Gateway/necx canceling recent Visiontek 4400/4600 orders without notification, check your orders

[JahWren]

Maybe Feb 28th was the end of the fiscal quarter. It wouldn't be the first time that a company issued coupons and ran specials in order to beef up revenue for the current quarter so that they could make their numbers. Then, once the quarter was over, they killed any outstanding orders knowing full well that they were money losers and that increased revenue at the start of the quarter wouldn't buy them anything.

 

[rainypickles]

thanks for the heads-up TheMystic. i'm sure everyone is thankful though they might not show it =)

did anyone who called gateway to reinstate their order get a new order number? is it showing up on the website for you?

 

[iwearnosox]

<< Maybe Feb 28th was the end of the fiscal quarter. It wouldn't be the first time that a company issued coupons and ran specials in order to beef up revenue for the current quarter so that they could make their numbers. Then, once the quarter was over, they killed any outstanding orders knowing full well that they were money losers and that increased revenue at the start of the quarter wouldn't buy them anything. >>



Not really. Unless they're cooking their books enron style this type of revenue is unbookable- indeed, they didn't even hold onto funds for these orders, they merely processed authorizations against cards in an automated fashion. The authorizations dropped soon after because the items never shipped.

 

[Devistater]

<<

<< Please stop with the REASONING that they decided to cancel the orders because they can't get enough of these cards to fullfil.

Gateway is cancelling orders on other stuff too like the Toshiba M81 and the 1.6A and whatever else we don't know about yet.
Read the whole thread before concluding that they only cancel orders on the GF4. >>



Ok...I don't understand your point. Are you saying that we shouldn't think of this as them cancelling orders because of no stock but rather that they're cancelling them for a more sinister goal?

How about:

1. Cancelling orders because they are going to declare bankruptcy and don't want the liabilities
2. Cancelling orders because they don't want to honor the coupon
3. Cancelling orders because they just wanted our information to sell to spam mailers
4. Cancelling orders because they want to use the cards for their high end $3000 machines (which really aren't high end in the first place).
5. Cancelling orders because they want to make the world's largest multi-display computer using 1000 cards in parallel
6. Cancelling orders, but not cancelling credit card charges, hoping to give their Customer Service staff some exercise
7. Cancelling orders because they are working with ATI to undermine NVidia, after all you can get a Radeon 8500 for $200 or less
8. Cancelling orders because they're assholes. >>




I vote for all of the above

 

[mrbass]

I got my order reinstated by calling in. Thanks ceo dude.
Item Order Status Qty. Unit Pr. Price
VISIONTEK
XTASY GEFORCE4 TI4400 Product not available:item canceled 1 $284.95 $284.95

this still says this on the status website....I wonder if it'll ever reflect it being resubmitted? Anyone have a clue?

 

[gear02]

<<

<< Maybe Feb 28th was the end of the fiscal quarter. It wouldn't be the first time that a company issued coupons and ran specials in order to beef up revenue for the current quarter so that they could make their numbers. Then, once the quarter was over, they killed any outstanding orders knowing full well that they were money losers and that increased revenue at the start of the quarter wouldn't buy them anything. >>



Not really. Unless they're cooking their books enron style this type of revenue is unbookable- indeed, they didn't even hold onto funds for these orders, they merely processed authorizations against cards in an automated fashion. The authorizations dropped soon after because the items never shipped. >>



YES! I get to use my financial accounting skills. You can't book a sale as a sale until the title of the item exchanges hands. Usually this is when the item is shipped. Since nothing shipped (bastards), they can't book any of it as a sale. If they do try to book it, they'll get screwed.

 

[5150Joker]

Jeez..i think you guys need to give up already and move on. They're not going to ship anything to you even if you reinstate your order, it'll just sit there till they automatically cancel it again. If you can't afford the card right now, save up and get it in a month, that'll take less time than waiting on a card from gateway. I'm glad i cancelled my order with them and went with best buy last week, my card arrives tomorrow

 

[Celstar]

Marketing studies show that it is cheaper to retain existing customers than it is to attract new ones. It's just a big nightmare for gateway, but then again, they were already going down the shltter.

 

[DestruyaUR]

<< I found the 800 number on the Gateway Accessory store site, called the number, waited for about 15 minutes, and I finally got to talk to a customer service rep. I merely said that my order got canceled, and he looked it up. When he saw that it was the GF4, he said, "The GeForce 4, huh?" Then he began reverifying my shipping information and asked me if I still wanted the product because they could reinstate my order and give me the $50 voucher. I didn't even ask him about any of that. Obviously he's done this already today. I said that I did, and he put me back on hold for 3-4 minutes. After that, he came back on and told me that it was all set. He also said, "You do know that we're not expecting this in until March 15th, right?" I said that I didn't know, but that it was fine. Then I hung up. Simple and mostly painless. >>



I'm surprised no one picked up on that bolded line. Rather odd that the CSR guy seemed to know what he was talking about with the screwup and all - and then mentions an ETA date of the 15th? This is why I decided to reinstate my order...I wouldn't mind waiting until May for a price like this - nVidia card prices stay constant for LONG TIMES before dropping to levels like this.

 

[Wolfram]

Mine got canceled as well. I talked to them on Friday and they said ETA was 3/4 (Monday)! That came and went. Next thing I know, it's canceled! So why would you think that 3/15 is any more legit than the 3/4 date given just before they blew out all those orders? the CSR said they had 400 ti4400 on backorder at that time. He made the comment that "these are not large numbers" as they get them from suppliers that order them by the thousands.
Can you trust them with this date? I don't think so.

 

[PinkPanther]

i just decided, i rather have integrity than this sh!t, no matter how good their deals will ever be, Gayway will never get my business again, ever. It feels good not to be dragged around by some 300 pounds coporate dumb fat a$$ anymore

 

[Hurrikane]

<< did anyone who called gateway to reinstate their order get a new order number? is it showing up on the website for you? >>




It has not yet shown up for me. It's been about 8 hours. Maybe batch job overnight?

 

[DestruyaUR]

TheMystic: maybe you should look back at my gigantic post on page 2 or 3 about calling in to have your orders reinstated.

Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I didn't ask for thanks.

- Dest

 

[roboninja]

<< i just decided, i rather have integrity than this sh!t, no matter how good their deals will ever be, Gayway will never get my business again, ever. It feels good not to be dragged around by some 300 pounds coporate dumb fat a$$ anymore >>


Here, here, panther, I am with you. I refuse to allow them to make money pff of me after the way they have gone about this. I would rather pay an extra $50 and give the profits to a good site, like newegg or mwave. Doesn't sound like a great attitude for a hot deals forum, but BB and Gateway/necx will never see another dollar of profit from me.

 

[TheMystic]

DestruyaUR - your posts were completely unrelated. You were speculating that you could get an order reinstated based off their policies when that turned out to be impossible, I confirmed that when I initially called them. The reason that they're now allowing people who call (and only those who call) to have their orders reinstated is primarily because of the fast response that my contact over at VisionTek made. I don't know exactly what he said but first thing yesterday morning, a rep and supervisor was saying that there was NO way that the orders would be reinstated. After he "looked into" it, they changed their story and sincerely apologized for the inconvenience.

So again, your post was totally unrelated, you were just crossing your fingers hoping that you could legally bind them to their statements about Gateway cancellations. I however spoke with VisionTek directly and a higher ranking Gateway supervisor to clear this whole mess up and pass a fact along to the major news sites and viewers of this forum. Anyways, no use arguing over this stuff, in the end things turned out pretty damn well for all of us. We both gave good suggestions, let's leave it at that .

Ryan 'TheMystic' Lord
Invisible Dream - President / CEO, Programmer, Editor in Chief
http://www.invisibledream.com/

 

[SPOOOK]

YOU CAN BUY XTASY GEFORCE4 TI4400 FROM BUY.COM 275.95 FREE SHIPPING I JUST ORDERED ONE GOOD
PEOPLE BUY.COM GATEWAY=HAMBURGER

 

[jeffrey]

As a member of the "Wounded Monitor Childdren" I feel you guys pain. Hopefully NECX/Gateway will have to pay you for this.

 

[mrbass]

I'm just glad every is finally satisfied and happy. This thread is such a huge rollercoaster of emotions.
--We will all get our orders at those prices (when ..who knows sometime this year)
--90% or more of us will never order from Gateway/NECX again...learned our lesson.
--Good Chance Gateway is going to fold anyway and be bought by Dell.
--Our kids won't resort to killing on the street since we'll all have nice geforce4 cards for nice FPS games and our little ones will only simulate violence through video games.

 

[tsnyder]

I guess I don't feel so bad about paying full price for mine. I bid $399 +$.01 for shipping through Ubid.com about a week ago. I received my geforce4 Ti4600 at my front door monday. The VisionTek card isn't as good as the Gainward card in my estimation though... If I'm not mistaken UnitedMicro is selling Gainward Ti4600's and Ti4400's. I've done business with them before... good, but not as good as Newegg.

All I know is, if a deal seems too good to be true.... well you know the rest.

 

[AdOgG0911]

I wouldn't be surprised at all if those who get their order reinstated never get their card. I think that the theory about Gateway going out of business/not being able to get a line of credit with Visiontek makes a lot of sense. Many people (myself included) ordered the visiontek Gf3 Ti200 from Gateway and we all got our cards. Why? They had them in stock in their warehouse and did not have to get credit from a vendor to get cards to ship. I'm sure they were losing money on that deal too but they didnt cancel any of those orders.

At first it made sense that they just canceled all the orders on the Gf4s and the Pentium 1.6As to make more money off them. But once someone posted that they just lost a billion dollars or something like that it made more sense. If you sold graphics cards for Visiontek and someone from gateway called you asking for a couple million dollars worth of hardware would you just go ahead and ship it to them no problem? I dont think so. You are going to look at their financial situation and wonder what your boss would do to you if you shipped all that stuff to them and then they declared bankrupcy the next day.

If they had canceled my card order I think I would use the $50 coupon on something else and look for my graphics card elsewhere. If they go bankrupt that $50 coupon that could have been used on something will be worthless.

 

[wfay]

<< Many people (myself included) ordered the visiontek Gf3 Ti200 from Gateway and we all got our cards. Why? They had them in stock in their warehouse and did not have to get credit from a vendor to get cards to ship. >>


i did not receive my gf3 ti200 package from some random "gateway/necx warehouse" -- mine came directly from a distributor named Tech Data who is located within 1mile of my workplace. the UPS guy didn't even bring the package to their consolidation point -- he saw the drop off address at the pickup, drove a few blocks over, and i had my card within a couple hours of it leaving the Tech Data warehouse.

anyways, just trying to make sure that you guys understand that Gateway/NECX does not run their own warehouses for these "accessory" products. rather, they buy direct from distributors and have the items drop-shipped. i have had this same kind of thing happen with orders from Buy.com and Dell (both came from Ingram Micro warehouses). the only products they actually handle personally are their computers -- everything else comes from an upstream distributor.

--w

 

[RaptorNV]

Just called to have my order re-instated. Didn't have to say much after "I'm calling about my cancelled GF4 order....". The guy put in a new order, applied the $50 coupon, AND gave me overnight delivery unasked! Where the hell is all this good attitude coming from? For a second I thought I had another company on the line .

Even more intriguing, he said they expect the cards within 1- 2 weeks now. Not that I'm holding my breath based on that, but it would be great, as it is the last component I'm waiting for to build my new baby!

 

[Euripides]

I called right before they closed down last night and got my order for the 4400 reinstated. It is now showing up on website when I log in with the discount applied. The CSR was friendly and did it in less than 5 minutes.

 

[KenAF]

I got my order reinstated this morning...too bad I didn't know to do it earlier. From the front of the line...to the end of the line.

 

[tigerbait]

Just called and got my order for the Ti4400 reinstated. Hopefully we get it before the GeForce 5 comes out