Will Aust Post wine be cooked with 39c days?

[btfwine]

Hi there,
First time poster, I don't buy wine online often however with my Langtons account I purchased eight bottles of quality red (Branson Coach House, and Yelland and Papps). My thoughts were more concentrated on hoping they'd arrive by christmas rather than the sort of weather it would be shipped in.

It was sent from Victoria, and yesterday 19/12 it got up to 39c (100f) there, and here in Adelaide SA it got up to the same temperature on 20/12. It arrived in Adelaide for delivery at 6am 20/12 (25c), then was with driver from 9am (36c) who delivered it at 11am (39c). They were warm.

My first thought was to get them in the wine fridge but only had enough room for 5 of them. But then I wondered if making them go from warm to cool so quickly could damage them further.

From what i've read online, an extreme sign of heat damage is a bulging cork but this usually takes days of extreme heat to occur. Six are corked and none of them are bulging (though one is a little raised than the others but still just below the bottle top). But apart from this, apart from opening and tasting them (which i've read I shouldn't do for at least a week after heat), it's hard to tell. I wanted to use a couple as Christmas presents so it's kind of hard to know.

Does anyone else have experiences with potential for heat-damaged wine from Australia Post delivered during heatwaves? Should I be worried with the above temps and timeframes or do I have nothing to worry about?

Thanks!

[Wizz]

Every chance they will be cooked, 29 degrees is uncomfortable, 39 is deadly. any wine delivered by any carrier will be exposed at that temperature. Most reputable sellers will not freight wine when it is that hot.

[Diddy]

I was in the same boat as you wanting to get an order delivered before Xmas. However with the weather we've had in Melbourne, it just wasn't worth the risk. I can only imagine how hot they'd get sitting in the back of a delivery van while he makes his deliveries all day long.

[cuttlefish]

I thought Langtons were supposed to be on top of this sort of thing, and held stock during periods of heat ??

[TiggerK]

From Langtons website... very poor and irresponsible policy I think. Surely they should have a cutoff 'stop-ship' temperature. If the start, intermediate or end delivery points are predicted to exceed 32 or something, automatically do not send anything? OK, bit of work for them, but perfectly reasonable.

During periods of heat we will only hold your shipments on your authorisation. While every effort will be made to ensure prompt delivery without compromising the condition of the wine, please be advised that Langton's insurance does not cover heat damage.

[btfwine]

During periods of heat we will only hold your shipments on your authorisation. While every effort will be made to ensure prompt delivery without compromising the condition of the wine, please be advised that Langton's insurance does not cover heat damage.

I've seen this too and I have to say, the wording is very unclear. From what I gather, 'hold shipments on your authorisation' means Langtons has to be contacted by the customer to advise 'do not send' due to heat. Otherwise, regardless of weather, Langtons are gonna send it. I wonder why this is the case if Langtons are supposedly one of the better wine auction sites.

But it's not Langtons or Aus Post's fault, I should have known better, I just didn't think. I won't ever get wine shipped again without checking the 7-day weather forecast first.

[n4sir]

During periods of heat we will only hold your shipments on your authorisation. While every effort will be made to ensure prompt delivery without compromising the condition of the wine, please be advised that Langton's insurance does not cover heat damage.

I've seen this too and I have to say, the wording is very unclear. From what I gather, 'hold shipments on your authorisation' means Langtons has to be contacted by the customer to advise 'do not send' due to heat. Otherwise, regardless of weather, Langtons are gonna send it. I wonder why this is the case if Langtons are supposedly one of the better wine auction sites.

But it's not Langtons or Aus Post's fault, I should have known better, I just didn't think. I won't ever get wine shipped again without checking the 7-day weather forecast first.

There's a button on your account details page - decide shipping later. Once you hit that, they should hold your wines until further notice (like if you want to add more wines from a coming auction to spread the freight charge, or try and avoid shipping in heat like this).

It is still a complete crap shoot though. Very recently I got them to ship out a parcel of four bottles and thought I had timed it right - a cool week ahead and they were all from the same auction, so I figured it wouldn't take long at all for them to be dispatched. It ended up being nearly two weeks before they even got to Australia Post, by that time the weather spiked and they were shipped over a bloody hot weekend in the mid-high thirties. Sure enough, something was leaking by the time they got here... so much for their policy about shipping things at the beginning of the week to prevent this stuff happening

Until very recently you used to get real time tracking information from Australia Post too, but with the move to the one warehouse and the cheaper shipping charges, that's been zapped. They never used to have disclaimer about the insurance not covering heat damage until a few years ago - I'm guessing they've managed to destroy enough bottles over the years with their sloppy shipping practices that they've slipped it in. I've found Australia Post as a carrier isn't too bad, normally it's only a day or two on the road (although I've also found the individual parcel delivery driver has a lot to do with it. If he has you last on his list of deliveries, they could be in a hot van for hours after everyone else has done a good job - when they had the online parcel tracking you could see that stuff happening). McPhees who was the previous contractor was much worse - I sent back quite a few rare bottles that were destroyed by them by heat after two weeks in transit, not sure if I could do it now.

The only real sure way is to get them to keep everything you buy over summer, and get them to ship it out in bulk after the weather starts to cool down. It must piss Langtons/Woolies off to have to store these bottles for months, but with their policies and shipping practices if you're interstate it makes the most sense. Otherwise, stick to buying locally.

My 2c,
Ian

[btfwine]

With cork bulging and leakage, if they aren't evident, does it carry much meaning? Or just simply they aren't completely pressure-cooked?

Has anyone received and consumed wine that was delivered in hot weather that turned out fine?

Trying to gauge the chances of salvaging...

[odyssey]

Had a similar experience with them but not as bad temp wise. Told them to hold the postage, thought I had timed everything right, but they couldn't locate one of these bottles and they ended up posting it it off on a Wednesday, so it as sitting at Aust post warehouse somewhere over the weekend, with one 30 degree day. A bit crappy but at least it was in a pallet.

With yours I would be kicking up a stink, drop the wine in at Surry Hills and ask for your money back... They may point at T&Cs but worth a try. Although some other poor sod would still end up buying it off them after it being shipped back. You could always sell it again I suppose.

That's my Langtons bashing post for the day. Could go on but better not.

[Broughy]

yep i bought a Chianti circa $150 for $30 that had been sitting in a remainders bin outside for months in the sun. The wine was excellent. It is a lottery and probably gets worse if your going to keep the wine for any length of time. The end result is that it is likely that the wine won't be at its peak but is unlikely (but not impossible) that it is undrinkable. I suspect a lot of big store wine is not handled well. I drive past a wine store every day that has wine sitting in the sun for extended periods.

[TiggerK]

From Langtons website... very poor and irresponsible policy I think. Surely they should have a cutoff 'stop-ship' temperature. If the start, intermediate or end delivery points are predicted to exceed 32 or something, automatically do not send anything? OK, bit of work for them, but perfectly reasonable.

During periods of heat we will only hold your shipments on your authorisation. While every effort will be made to ensure prompt delivery without compromising the condition of the wine, please be advised that Langton's insurance does not cover heat damage.

Looks like we have a new Langtons policy!! From their website today.

***Shipping during Extreme Hot Weather***

During extreme hot weather, 30 degrees plus, we do not ship your wines from our temperature controlled cellars in Victoria; unless you specifically request.

[grapeobserver]

yep i bought a Chianti circa $150 for $30 that had been sitting in a remainders bin outside for months in the sun. The wine was excellent. It is a lottery and probably gets worse if your going to keep the wine for any length of time. The end result is that it is likely that the wine won't be at its peak but is unlikely (but not impossible) that it is undrinkable. I suspect a lot of big store wine is not handled well. I drive past a wine store every day that has wine sitting in the sun for extended periods.

Poor heat handling is a concern of mine as well, and I too have seen any number of bad examples and agree with the lottery call, probably with similar odds of winning. For the more expensive wines, perhaps it would be good to see greater use of temperature monitoring devices that I think exist now and can track the wine's temperature from winery, shipment, docks, delivery etc. I'd certainly value that sort of effort by a vendor to do the right thing.

[Duncan Disorderly]

Two weeks ago I rang up Langtons because, while my account said that I had shipping orders with AusPost tracking numbers, I hadn't received anything for two weeks.

Langtons explained that they had issued the paper work but, due to heat, the wine hadn't physically been sent. They then asked whether I wanted all my shipping delayed until the weather cooled, to which I replied to in the affirmative. Then four days later, when the temperature had averaged 35C I received the first half doz followed three days later by another half doz, despite even hotter weather.

However...

The wine has been fine, perhaps due to the fact that while things appear to be a little confused at Langtons they certainly know how to pack boxes and (perhaps addressing the OP) AusPost are reliable shippers.

[The fish]

Hey Duncan!

Just bring the bottles to the dinner on Thursday and we'll check/test them. Dlo has this trick where he takes the cork out of the bottle and voila! You can pretty much straight away tell if it's cooked or not

Cheers
Matt