Most of my colleagues rate wines according to a points system. The trouble is, they use different systems – some are fond of a 20 point system, while others use the 100-point system (although, in truth, you’ll rarely see wines scored below 12/20 or 80/100). Very few writers explain how they arrive at their scores, and even those that do differ on the criteria they use.
I want to make life (well, wine ratings anyway) a bit simpler. I will only ever write up a wine on this site if, hand on heart, I think it’s worth recommending. Furthermore, I want to make my rating system easy to understand, so if you see this icon 
it means that I think it’s worth splashing out on a glass of this wine, while if you see this icon 
I recommend you buy a bottle. I reserve this symbol 
for the very best wines, those where I’d be tempted to run out and buy a whole case.