A couple of months ago I bought a Barclay’s Groupon and placed an order and received a confirmation and tracking number as expected. A week or two later, the tracking information showed that my order had still not been shipped. I contacted them and they said it would be leaving their warehouse soon. The next day I came home from work to find that delivery had been attempted! So I had to wait 2 days for it to arrive at a fedex center and then go to pick it up. Annoying that they were completely clueless about the status of their orders (or can’t be bothered to actually check), but not the biggest deal, right?

Barclay’s then sent me a gift certificate which reads “Usable on any purchase of $75 or more in our Wine Shop. The certificate is the same as cash—just browse through our Wine Shop and don’t forget to check out our amazing sampler cases for the best deals. When you spend at least $75.00, we will apply this certificate against the total.” I went to their web site to use the certificate and placed an order for one of the sampler cases. During the order process, upon clicking the button to go to the next step (Next or Continue or whatever), my order was finalized without giving me the opportunity to enter the gift certificate. I had assumed there would be a box for that on the next page, like any other e-commerce web site. I even second-guessed myself, thinking that perhaps I had missed something. As soon as I received the order confirmation, I immediately replied explaining the situation and asking them to apply the gift certificate to my order. No response. That night I emailed them again. Still no response. So the next morning I used the form on their web site to email them. When I still had received no response the next day, I called them.

The woman told me that I was not allowed to use the certificate because I did not buy my wine in their wine shop. But of course I bought it from your wine shop, I said, how else would you have my order in your system? After going round & round trying to figure out what on earth she was talking about, she said that because I had clicked on a link in an e-mail from them to go to their web site and order my case, rather than going to their web site manually, clicking on “wine shop”, and ordering a case, I had not ordered from their wine shop thus the certificate could not be used. Apparently unless you go to their web site and actually click on the words “wine shop”, you’re not ordering from their wine shop, even though you’ve ordered wine from the exact same web site. Huh??? I tried to explain to her that this makes no sense, but she did not care. The web site of a wine merchant IS their wine shop (unless they’re referring to an actual physical store someplace, which they’re not). How would a customer know that when a wine merchant says “our wine shop”, they’re not referring to the web site from which they sell their wine, but rather only one particular page on that site? It’s obviously just a scam to prevent people from using coupons/certificates. On top of that nonsensical explanation, she tells me that my order is already in transit (so I can’t cancel it, which is what I wanted to do). Then she actually had the nerve to tell me that I could still use my certificate if I wanted to go to their wine shop now. I’m so sure!!! I told her not to worry, that I will never be ordering anything from them again.

Once it shipped, their website had the tracking number and I was able to see my delivery info on FedEx’s website. Wine arrived well within the 10-14 day window they promised. The selection is not terrible. I received 2x ‘Carma’ Carmenere 2010, 2x ‘Chateau Les Tuileries’ Bordeaux 2009, 2x ‘Roza Ridge’ Cabernet Sauvignon 2004, 2x ‘Carma’ Sauvignon Blanc 2010, 2x ‘Blue Pirate’ Pinot Gris 2008, and 2x ‘Lunacy’ Chardonnay 2007.

I looked all of these up, and the cheapest I could get these for would be $161.66 + whatever sales tax I ended up paying. I bought the groupon so all total I spent about $100 on this wine, including $20 shipping (which I won’t have to pay next time apparently). I haven’t popped any of the bottles yet as I just received them, but non of this strikes me as the horrible experiences I’ve read some people say they had.

All in all, I’d say 4 out of 5. I’m satisfied with everything except for the not getting a shipping email and maybe one or two of the selections could be improved slightly. Oh, and I didn’t get the tasting notes… need to call them about that.