Dead-Stock & Ageing Analyser

There is no legal figure — go by your own selling cycle. The common counter habit is three buckets: unsold at 90 days is slow, at 180 days it is stuck, past 365 days it is dead. Plated and fashion lines age fastest, because plating dulls and silver tarnishes in a closed drawer, while a plain 916 chain can sit a year and still sell at rate. Date-code every tag so the clock lives on the piece, not in your memory.

Work out the melt return first: stones out, net weight at your karat — 916 for 22K, 750 for 18K — less the melting loss and the refiner's charge, usually a few percent each. Melting gives you back metal, never the making charge and wastage you already paid the karigar. So if the piece can still sell, discount it: the metal is at rate for everyone, and making plus wastage is the whole room you have to move in.

Yes. A HUID belongs to one article; melt it or rework it into a new design and that article is gone. Whatever you sell afterwards as hallmarked goes back to the assaying centre as a fresh article, with a new mark and a fresh charge — a fee per article plus a minimum per consignment. Count that, and the karigar's labour, before you decide rework is cheaper than a discount.