Google's Checkout Challenges

Michael Rubino was thrilled to have finally found a coveted Nintendo Wii online as a gift for his 9-year-old son this Christmas.

But when the software engineer from New Hampshire made a purchase with Google's(GOOG) newly launched Checkout service -- which is set to witness its first holiday season with heavy promotion from the search giant -- the product never arrived.

"I felt so badly burnt," says Rubino, who made the purchase on the Web site of Toys R Us, one of Google's many partners in Checkout, which started accepting payments through the service only about two weeks ago.

"While I am usually impressed by Google, my experience with this service was so poor that I could never see trying it again. It is such a disservice to launch something like this right ahead of Christmas."

Rubino isn't alone. Tempted by the steep rebates Google is introducing to promote Checkout, John Burley of Columbus, Ohio, used the service to place an order with Google partner J&R Electronics.

But when the order didn't arrive, Burley had to try to track down the item himself with the vendor, only to discover that J&R had been overwhelmed by Google Checkout and put the service on hold.

J&R's Web site apologized for any inconvenience and said "we have removed the Google Checkout option from our site so that we can focus on processing existing orders as quickly as possible."