the business. The antiques fairs are booming and QUICKTEST exhibits at two or three per week, from Devon to Kent to Staffordshire to Southern Scotland. 

1988 sees the second edition of The Gold & Silver Buyer's Handbook, with a third edition in 1993. Raffi also takes to writing for the antiques press, with two regular columns in the Antiques Dealer newspaper (one humorous, one serious) and occasional articles for The Antiques Trade Gazette. At the same time, the mail order side of the business grows.  QUICKTEST employed a part-time packer, it is no longer a one-man business. 

1990s. QUICKTEST moves ro an industrial unit in West Watford and acquires a large collection of part-timers to helpers in the office and at the fairs. 

2000s. We move three times, each time into slightly larger premises (but keeping the Box Number address for continuity).  We buy our competitor Troytest (the founder, L T W Hansen invented the tester in 1949), and supplied Troytest and Quicktest precious metal testers to most jewellery wholesalers in the U.K. We take over the warehouse next door.

2010s, With the antiques fairs going into decline we concentrate on mail order, developing a clientele of trade customers, from one-man antiques traders to small companies with a handful of shops to large companies with hundreds of shops. 

2020s. We survive covid, largely because we already imported goods from China and used our contacts to find reliable suppliers of masks. New web site. We win a Gold Trusted Service Award for the FEEFO feedback service.

In the aftermath of Brexit and covid there is economic and political turmoil, and as the price of gold rises we develop our range of testers for gold, gemstones and diamonds.