Julie,
May I chime in with my 2 cents?
As an online merchant, I can probably bring a perspective from the shop's side of things.
I'm basing my reply on how the shopping cart software that I use works. I can't know for sure how any other carts operate, but my guess is that they would be pretty similar.
A gift certificate is not the same thing as a coupon code. Presumably a lot of people have access to a coupon code, and the shopowner definitely would know about the code, right? The owner has to decide what the code should be, and what it's good for. So if a shop has issued a coupon code, their shopping cart definitely should be able to honor/redeem it. But gift certificates operate differently.
Now, I've never participated in the Shop Hop (as a shop, or as a hopper)... but I think that it's likely that (1) your gift certificate has some unique code on it and (2) any Shop-owner would not be able to guess that you'd like to use your certificate in *their* store (unless, of course, you tell them so).
Within the shopping cart software, I have to manually define each gift certificate, to set a code/number for it, and also the value/worth of it. Without this in place, a gift certificate can't be redeemed (at least, not online).
Let's see if I can explain this another way. Suppose it's gift certificate #1234 that you have. Probably the shops that participated in the hop have no idea that certificate #1234 exists. They only know that some people will win a certificate, but the shops won't know the numbers on them. So they *can't* set up their carts to accept the certificate. Or, supposing that the shops *did* know that certificate #1234 had been issued... well, if they all set up their carts to accept certificate #1234, then you would be able to redeem the certificate at ALL of the stores, not just one. (Clearly that's not the way it was intended, though as a shopper it sure would be fun! :wink: )
So, this is all my educated guess. It just makes me uncomfortable for a shop to get negative publicity when there's a very real possibility that there's simply a misunderstanding about how one can actually redeem the certificate. Especially since Feline Drive's owner is probably unaware of this post, and so won't be responding here.
That said... you should definitely e-mail her again. I believe in *always* giving the benefit of any doubt. You mentioned she's only an online shop? It's possible that she's away, out of town, on a vacation, ill, or that the e-mail didn't get delivered (delays can and do happen). If she does not have an autoresponder set for her mailbox, then you have no way of knowing whether she *did* receive your message or not. And if she is a very small shop, she may not have anyone else to take over for her if she's away.
Still... IMHO any online shop that wants to be taken seriously should always have FULL contact information clearly posted on their website: phone number, address, and e-mail.