*** NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 3080 SERIES STOCK SITUATION - NO COMPETITOR DISCUSSION ***

[PrincessFrosty]

Good post.
A sensible analysis among the childish hysteria shown by a lot on here. Yes, it sucks to have to wait, but at least OC give us the chance to join a quue and get on with our lives, rather than the daily grind of stock checkers, part alerts and telegram groups.
I know which I prefer.

Right, like with my job analogy it's like, we're queuing here because it allows us a guaranteed spot which means we'll get our cards as early as possible given the circumstances. If there was somewhere better that magically had pre-orders that were faster and had super accurate knowledge of precise ETAs weeks and months ahead, people would go and shop there, but that doesn't exist. So people use the best they can get and then complain the best they can get isn't good enough, lol.

@PrincessFrosty Then they can pre-auth and collect payment as soon as you approach 100 pos in queue - similar approach have a few other businesses from game industry where they collected just now payment for my pre-order of Cyberpunk 2077 Collectors EEditior which I placed almost TWO YEARS AGO. At least no one was lying that you may get your game before the end of the year because no one new about delays and mismanagement at CDPR.

Now they're dealing with processing payment, figuring out queue position and cancelling eventually orders that aren't happy with situation.

As far as know none of this is automated. Especially cancellation before despatch. They're using Google form.
At least cancellation is pain free, next day after opening they've cancelled my order.

Then maybe they could, that's kinda speculative without knowing details about hardware supply chains and how preordering stock works and all that. With games prices don't change but with pre-ordering hardware which has supply problems the asking prices can rise especially if you order out into the future (even competitors have specifically said this in their own 3080 Q&A), a problem games don't have at a fixed price and unlimited availability and the ability to price and therefore preorder way into the future. Bottom line is no one else is doing this better in the hardware space right now. If there was another business doing this to compare to which was doing it better then yea I'd agree and we'd all have made our pre-orders there instead, but there isn't (to my knowledge) so again its people complaining about the best they can get. It's why its so funny that people use OCUK for their pre-order to get the benefits that other places aren't offering, but leaving behind the threat that after using the best service they can get, they're going to shop elsewhere in future.

 

[Riddler101]

Ty chizzy

 

[Riddler101]

Good post.
A sensible analysis among the childish hysteria shown by a lot on here. Yes, it sucks to have to wait, but at least OC give us the chance to join a quue and get on with our lives, rather than the daily grind of stock checkers, part alerts and telegram groups.
I know which I prefer.

 

[spluff]

What’s the point in that post riddler ???

 

[Riddler101]

What's that saying bunch of snow flakes it's not overclockers fault they just sell the cards we are all angry my gtx 1080ti broke 2 week's before the launch I waited hoping I would snag one of the new cards now I'm rewatching TV box sets as I have no laptop and iv seen people getting mad about them taking money for preorders in my mind that's just smart business there shop is closed due to covid so the income from the preorders will help i mean it's not even hard to cancel and get money bk

 

[Riddler101]

What’s the point in that post riddler ???

The point is there are a lot of people *******

 

[Parsley]

Snip snip

What would satisfy me would be some communication similar to what we usually get when things are "going well". The staff can be very verbose and they are happy to be conversational, but the impression I have been left with from recent events is that it is only when they can drive up hype with eye rolling marketing nonsense and don't have to deal with so many annoyed customers. Fair weather communication I guess.

Contrary to what you're saying I'm not a particularly hyperbolic person. My world isn't going to end because I don't have my new shiny and I'm happy enough waiting, my feelings aren't hurt. I just don't like how the company, in my opinion, is going about doing business. So I will take that business elsewhere. Do I feel that the majority of the staff are passionate PC enthusiasts? Many of them will be, perhaps most of them. But are those passionate people the ones making the decisions here? Is passion leading the decision making or is it the bottom line? If it was passion surely they'd be sharing their thoughts with us, if it's all about the business then talking to us would be wise as well, wouldn't it? I have no idea, I just know I can see tumble weeds rolling across the room . As to the "cretinous customers" remark, I think anyone who has ever worked in retail will have had that thought about their customers at some point. But yeah I'm being a bit hyperbolic there I guess. They probably don't give it enough of a thought to think that .

I have to disagree with you about them not relying on the mod team though. The mods are the ones who have actually communicated and dealt with us, pretty even handedly as well. I don't consider occasional, badly typed out stock updates to be enough, no. (Which I don't believe are entirely honest as it seems they're taking stock for their pre-builds... which is fine I guess, but I feel it's another anti-consumer practice when they have customer money, but their customers are still waiting, this is also conjecture, just a thought). At the very least they have caused the mods a huge amount of unnecessary hassle.

If you feel what they've implemented is enough, that's fine. I still don't consider it verbose enough and the queue system took a very long time. Even if they can't give us useful information they could still post, but they've actively disappeared and stopped posting in here. Sometimes people only want to be heard and then they're happier. They're not listening to us directly though, all we have to go on is that the mods are passing on concerns.

 

[spluff]

I mean repeating what someone else said without adding anything..,,

 

[Riddler101]

Good luck but this is the best way of getting a card in my opinion unless you Wana pay a scalper on eBay pre-order card relax wait for update almost every other site in UK the same bots snatch them up instantly

 

[Parsley]

Good luck but this is the best way of getting a card in my opinion unless you Wana pay a scalper on eBay pre-order card relax wait for update

I agree, the pre-order is staying where it is. I'll just be looking elsewhere for future purchases.

 

[Riddler101]

Same if I see one and I'm quick enough I'll grab one but my preorder not going anywhere until I have confirmation of purchase

 

[Mr Oblong]

https://youtu.be/F9STIStpTs8

They still dishing boxes of these cards out to reviewers...

Hype hype hype, drive the price above MSRP...

 

[Mr Oblong]

I agree, the pre-order is staying where it is. I'll just be looking elsewhere for future purchases.

That's a sound plan. Who knows what comes up?

 

[AmiBorg]

Same if I see one and I'm quick enough I'll grab one but my preorder not going anywhere until I have confirmation of purchase

I'd wait until confirmation of shipping. Heard of people managing to "purchase" only to have their order cancelled.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

Also snip

Problem I think is that they're at the recieving end of an insane amount of orders and consumers probably all asking the same questions. I was sadly in hospital due to an emergency operation I needed and was recovering on the ward when I ordered my card on the 17th, and thought it might arrive before I get home so ordered it to a friends house just in case, then got home 2 weeks later and used a normally quick webnote request to change delivery back to my home address, and it took 3 days to be processed. So they're obviously dealing with insane demand, some forum users going as far to say as they're going to call up every day until they get an update. So I'm sure right now doing CS at the receiving end of all this is a nightmare. I've not personally phoned them but I wouldn't be too surprised if the person on the other end was short with me if I was demanding stock updates and things they do not have information for.

So you'd be happy with the boss sharing his thoughts with us? But hasn't he done that? He's posted numerous times in both the launch thread talking about likely delays even prior to pre-orders opening, that supply would be bad until probably Nov, that people can't expect their cards any time soon. There's constant stock updates in the update thread. He's told us that he basically sympathises with our position, that they're working as hard as they can to get information from partners, and give daily updates on the forums, etc. What is the golden thing that he could say that would turn your point of view from basically "this is awful I'm not coming back here again", to "that's perfectly acceptable I'll just wait it out".

The prebuild stuff, the keeping of money for preorders and much of that other stuff honestly at this stage is just conjecture. They admitted to making a few prebuilds if the ordered were made early in which case those people are in the same queue as the people who ordered cards. As evidenced by the fact that a bunch of people giving 1 star reviews on trust pilot were raging out about their building being 2-3 weeks old and still no news.

I don't think what they've done is enough strictly speaking, and I've been vocal in both directions, being what I believe to be evenly handed with complaints for and against them, for example I was critical of why queue updates came so late and something we both agree on. But I'm fairly emotionally stable in the sense that what matters to me are the facts of the situation, and less so about things like the lack of info. We know it'll be a good few month wait for most of us to get these cards, that f'in sucks and is the primary cause of the rage, I just don't see the other stuff as very important. Like OK we didn't get queue information for about 2-3 weeks, but in the grand picture of having to wait like 3 months does that really matter? Not really, nothing changes at all.

Just for the record I'm just as frustrated about the wait as everyone else, I just have an iron will to remain level headed about all of this. I think people are letting their frustration about the wait temper their view on OCUK and that's kinda unfair IMO. You'd think they're soulless evil people by some of the comments here, they're just people like the rest of us who have to go to work and deal with ****** people and do the best they can. I think they've been seriously charitable about the accusations made here, I'm surprised more people haven't been bounced for some of the speculation about business practices going on.

 

[Zeed]

 

[ScottMc]

I tell you what I think I'm in more than 800 places on tuf oc
So you know why they can't supply this cards to us ? Because they are cheap and they waiting to announce 3080 20Gb and after that they push only this cards and price probably will be 1000£ 1150£ or more but below 24gb price
This what ocuk do is rubbish why they take money dont have clear information about stock and they send 10 cards per week ? What a shop order 10 cards from retailers? They want more money from our pockets

Send them a webnote ask which cards have the lowest queues and maybe pick one if you want a 3080 soonish, 800 for an Asus will be next year I think.

 

[Slixy]

Who needs the front of their case anyway...

 

[Dynarush333]

snip

Give up the masquerade Gibbo we know it's you. You've done an OK amount of defending OCUKs lack of transparency on cards people have paid in FULL for Just remember it's always easier in life to cry in your Ferrari than it is to cry on a 3080 which is not for a prebuilt A special relationship with Nvidia I hear you say? More like simping Nvidia

 

[Parsley]

Quantum Snip

The insane amount of orders is a problem of their own making .

There isn't any golden thing that could be said, that bridge may already be burnt for me, not that anyone really cares! But I guess I'd want to see a change in customer interaction, an apology for a lack of communication would be a start though and I really dislike the taking of money before dispatch, I always have. No one else does it that I'm aware of (not amongst the PC component businesses anyway). Also marketing at us like adults would be nice, though the fact they do things as they do must mean it works. I think I'm just a miserable get.

Ultimately, the card itself isn't really the problem for me and if anything the delay has done me a favour as now I can consider AMDs offerings (lets see how supply of them goes...). It's just the handling of the entire mess that has me disappointed. It could have been much better and more willing should have been shown. Also, as one last factor to it, the "special relationship" with the AIB's / suppliers that they said they have doesn't seem so special anymore. Things like that bring questions to mind. You can go down a line of conjecture with that that just ends up with "well what else do they twist the truth about?" (or lie, if you want to be blunt). It's conjecture that I feel could have been mostly avoided as well.

It's hardly life changing stuff though so yeah people getting so worked up is wasted energy. But I understand the anger, more communication would alleviate it, people like feeling like they matter.

As for charitability... the sceptical side of me thinks they aren't sending people on permanent holidays because they'd potentially lose even more customers... it would look really bad. The reasonable side of me... they think it will just blow over and any custom actually lost will be insignificant. They're probably right, outrage never lasts long anymore, all they need is to stock the next shiny!