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

Associate
Joined
18 Dec 2020
Posts
72
Given the current state, would anyone here change their buying strategy next time round?
It's unlikely I'll get caught out like this again. I don't do early adoption, this was unique case I expected to wait a few months and it wouldn't have been much of an issue. The only gaming I do is sim racing, I wanted to upgrade my VR setup and was fine waiting a few months given the circumstances.

I don't buy the latest and greatest cards, I'm more than capable of going with out. If I'd known going in how long the wait was going to be I would have just made do with my old setup. Now I have the HP G2 headset and a card that can't handle it.

Next time new products come out I'm going to wait until there's proper supply before I even consider buying one.

I've been left very bitter towards Nvidia though. I've been tempted by the 3090 a few times but I couldn't get over the fact that would be rewarding Nvidia for not being able to provide the service they said they would. If they were honest up front I could have made a better decision with regards buying the new VR headset and I wouldn't be in this position.

Next time, I won't be going for Nvidias new products, I'm going to wait.
 
Associate
Joined
30 Oct 2020
Posts
13
@Gibbo Hi,
Have these shipment arrived or nor yet?

Incoming shipment:

5x Asus 3080 TUF OC
2x Gigabyte 3080 Gaming OC
1x Gigabyte 3080 Master
1x Gigabyte 3080 Extreme
5x Palit 3080 Gaming Pro
4x Palit 3080 Gaming Pro OC

Thank you.
 
Associate
Joined
22 Apr 2014
Posts
16
Officially received the email stating that the refund has been sent out from OCUK for the Gaming X Trio.

Needless to say im disappointed that OCUK have essentially shrugged their shoulders towards customers on this issue rather than offer any kind of alternative for those affected. Honestly dont think im going to shop with them again and will instead look for a competitor who has handled this situation better.

Whilst i fully accept its not all OCUKs fault, the leading causes being MSI and Nvidia, now was the time to set a better precedent given that other vendors will almost certainly follow suit down the line, and theyve honestly done the bare minimum for those of us left in the queue.

Alternatives shouldve included:
1) Fee to upgrade to the Gaming Z Trio whilst maintaining queue position.
2) Utilising any acquired Suprim stock to fulfill remaing Gaming X Trio queue (as they have done in the past)
3) Offering to transition people to other queues, even if its only to the back of them.

Only if all of those options were rejected should refunds have been processed. Weve been waiting 7 months for less than nothing, because not only have we not received the item weve ordered, weve also been out of pocket the entire time, left with total uncertainty of when wed have our orders fulfilled. I sincerely hope that no other pre-order lines have to go through this disappointment those of us in the Gaming X one have experienced.
 
Associate
Joined
9 Dec 2020
Posts
37
Officially received the email stating that the refund has been sent out from OCUK for the Gaming X Trio.

Needless to say im disappointed that OCUK have essentially shrugged their shoulders towards customers on this issue rather than offer any kind of alternative for those affected. Honestly dont think im going to shop with them again and will instead look for a competitor who has handled this situation better.

Whilst i fully accept its not all OCUKs fault, the leading causes being MSI and Nvidia, now was the time to set a better precedent given that other vendors will almost certainly follow suit down the line, and theyve honestly done the bare minimum for those of us left in the queue.

Alternatives shouldve included:
1) Fee to upgrade to the Gaming Z Trio whilst maintaining queue position.
2) Utilising any acquired Suprim stock to fulfill remaing Gaming X Trio queue (as they have done in the past)
3) Offering to transition people to other queues, even if its only to the back of them.

Only if all of those options were rejected should refunds have been processed. Weve been waiting 7 months for less than nothing, because not only have we not received the item weve ordered, weve also been out of pocket the entire time, left with total uncertainty of when wed have our orders fulfilled. I sincerely hope that no other pre-order lines have to go through this disappointment those of us in the Gaming X one have experienced.

Good alternatives. @ScottiB , @Gibbo Why did you not go for "Fee to upgrade to the Gaming Z Trio whilst maintaining queue position"? That would keep customers happy (or happier) and your order book full. What can be wrong with that?
 
Associate
Joined
23 Jan 2010
Posts
13
It is now 6 months since I placed my order on 07/10/2020 for Asus GeForce RTX 3080 TUF Gaming OC 10GB and my queue position went down from 970 to 73 :) I wonder how much longer I will have to wait for that card..


you doing better than me ordered 17/9 started at 566 and still at 106, that what i get for not going for the oc model
 
Caporegime
Joined
5 Sep 2010
Posts
25,572
Good alternatives. @ScottiB , @Gibbo Why did you not go for "Fee to upgrade to the Gaming Z Trio whilst maintaining queue position"? That would keep customers happy (or happier) and your order book full. What can be wrong with that?

They've already covered that.

I will post what Scotti quoted:

we are genuinely looking at options but we keep coming back to the same issues;
- man power
- lack of stock
- poor automated systems

Thousands of affected customers, no stock of alternative cards, not enough manpower to have a discussion with every customer. :(

Also the problem is any 3080 we now buy in, even if we get a low-end model, our cost vastly exceeds £749 inc. vat, now of course if we had stock to upgrade you too, even if it lost us money, we would still do that, within reason which is why a lot of 3080 Gaming X pre-orders were upgraded to the Suprim X model.

Problem is now the supply is even thinner and the prices have all increased by around at least £200 since launch and as the launch prices was supported from day one, means the actual price increase is more like £250ish, some are over £300 more expensive.

But that aside we simply don't have product to offer free or even paid for upgrades too and I refer to Scott's quoted post above.
 
Associate
Joined
22 Oct 2020
Posts
221
So I am just waiting for the news that Gigabyte are canceling all pre-orders off the Aorus 3080 Xtreme to concentrate on the Aorus 3080 ti. Im still 19th in queue for the Aorus 3080 Xtreme.

The 3080 and 3080ti are different wafers I think. One should not really effect the other.

I would have thought you are OK with the extreme anyway. It will be the Eagle that goes if any. I think the main issue MSI and all the AIB's have is the quality of the silicon. They are getting very high yields. They make more money on high end cards v low end so they won't waste quality silicon making an Eagle they will make the extreme instead.
 
Associate
Joined
9 Mar 2021
Posts
40
The 3080 and 3080ti are different wafers I think. One should not really effect the other.

I would have thought you are OK with the extreme anyway. It will be the Eagle that goes if any. I think the main issue MSI and all the AIB's have is the quality of the silicon. They are getting very high yields. They make more money on high end cards v low end so they won't waste quality silicon making an Eagle they will make the extreme instead.

From the looks of some tear downs they were using TI chips for 3090s (Striking the TI chipset code and reprinting the 3090 code) so could well be them doing the same with the 3080 chips
 
Associate
Joined
9 Jan 2021
Posts
12
The 3080 and 3080ti are different wafers I think. One should not really effect the other.
I suppose we just have to wait and see how Nvidia spin it. If the 3080ti uses a cut down version of the same chip as a 3090 does that mean less 3090's will be made? Or if the 3080ti will make them more money than a 3080, with there being a global silicon shortage, will the wafers for 3080ti's be prioritised over 3080 production? On launch day they launched 2 models in the 3000 lineup and still 7 months on the supply cant meet the demand, will be interesting to see how they justify the timing of launching a 5th.
 
Associate
Joined
17 Apr 2021
Posts
13
They've already covered that.

Yes they've already covered it, but this isn't set in stone. This is their current decision based on all the factors, including...to be blunt...what OcUK think they can get away with. They are perfectly able to change their minds and offer the Z cards to those of us who waited 7 months before they go live on the site. It's a balance of money and customer anger and a hundred other factors.

I'm sure that the hope is customers like me will quietly submit to this, well, absolutely extraordinary outrage. We'll blame MSI, rather than the company we made the order with. Nod solemnly and walk off into the night. But it may also mean years of bad word-of-mouth and angry forum comments and wasted customer service time.
 
Associate
Joined
8 Aug 2013
Posts
67
Bet OCUk is ****** as **** about his. what a pointless exercise this has all been for them with margins so thin.

Still have a 3080 pre order but I can just let it burn down now as I managed to pick up a 6800xt recently, for £900+ mind.

Feel sorry for all those still on day one pre orders seeing stacks of gpu boxes posted on FB every day from miners.
 
OcUK Systems
OcUK Staff
Joined
16 Nov 2007
Posts
2,986
Location
Stoke-on-Trent
Yes they've already covered it, but this isn't set in stone. This is their current decision based on all the factors, including...to be blunt...what OcUK think they can get away with. They are perfectly able to change their minds and offer the Z cards to those of us who waited 7 months before they go live on the site. It's a balance of money and customer anger and a hundred other factors.

I'm sure that the hope is customers like me will quietly submit to this, well, absolutely extraordinary outrage. We'll blame MSI, rather than the company we made the order with. Nod solemnly and walk off into the night. But it may also mean years of bad word-of-mouth and angry forum comments and wasted customer service time.
The situation is very complex which is why...
we keep coming back to the same issues;
- man power
- lack of stock
- poor automated systems

Thousands of affected customers, no stock of alternative cards, not enough manpower to have a discussion with every customer. :(
We'd need to have a conversation with every affected customer and depending on original payment method it's not even possible for us to charge every customer a cost difference. Cancelling the orders is not an ideal solution for us either since we have to process them manually and due to the age of the payments involved there's going to be more transaction charges for us to pay.

Besides all of this, we are talking about a manufacturer who is unlikely to deliver more than handful of units per month so, even after the immense amount of work involved in doing what you think we should do, we would likely just be delaying the inevitable for most customers.. Either way we lose money so it's not really a financial discussion, it's purely what's realistic for us to manage.
 
Associate
Joined
17 Apr 2021
Posts
13
We'd need to have a conversation with every affected customer

But you're arguing against your own case. Make the refunds, fine. Then, when the same-in-all-but-name Z cards start to trickle in, let those from the old queue have first shout. New price, no discount. Just a chance to get in before the scalpers. To have some tiny grain of positive in a handful of ashes.

A handful of units a month means a handful of customers you need to contact to give first refusal. I'd say it's the least you can do, but apparently the least you can do is a sorry email, a refund and a shrug.
 
OcUK Systems
OcUK Staff
Joined
16 Nov 2007
Posts
2,986
Location
Stoke-on-Trent
But you're arguing against your own case. Make the refunds, fine. Then, when the same-in-all-but-name Z cards start to trickle in, let those from the old queue have first shout. New price, no discount. Just a chance to get in before the scalpers. To have some tiny grain of positive in a handful of ashes.

A handful of units a month means a handful of customers you need to contact to give first refusal. I'd say it's the least you can do, but apparently the least you can do is a sorry email, a refund and a shrug.
That's not how this works, we need to do something about all of the affected customers now. It's not just the few who are on our forums who are aware of the situation that we need to think about, there are hundreds who need to be informed and that will trigger hundreds of conversations that we don't have the man power to realistically manage. You've only just joined this forum so I'll forgive you for not understanding our company and how the last thing we want to do is ignore or fail our community, but we've explored the options and come to the only workable solution.

What we do will set a precedent and we have to assume that other brands will follow suit and within a few weeks the problem grows from a few hundred customers to a few thousand.
 
Associate
Joined
17 Apr 2021
Posts
13
Yes I've only just joined, but I've been here since day one. Like I said in my first comment, I sympathise. But sympathy only goes so far. I work customer service as well. I can't imagine the world-ending storm I would create if I cancelled and refunded an order after a 7 month wait. I'd never work again, regardless of the behind-the-scenes reasoning I provided.

You're already going to have the pain of non-forum customers descending on your contact desk/system, so why not give yourselves ammunition to calm those customers down? "The cards are like gold dust. We'll let you have first shout. You stuck with us for months and we love you etc. It's a terrible situation, but you can see we're doing our best with what we have."
 
Associate
Joined
3 Mar 2015
Posts
385
Location
Wokingham
A silver lining would be to hear that OCUK have updated the Web ordering system and processes so this can never happen again.

- When an item is in basket, it is held and guaranteed for 15 minutes only.
- Dispatch order based on when item went in basket, not when payment was confirmed.
- 10% stock held for 3 weeks from dispatch to cover dead-on-arrival/return-and-repairs.

And, as a bonus; VIP purchase system (first hour?) based on prior purchase history.
 
Associate
Joined
9 Dec 2020
Posts
37
Yes I've only just joined, but I've been here since day one. Like I said in my first comment, I sympathise. But sympathy only goes so far. I work customer service as well. I can't imagine the world-ending storm I would create if I cancelled and refunded an order after a 7 month wait. I'd never work again, regardless of the behind-the-scenes reasoning I provided.

You're already going to have the pain of non-forum customers descending on your contact desk/system, so why not give yourselves ammunition to calm those customers down? "The cards are like gold dust. We'll let you have first shout. You stuck with us for months and we love you etc. It's a terrible situation, but you can see we're doing our best with what we have."
Surely its hard to disagree with this rational @ScottiB The **** storm is coming your way anyway, so why not take the edge off it by keeping the queue. The decent thing to do would be to give people their money back, keep the queue and charge for the product, at whatever the price is, when it is shipped.
 
Associate
Joined
11 Nov 2020
Posts
57
Surely its hard to disagree with this rational @ScottiB The **** storm is coming your way anyway, so why not take the edge off it by keeping the queue. The decent thing to do would be to give people their money back, keep the queue and charge for the product, at whatever the price is, when it is shipped.
I think you’re missing the point that they also don’t want hundreds of people in a queue, why on earth would they keep the queue when realistically it makes their jobs easier not to have one? They’ve been black and white from day one about orders and cancellations.
I’m going to be next, ordered an eagle, no official word but some sites don’t even list it anymore.
They don’t have to do jack **** to help people, but they have. They could have cancelled every order day 1, but they didn’t. They’ve done absolutely everything in their power to get people cards. Tried every avenue, if the next steps aren’t realistically possible, you can’t complain at them for not doing it. That’s ludicrous.
 
OcUK Systems
OcUK Staff
Joined
16 Nov 2007
Posts
2,986
Location
Stoke-on-Trent
Yes I've only just joined, but I've been here since day one. Like I said in my first comment, I sympathise. But sympathy only goes so far. I work customer service as well. I can't imagine the world-ending storm I would create if I cancelled and refunded an order after a 7 month wait. I'd never work again, regardless of the behind-the-scenes reasoning I provided.

You're already going to have the pain of non-forum customers descending on your contact desk/system, so why not give yourselves ammunition to calm those customers down? "The cards are like gold dust. We'll let you have first shout. You stuck with us for months and we love you etc. It's a terrible situation, but you can see we're doing our best with what we have."
You talk as though you think we haven't discussed options. The simple truth is that we are unable to put anything in place right now because of two over-riding issues.
1) we don't know how many cards we are going to receive
2) we don't know how expensive they are going to be.
Supply and pricing have been erratic to say the least most customers won't sit quietly waiting for an outcome. At the current rate of supply we could be looking another year before we're even close to clearing the queues and prices have been rising by more than 5% per month.

A silver lining would be to hear that OCUK have updated the Web ordering system and processes so this can never happen again.
coming soon, but you'd know that I've made no secret of that if you'd read my post history

Surely its hard to disagree with this rational @ScottiB The **** storm is coming your way anyway, so why not take the edge off it by keeping the queue. The decent thing to do would be to give people their money back, keep the queue and charge for the product, at whatever the price is, when it is shipped.
If things were as simple as he seems to think then his rational is perfectly sound, but you're ignoring the complexity and manual workload needed to manage such an action. We can't just keep treading water hoping for an improvement to the situation. If anything things have gotten worse over the last few months and there comes a time where we all have to say, enough is enough.
 
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