5DIII pre-order thread

[lonelywhitelights]

Lots of online retailers in the UK now showing stock of body only and kits. But still the larger outlets appear to have none.

A friend of mine works for Jessops retail here in the UK and he personally took delivery of 5DIII bodies and 24-105 kits 2 days ago so they are in store ready for sale

[martydo]

just check with Crutchfield and they only got a few units yesterday and they are sold already.

[Freshprince08]

Lots of online retailers in the UK now showing stock of body only and kits. But still the larger outlets appear to have none.

A friend of mine works for Jessops retail here in the UK and he personally took delivery of 5DIII bodies and 24-105 kits 2 days ago so they are in store ready for sale

I've had my pre-order with Jessops (body only) for a week, called them this morning to confirm stock arrival which I was told would be tomorrow, they said it had come in early and mine would be dispatched today for delivery tomorrow! They also said they had enough stock to cover their pre-orders "and some spare".

My only problem is I won't be around tomorrow to receive delivery....

[jalbfb]

Where did you read that the shipment on March 21st will be large? I didn't see anything on the CR twitter about that. Is this confirmed info?

part of the conversation on twitter suggests that it's a large shipment (copy/pasted from the feed):

ctilley79 ‏ @ctilley79   
@canonrumorsguy I hope the got enough units to fulfill the order I made on 3/6.
5:26 PM - 20 Mar 12 via Twitter for iPhone · Details
 Canon Rumors ‏ @canonrumorsguy Close
@ctilley79 You're going to be happy I think

I got one of the automatically generated emails this morning. My order was placed on the 6th. So I called CS at B&H and was told by the CSR who handled my call that they were expecting an shipment to come in on the 23rd.  When I asked where I was in line he took a few moments of searching and said I wasn't in the first shipment going out, which I figured, but could not give me any indication where I was after that.  My guess is that he did not know the number of units in the second wave. So this begs the question of how often will they be re-stocked?  Weekly? Twice a week?

[Dylan777]

I bought 5D III yesterday March 20th at Crutchfield.com and got confirmation and UPS tracking number, which will arrive tomorrow March 22nd.

I posted this link yesterday around 1PM PCT, I believe CanonRumors members have cleared out their inventory in short period of time - both body only only and kit 24-105.
http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php/topic,4542.0.html

Anyway....little update with BH as of March 21th 6:15AM PCT, I called BH to cancel my pre-order. They still DO NOT know when 5D III will be ship 

Then...I asked the CS, do you have 5D III instock yet? The answer I got is "I do not have access to the inventory, I do not know"

Good Luck Guys


 

[Rod Guajardo]

Holy crap Amazon, May 3rd, say what?!  I placed my order March 2nd at 8am cst.

[isaaclkoval]

What store in Oregon has them in stock? I live in Portland. Thanks!

[kidnaper]

Holy crap Amazon, May 3rd, say what?!  I placed my order March 2nd at 8am cst.

To be slightly fair to Amazon "by May 3rd" is between tomorrow and then. They're just covering their butts by not saying you'll get it friday and then it being delayed a week. Or a month. I'd be willing to put money on you getting yours long before May 3rd. But if that date is accurate I'm going to be very, very disappointed as I had to sell my camera and use a whole lot of amazon credit to afford just the body.

[MARKOE PHOTOE]

Just spoke with BH repaid he said they expect to start shipping on the 22nd.   Also, the 24-70 lens is on its way to them from Japan which he said could take a while.   Encouraging to say the least. 

[kidnaper]

...They're just covering their butts...

Why should a company need to be vague or inaccurate to cover their butts? If the CS had all the information, they could just tell the customer the whole truth - all the relevant facts! The problem is that they do not have all the information they need so cannot tell the whole story because they do not know the whole story.

So we are back to big companies vs small once again.

Exactly. They're just following the book to move on and tell the next customer with the exact same question question the same unsatisfying answer. One way or another, we will all have our cameras, the impatient will just end up paying tax and the ones already stretching their budgets will have to wait.

[peederj]

Amazon has a promise date concept which in that case is May 3.  The rep was simply confirming that the expectation is they will meet the promise date. If they are not expecting to meet the promise date they cancel the order for you and let you know.

They aren't always out to getcha.

[TheAshleyJones]

GOT MINE!

Just picked the kit up from Jessops.

As the young people say:  OMG!

[se7en]

I just got off of the phone with B&H with the intent to cancel. At first the customer service rep stated they had no information but he would be willing to talk to a supervisor with the sales department to double check, this was after I expressed my frustration. He came back several minutes later and said something to the tune of 'they literally just updated the status on this product, you should expect your product(with two day shipping)to arrive by the end of this week or very early next week.' he also said that they got more kits than were pre-ordered so I will be on the first 'wave' despite my late preorder(03/12). I didn't ask about the bodies.

The beginning of next week is what I initially expected, so i'm happy....

[castillophotodesign]

i got tired of waiting for an update from B&H, so i just called the local camera store they had it in stocky, so I just went and picked it up. OMG is amazing! the noise level at 12800 ISO is great

[SomeGuyInNewJersey]

To be fair to the big guys such as B&H and Amazon they did have preorder links open within hours of the annoucement and because they were the only links available to thousands of rabid customers who have been waiting for the 5d3 they probably have an absolutely collossal amount of preorders. They may be big but they are not infinitely big and will definitely not get enough from Canon to cover the many thousands of preorders they have received.

Comparing them to a small store that provided no way for the masses to preorder but get a hundred cameras in and then have them for sale is a little unfair. The big guys order system is probably full of people preordered who have no intention of buying from them because they are either looking elsewhere so they can try and get their camera quicker and also people who just got on the list while they made up their minds if they even want the camera. Now actual release time is here a lot of preorders are going to be cancelled. Now when they are trying to get organized with how many 5d3s they are actually getting in and going to thier order list to ship they will have thousands of people up and cancelling their orders as they work, the list will be shrinking so fast people will be flying up the list. Probably people they could have told would be not getting in the 1st few shipments now will be.

I'm not saying Amazon and B&H are wonderful and have perfect customer service... Just that this is a not a normal situation.

The hysterical I'm never going to buy anything from them again comments based on this current situation is a bit over the top. Once this all over and we all have our new cameras then perhaps both B&H and us customers can start behaving normally in our roles again...