A screen quote is not a pile on a counter. Between the number and an object in hand sit a dealer, a payment, a carrier, and a piece of paper. Each can fail on its own. Remote buying is that logistics: identity, whether the payment can still be clawed back, how the parcel moves, and what the invoice names.
Who the dealer is
A dealer is a name, a place, and a history you can check without relying only on their own FAQ. A registered company, an address that is more than a box story, years of the same trade under the same name — ordinary facts. A social-media handle, a one-week shopfront, or a page that answers every question with its own marketing is a thinner counterparty.
Checkable history means records outside the seller’s site: a company register, contact details that have stayed put, the same desk still answering after a parcel arrives. It is not a star collage the desk wrote for itself. Online, the object is not yet in the room, so the desk is the first fact, not the scale. A name that cannot be found next year is a reason to stop before any metal moves.
Whether the payment is final
Some rails leave a window to dispute a charge. Others settle as a final transfer: once the funds are gone, getting them back is slow, expensive, or closed. A method that reverses is a different product from one that does not.
Know whether the payment is still reversible after the desk says the metal has shipped, and what the desk’s terms say about that moment.
The price is locked at the order
The number on the order is the price of that order. A later screen print does not reopen it. Dealers commonly buy the metal, or hedge the sale, at acceptance, so the book is committed at that print.
Cancelling after the spot price has moved can leave the buyer liable for the difference. Dealer terms often call this a market-loss clause. It is common in those terms and conditions, and it applies whether the screen has since fallen or risen. It is not a forecast of the next print.
Payment deadlines are typically short. How long the window lasts is in that dealer’s terms, and it differs by desk and by country. A late transfer can still trigger the market-loss clause.
Shipping, insurance, and the empty box
Shipping is the stretch where the object has left the desk and has not arrived. Insured carriage, a signature on delivery, and an address under your control are the ordinary facts. A box that advertises bullion is also a sign. Discreet packaging is a habit of the trade for that reason.
An empty box is a tracking line that ends without an object that matches the invoice. Insurance pays only the loss its contract describes.
When a parcel does not arrive, or arrives light
Until handover, transit risk generally sits with the seller: loss, theft, or a box that never arrives. Handover is delivery to the buyer, often against a signature. A signature the buyer did not make is a different handover, and the tracking line is only the carrier’s scan.
Terms vary by dealer and by country. The dealer’s terms and conditions say when risk moves — on dispatch, on a carrier scan, or only on signature. Read them before the metal is on a van.
Reporting deadlines exist, and they are short. Carrier rules, the insurer, and the dealer’s terms each set a notice window for a missing parcel, a light carton, or obvious damage. The number of days is written there.
Film or photograph the unboxing before the contents are handled, including the outer labels and the seal. Keep the packaging, the labels, and the inner wrapping. Compare the weight and the dimensions with the invoice.
What the invoice names
Product name, weight, fineness, and serials when the object carries them are the ordinary fields. The premium — the gap between the screen ounce and the line on the invoice — belongs on the same paper. That gap is the premium over spot: form and liquidity on a named object. Without those facts a later dispute is an argument about a story.
A weight and a fineness without a product name is a paper ounce with adjectives. A product name without a weight is a stamp without a measure. The invoice does not make the metal safer. It makes the claim checkable when the box is light, the stamp looks wrong, or the desk and the carrier disagree about what left the building.
“We store it for you”
A seller who will only store the metal and never ship has not finished the purchase. The custody question has changed costume. If the metal exists as a named pile at all, it still sits somewhere — a vault claim, or an unallocated line on someone else’s books. That menu of access, cost, and counterparty is storing gold and silver.
The logistics end when an object can be signed for at an address you control. A pitch that skips the parcel is a storage pitch.
A quote far below the field
Spot is a screen price for a paper ounce. The object carries fabrication, shipping, insurance, and a dealer’s book. An ask that undercuts that field by a wide margin has to be explained by something other than generosity.
Treat the outlier as a warning, not a deal. The longer filter for obvious copies is spotting fakes. A high ask is not proof of honesty. A low ask is not proof of a fake.