Hi Opera,
The surcharge for 4 diamond chips is so beyond ridiculous that I can hardly fathom it. This is not going to be a custom setting. They are just gluing the pearls into a pre-fab semi-mount. The semi-mount in 14k will cost something around US$90.00 wholesale from the Stuller catalog. That is already including 4 diamond chips that come with the setting from the manufacturer. If you want to really annoy your jeweler you buy yourself a suite of fancy color diamonds chips in a rainbow assortment from
www.alphagems.com (get the phone number, ask for Balu Khatod, call him Prince and tell him Bagheera referred you) and he'll pick a whole carat worth of meleé in fine color and clarity for about US$100. Then kindly ask your generous jeweler to set their "free custom" mounting with these.
Zeide