Refund & Returns Policy

Before reading this policy in full, it is important to understand a fundamental constraint unique to alcohol retail in the United States. Federal and state alcohol beverage control laws impose significant restrictions on the return of alcohol products that do not apply to other categories of consumer goods.

In most US states, the return of alcohol to a retailer is either strictly prohibited or tightly regulated by the relevant state alcohol control authority. These laws exist to prevent the re-sale of previously purchased alcohol and to maintain the integrity of the regulated alcohol supply chain.

This policy is written to be as helpful as possible within the legal framework that governs alcohol retail in the United States. Where you are entitled to a remedy, we will provide it — and we will always endeavour to go beyond the minimum legal requirement where it is within our power to do so.

You are entitled to a refund, replacement, or store credit in the following circumstances. These are our commitments to you — not exceptions to be argued, but our baseline standard of service.

Due to the legal restrictions governing alcohol retail in the United States, and in accordance with our Terms of Use, the following circumstances do not qualify for a return, replacement, or refund:

• Change of mind: You have changed your mind about a purchase after the order has been despatched. We encourage you to take advantage of our product descriptions, tasting notes, and customer service team before purchasing if you have any uncertainty.
• Tasting preference: You have tasted the whisky and do not enjoy it, or it does not match your personal preference. Taste is inherently subjective and cannot form the basis of a return claim.
• Gifting regrets: The recipient of a gift order does not want or like the bottle received.
• Price matching: You have found the same product available at a lower price elsewhere after placing your order.
• Delayed reporting: Damage, incorrect items, or missing items reported more than 48 hours after delivery, or non-delivery reported more than 14 days after the expected delivery date.
• Customer-caused damage: Bottles that have been damaged after delivery through mishandling, improper storage, or any other cause within the customer’s control.
• Cosmetic variation: Minor label, capsule, or packaging differences on vintage or older expressions that fall within the expected range of variation for that product.

Although we take great care with our packaging and work with reputable carriers, damage in transit can occasionally occur. When it does, we take full responsibility and act swiftly to put things right.

How to Report a Damaged Bottle

If your order arrives with a damaged bottle, please follow these steps to ensure your claim is processed as quickly as possible:

• Do not dispose of the bottle, any broken pieces, the inner packaging, or the outer shipping box until your claim has been fully resolved;
• Photograph everything — the outer box (including any visible damage to the exterior), the inner packaging, and the bottle itself from multiple angles;
• Contact us within 48 hours of receiving your delivery via our contact page, quoting your order number and attaching your photographs;
• Describe clearly which item(s) are damaged and the nature of the damage observed.

Once we have received your report and supporting photographs, we will assess the claim and confirm the resolution — typically within 2 business days. We will then either arrange a replacement shipment (subject to stock availability) or process a full refund to your original payment method.

While our packing accuracy is high, errors can occasionally occur. If you receive a bottle or product that does not match your order — whether a different expression, age statement, bottler, volume, or an entirely different product — we will correct it at no cost to you.

To report an incorrect item, please contact us within 48 hours of delivery via our contact page with your order number and a clear description of what you received versus what you ordered. A photograph of the bottle received is helpful but not always essential for straightforward cases.

We will arrange for the correct item to be sent to you as a priority, subject to stock availability. In cases where the correct item is no longer available, we will offer a full refund or store credit for the affected item. We will also arrange for collection of the incorrectly sent bottle at our expense — you will not be required to pay any return shipping costs.

If your delivery arrives and one or more items from your order are not included, please check your order confirmation email first to confirm whether your order was despatched in a single shipment or split across multiple parcels. Multi-bottle orders occasionally ship in more than one package, which may arrive on different days.

If you have confirmed that an item is genuinely missing rather than arriving separately, please contact us within 48 hours of receiving your parcel with your order number and details of which item(s) are missing.

We will investigate promptly and, if the item was omitted in error, despatch the missing item as a priority. If the item is no longer in stock, we will offer a full refund or store credit for its value.

You may request cancellation of your order at any time before it has been despatched from our warehouse. If your cancellation request is received and confirmed before despatch, we will cancel the order and issue a full refund to your original payment method.

To request a cancellation, please contact us as soon as possible via our contact page, quoting your order number and requesting cancellation. Due to our typically fast despatch times, we cannot guarantee that a cancellation request will be actioned before your order ships — but we will do our best to intercept it.

Once an order has been despatched, it can no longer be cancelled. If the order has shipped but you no longer want it, please refer to the relevant sections of this policy — in most cases, we are unable to process a refund for an already-despatched order unless a fault-based reason applies, due to the legal restrictions on alcohol returns described in Section 1.

Where a refund has been agreed, we process it promptly. Here is a clear timeline of what to expect from the moment you raise a claim to the moment funds appear in your account.

All refunds are issued to the original payment method used at checkout. We are unable to process refunds to a different card or account. If your original payment method is no longer valid or accessible, please contact us to discuss alternative arrangements.

Because of the legal restrictions on alcohol returns in the United States, we are unable to offer a straightforward like-for-like exchange programme for change-of-mind purchases. We cannot accept the physical return of a bottle that has been correctly delivered, and we cannot then send a different bottle in its place, as this would constitute the return and re-sale of alcohol, which is prohibited in most states.

Where a fault-based claim is upheld — for example, a damaged or incorrectly sent bottle — and a replacement is available, we will despatch the correct item to you directly without requiring the return of the affected bottle in most circumstances. We may request photographs of the issue but will not require you to organise return shipping for damaged goods.

If you are looking for guidance on choosing a different expression for a future purchase, our team is always delighted to help. We know our range well and can point you in the right direction based on your tastes, budget, and purpose.

Purchases from our Old & Rare section are subject to the same policy as all other products, but there are some additional considerations specific to the nature of aged, vintage, and collector-grade expressions that are worth understanding before you purchase.

Condition of Older Bottles

Vintage and pre-owned single malts are sold as found, with condition noted in the product listing. Older bottles may exhibit signs of age including minor label wear, light soiling, slight level reductions within the accepted tolerance range, or variation in capsule condition. These characteristics are inherent to the age and provenance of the bottle and are disclosed in the listing description. They do not constitute damage and are not grounds for a return claim.

We take great care to accurately represent the condition of every bottle in our Old & Rare section. Where we have a concern about condition, we will note it explicitly in the listing. If anything about the condition description of an older bottle is unclear to you, please ask us before purchasing — we will always give you an honest assessment.

Significant Misdescription

If a rare or vintage bottle you receive has a material difference in condition from how it was represented in the listing — beyond the expected variation described above — this constitutes a misdescription and is fully eligible for a refund. Contact us within 48 hours of delivery with photographic evidence and we will resolve the matter promptly.

When you send a bottle as a gift, the same returns and refunds policy applies as for any other order. The purchaser — not the gift recipient — is the party to the contract of sale and is the person entitled to raise a claim.

If a gift order arrives damaged or contains an incorrect item, it is the purchaser’s responsibility to contact us to raise the claim, using the order number from their original confirmation email. Gift recipients are not able to raise claims directly as they are not party to the original transaction.

As noted in our Shipping Policy, we do not include itemised pricing in any of our shipments. If a claim is upheld for a gift order, any refund will be returned to the purchaser’s original payment method — not to the gift recipient.

If you need to raise a claim, have a question about this policy, or simply want to speak to someone before deciding whether to raise a formal claim, our customer service team is here for you. We are real whisky enthusiasts who care about your experience and want every order to be exactly right.

To contact us, please use the contact page on our website. When reaching out about a specific order, please include your order number, a clear description of the issue, and any relevant photographs. This allows us to begin assessing your case immediately rather than going back and forth for basic information.

We aim to respond to all enquiries within 1 business day and to resolve all eligible claims within 3 business days of receiving the required information. If your matter is urgent, please indicate this clearly in your message.

Shop Whisky Online reserves the right to update this Returns & Refunds Policy at any time. Any changes will be reflected on this page. We encourage you to review this policy before placing an order, particularly for high-value or rare bottle purchases.