Calm down, people.

It is AT&T's employees fault as they were the ones that allowed the ordering to start ahead of time. It is also the company's fault that they can't track their own inventory. My shipping date has changed 6 times from launch date to backordered and everywhere in between. That rests solely on AT&T. It is also each employees fault if they speak to me rudely or act condicending towards me. Also, telling everyone that the phone isn't that great so don't be in a rush doesn't change the fact that people want it, bent over backwards to pre-order it and did so with the expectation that they would get it on launch day. At this point, AT&T would gain alot of ground by simply addressing these issues instead of just sitting back and watching the chaos.

It was the fault of the people behind AT&T's site, yes, but you'll never speak to those people. Yelling at the CSRs who answer your calls or respond to forum posts is misdirected anger. They can't do anything about it except tell you what you already know.

Also, it's not AT&T's inventory - it's Apple's. All that AT&T (and every other carrier) has is an allotment from the "pool" of product. When you have orders coming in from multiple places to the same source, wires are going to get crossed. AT&T didn't expect that Apple's site would be screwed up, and the AT&T customers who were going to order from Apple had no choice but to order from AT&T. The orders that came in later were seeing insane ship times due to this reason, and all the cancellations only exacerbated the ordeal.

I'm not claiming that it's not great - if I felt that way, I wouldn't have ordered one myself. I am saying that it's not worth getting so worked up over, and the idea that anyone "bent over backwards" just to order the thing is absolutely insane.

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@chameleon4242 wrote:

It is AT&T's employees fault as they were the ones that allowed the ordering to start ahead of time. It is also the company's fault that they can't track their own inventory.

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Yup, it's all AT&T's fault.

To my mind, it was kinda smart that the site opened a bit early (15 minutes is the best guess).  Those who got in early were queued, so not all us got in the exact minute it went live.  That allowed the order system to ramp up, rather than just be instantly overwhelmed. 

According to the news reports. AT&T's site held up the best under the order onslaught.  The Apple site was pretty much unusable for the most of the first two hours.  Sprint and T-Mobile were much worse.

As far as "managing the inventory," it's a dynamic process that operates across multiple systems.  A lot of the customer anxiety is self-inflicted.  Imagine if someone ordered around midnight PT, confirmed that his credit card was authorized for the full purchase amount sometime midday on Friday and then checked his order status on Monday.  What would that person have missed/avoided?  Only angst as AT&T trued up its ship dates.

It's important to remember that hundreds of thousands of customers were able to place an order without incident.  This site caters to the exceptions, not the rule.

It's not insane. I get up at 4am for work. I stayed up past 1am to order. I am sure I am not alone. Also, AT&T was given an allotment, and they knew what that number was. Either I was in that number or not. I should not have my shipping date changed from launch day to backorder to 3 weeks after launch to 1 week after launch and so on. People in line in front of me would account for me moving up in line, but there is no reason I should be gettingpushed back, aside from poor planning or orderkeeing on their part. Also, I never said, nor have I seen anyone here say they were yelling at employees. These employees are, however, representing this company and this kind of sales rush should have been expected. I have been polite and courtious to every employee I have talked to, and have been talked down to several times in return. It has not been every employee, but that doesn't excuse the ones that have acted this way. 

I stayed up late, too, but I would hardly call it "bending over backwards." I made a choice to do it and didn't go to any great pains in the process. I've certainly lost a few hours' sleep for worse reasons.

AT&T did know what their allotment was - or rather, should have been, had Apple not dropped the ball. If it had gone smoothly, roughly the same number of people would have ordered across Apple and the carriers - as it happened, people were unable to order from Apple and flocked to carrier sites, thus resulting in them getting the bulk of the orders and Apple receiving relatively few, at least initially. When people began seeing the artificially inflated ship times, they cancelled their carrier orders and ordered with Apple, hoping to get it sooner, and now the carriers have to deal with that mess. 

I'm not saying you were rude to AT&T - it's just a general statement that applies to customer service everywhere. Something like this happens, people are outraged, and they take it out on those who weren't responsible and are powerless to rectify the situation.

Bottom line: Everyone's actual ship time will become apparent in the next few days.

You're very welcome, iPhonejunkie.  It's been a royal mess and I wish Apple and the carriers could release an official statement on the situation to put the troubled minds at ease, but on the other hand, I understand why they're being silent right now: no one is 100% certain what the situation will be for each customer until everything is sorted out over the coming week, and to make a statement before that happens will only add fuel to the fire, which isn't doing anyone any favors. 

Believe me, I'm just excited about the new iPhone as anyone, but all we can do right now is relax and hope for smooth sailing from here on out. Besides, once it's in your hands, none of this will matter.