Despite the warnings on this board and others I have been buying off JJ Buckley for the last few years. I like winning the actions and occasionally they will have a deal I will grab. I always thought it was kind of nice because I could put the stuff in storage until I get a full case then ship it over 3-day. They use to have a deal for $28 but that has since gone up. I have heard people complain about the condition of the wine but I have gotten some real gems and I have never had an issue. Anyway, been waiting for the heat to die down and ship a case back. Here is the series of events:
9/26 Put in request to have a case shipped out on 10/1
9/29 Get tracking information for the package to go out
10/1 Wine is suppose to ship but does not
10/3 Get another tracking number for overnight shipping but nothing goes out that night.
10/4 Call customer service and ask what happened to my package. Tell me not sure what the problem is but they can ship it out that night but I refuse since no one is going to be home the next day to sign for it. Instead, ask them to ship the package Monday 10/8.
10/5 I get another tracking number so I figure the wine must be going out on Monday.
10/8 The wine doesn’t go out.
10/9 The wine finally gets shipped for overnight delivery.
10/10 Suppose to receive the package by 3PM but it doesn’t come. I call Fedex. They said there was a problem with the plane and it had to be re-routed back to Oakland. Since it was guaranteed by 3PM I ask about a shipping credit. They tell me JJ Buckley would have to work that out with then but I could ask them to credit my account on their end. I call up my sales rep, explain the situation and he agrees to issue a credit for all the trouble I had. I also express concerns about the condition of the wine since it has been sitting around god knows where. I am assured that the wine was in there warehouse and should be fine.
10/11 I received the shipment today…or at least part of it. It was missing 5 bottles! Not sure I understand how those guys could not have my wine. I purchased it and it was placed in storage. I mean, where did it go? How can you lose 5 bottles? 1 of the bottles of the 2005 Plince I purchased directly from my sales rep. Should I assume my other 2 in storage are also gone? On top of that, 2 bottles of 2008 dominus, 1 bottle of 2007 Bran Caia, 1 2003 Pontet Canet and 1 2004 Honig Napa Valley X had wine stains on the labels. Now I don’t believe it was heat damage, it appears it was probably a breakage but I went back and checked the auctions. None of them were for bottles with wine stained labels. I tell them that this is completely unacceptable and to please let me know what is going to be done to rectify this situation as well as a credit for the shipping on this package, since they will be getting a credit from Fedex. I didn’t buy wines with stains on the labels.
10/11 I am told that they transitioned to a new warehouse and had some issues with some pallets of wine not getting scanned in. They will find the wines and ship them out to me.
10/11 I inquire if there is a cut off if they don’t find my wines and inquire again about the shipping credit.
10/12 I get an email back from my sales rep the next day saying he is passing this off to the operations manager and the sales rep does not give me any answers.
10/18 Since I have not heard from them in almost a week and they have not answered any of my questions, I send another email asking about the status.
10/19 I get an email back 24 hours later stating the following:
“Hi Matt, I will check on this for you. Please know we will get to your credit with a refund or Gift Certificate; however, our staff is very busy with shipping and we moved into a larger warehouse.
Thank you for your patience.” Hey cool…it’s been a week and you haven’t even checked on my issue?!
10/19 I respond to my sales reps email:
I understand you have moved into a new warehouse but the attention that my issue has received is extremely disappointing. Please ship my remaining wine in storage and when you have sorted out the issue please issue a refund. I DON’T want a gift certificate. I no longer wish to do business with JJ Buckley.
10/21 I have yet to receive a response although if I got an email from a customer like that I would have tried to rectify the situation immediately.
I mean, am I overreacting here. What really gets me angry is I get like 100 emails a day from this sales rep. I have been on the phone with him in the past and he ruthlessly tries to sell you wine. I guess after he runs your card that is where the service ends and if you don’t get your wine or have an issue that’s not his problem. Never heard from the operations manager. Guess I had to learn the hard way and should have listened to the warnings.
That would be very frustrating for me, too, and I am sure I would stop doing business with them forever after that. I haven’t been buying from them for long, but haven’t had a problem. We’ll see what happens soon when I ask them to ship my purchases from the past few months. I hadn’t heard of any problems before this.
EDIT: I should say that I haven’t had any problems as significant as this. They did charge me for storage when I had nothing stored with them. It was a small amount, and a phone call cleared it up quickly.
I had some issues (primarily shipping related) at the end of December. I was assigned a different rep a couple weeks later, and he asked me about my experiences. I explained my situation and he said he’d look into it and would get back to me…
Never head back from him and I haven’t ordered since.
I’ve only bought once from them last year - a mixed case of various wines on sale.
I bought 2 bottles of Te Awa Hawkes Bay Syrah 2009 on sale for the $15-20 range. WHen shipped they packed 2 bottles of Te Awa Haekes Bay Cabernet Merlot 2007. Same producer, different vintage and different grapes (the back label of the wine also didn’t match the front label - the back label said Merlot, the front label, Cabernet Merlot).
I brought it up with them and they said they would replace if i shipped the wine back to them. For the price of the wine i decided it wasn’t worth my effort and told them not to worry about it i’d just keep and drink the wrong wine. That was my call, and i didn’t expect them to refund without me returning it, but some sort of future discount would be good customer service.
Haven’t (and probably won’t) ordered from them since.
From a few of the posts above it seems like they run a pretty poor warehouse and post sales customer service.
Many transactions, no issues. I would bet that there isn’t a retailer in the country that hasn’t screwed up an order or a shipment. Sorry you had trouble with them this time.
I would be quite frustrated as well if i were you. I have bought a few cases from them and have been extremely happy with the service i have received. You may just need to change sales reps
I’ve ordered a few times, mostly good but the recent one a poor experience.
I ordered some wine pre-arrival. Some time later, after never having been notified that it was in stock but noticing in CT that it was still pending, I went to my account page, saw that the wine was ready to ship, and gave the greenlight. Note that the pre-arrival bottles in question were only a portion of the shipment. When the box arrived, the pre-arrival bottles weren’t included. When I inquired, I was told that they did not have inventory & couldn’t ship that wine. They did offer to replace with a more recent vintage, which I took, but that being the sole option didn’t thrill me.
No notification when the wine was in or that it wasn’t available, and no heads up or refund upon failing to ship…sloppy. Unlikely that I work with them anytime soon.
I don’t blame you one bit for being frustrated and giving up on them for this situation.
However, I have to say I’ve only had good experiences with JJB, and thus most of my online purchases now go to JJB. I’ve had a snafu or two with them (as with any retailer) but they always make it right (unlike many retailers). Making it right is all I ever ask…
I get the sense that it’s a big operation, and they do seem to lose bottles relatively often. Or neglect to ship some of your items. Looking at the inventory on their website plus all the winecommune auctions, it’s understandable that issues may arise. I speak up when I’m not happy, and so far they have been ok.
I have a different sales rep. I had an issue once previously but it was quickly resolved. Other than that never had a problem and I ave bought quite a few bottles from them as well.
The thing that really gets me is this sales rep hounds me with emails and pushes wine whenever I have been on the phone with him. But now I got an issue and I get the cold shoulder.
I have and still do a lot of my wine business with JJB. Over the years, there have been a couple of mistakes (one unfulfilled futures order was noteworthy), but overall, I’m happy with the quality, price and service. Hopefully they’ll make things right for you.
They did charge me for storage when I had nothing stored with them.
That’s brilliant! Way to raise some much-needed cash!
Actually I’ve had pretty good experiences with them. As mentioned, there’s probably not a retailer in the country who hasn’t messed up an order here and there. The issue isn’t that there can be some error, it’s how they deal with it. Too bad about the experience, but I’ve been quite happy with them for the most part.
Most recently, they were going to ship out an order a few months ago - I sent them a note asking them to hold it until the weather was cooler and within hours I got a response telling me it was in storage. No problems at all over the past few years.
My first order from them was delivered to my home (while I was at work, duh). Three delivery attempts so it was set to make the journey back across the country. My rep recalled it but without waiting for the original order to arrive back at JJB shipped identical wine overnight at no charge.
He earned a lot of business from me with that customer service. No other problems.
I had a delivery on Friday and a few bottles were missing. Sent an email and my rep got right back to me. Said they were having some issues and would look into it.
I’ve had excellent service and no hiccups but they push a lot of volume so mistakes are to be expected. They do need to rectify the op’s situation though; unacceptable.
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