Standard story: on 2/18 I saw a wine I had been looking for on their website and ordered with the standard confirmation. Next day (2/19) I get the “sorry, sold out, how about x or y”? email and I say no thanks and ask for a refund. That was 11 days ago and still no refund. Interestingly, my card statement shows the sale date as 2/20 indicating they charged my card after I asked for the refund. The wine still shows up on their website as available for purchase, btw.
Cellar d’Or is a interesting little wine shop located in Ithaca, NY. I first discovered it while my daughter was attending Cornell University. They carry an eclectic selection of wines, some of which are not widely distributed. Not all of their inventory is stocked in their small physical store. I have successfully placed few orders. In my opinion, their website is subpar. If you are having customer service issues, just give them a call. Their staff are very helpful.
Thanks for the background, Jeff. I did call them, but my general feeling is that I shouldn’t have to spend my time running them down for such a basic issue. Their system seemed to work flawlessly in charging me so it should work as well the other way. I understand things happen, but I have lots of options and haven’t had this problem with other vendors. They were helpful and apologetic, but didn’t have any real explanation for what happened. I did get an email refund confirmation from them right away so I’m assuming it will show up on my cc soon.
I have had nothing but good experiences with these folks also, and they have some hard to find things from time to time. That said, I sympathize with the OP. I remember ordering a difficult to find wine from a NYC shop, wanted it ship right away. After three calls and two weeks, they said they had sold it, and only then refunded. Just as in the above, if they could take my money so easily, they should as easily get it back to me.
They are a (very) small shop that belies their web presence. I think only 3 people work there, so give them a break. All my interactions with them have been excellent, but then, I don’t use the web to do things. The web portion of their sales seem to be tallied separately than from what the store does and I have a feeling they use a service that bills in a different way from what the store operation handles it. I should think placing a call shouldn’t be such a hassle when dealing with good and honest people.