O2 has confirmed Apple iPhone 3G shortages and that stores will only have a few dozen in stock, now if this is the case we can see many customers being pretty peed off, me included.

Yes it has been revealed that stores will only have a few dozen handsets in store as its revealed site was smashed and crashed by 13,000 orders per second, now that is astonishing. The O2 website took a staggering 13,000 orders per second when the iPhone 3G went live for pre-order, the operator does not have much stock as they would like to have.

This is a huge set back and major disappointment to customers and O2 has been under much criticism for both press and customers for technical difficulties that were experienced as the iPhone 3G area of the site went live, it was later revealed that the difficulties were described by O2 as “unprecedented demand”.

Stephen Shurrock, the sales director at O2 responded by saying “At O2 we had said that we would keep all those who had registered their interest in Apple iPhone 3G up to date with the launch developments. We also used the registration data to keep Apple up to date on the phenomenal interest and to support our orders for the phones with them. We have been working continuously with them to get as much stock for the UK as possible. Unfortunately, they have only been able to supply a small proportion of the number of phones we asked for, because they are launching simultaneously in 22 countries. We are confident that over time we will start to get sufficient volume to meet demand, but it is likely that stock will be in very short supply for some weeks to come.”

“We opened the online shop yesterday [and] had over 200,000 people expressing interest and only a very small proportion of that number of devices available. Faced with this dilemma, we made it clear in the communications that to be fair to all customers the orders would be managed on a first come first served basis, as stock was limited. The response was so great that the online store completely sold out of iPhones within just a few hours… The massive simultaneous crush, partly created by our open and honest communications approach with the registered community, exceeded even our worst case assumptions. Demand was at 13,000 orders per second. Frankly, we have to admit we just weren’t prepared for this unprecedented level of demand. No website is.”

“The next opportunity to get an iPhone will be when the device goes on sale in the high street on 11th July. O2 and Carphone Warehouse stores will be taking new orders and upgrade orders. Apple stores will only be taking new customer contracts. Most shops will open at 8.02am but some stores, particularly in shopping centres where early access is not possible, will open as usual from 9am. The approach on Friday will also be on a first come first served basis. The amount of devices will vary depending on the store but will be on average a few dozen iPhones in each O2 or CPW store. We are expecting early queues and, like the online site, are expecting to sell out very quickly. Apple stores will have more devices. We will be receiving deliveries from Apple roughly once a week for the foreseeable future but it will be several weeks before stocks increase. We will release stock updates for the online shop as they become available.”

This is very bad for you the customer and indeed myself, especially if we arrive at an O2 store a little late in the day, come on only a few dozen iPhone 3G handsets in store is pathetic. If you are going to launch one of the biggest much-talked about mobile devices in the world with the launch being Friday 11th Apple and O2 should have been prepared for this.

We can see many customers going out of control if they do not get their hands on the handset, this is a device they have all been waiting for and to turn up at the door to be turned away will be very much a disaster.

The obvious reason for the shortage is down to launch the Apple iPhone in 22 different countries simultaneously, all we know is Apple knew that this would be a major selling device so they should have been much more prepared.

According to Hitwise, the website monitoring service: “During the June peak, 22.4% of people searching for iPhone went to Apple’s official iPhone site, while 14.0% went to www.o2.co.uk. This time, O2 has taken the top spot, with 23.5% of traffic, compared with Apple’s 18.7%. That said, consumers still need a bit of nudge: 90% of O2’s traffic from the term ‘iphone’ comes from paid search, up from 50% last month”.

For those who do miss out on Friday we would have to say wait a while, the prices will come down. If we here more about the shortage we will let you know as soon as possible.

How annoyed will you be if you do not get an iPhone 3G on Friday?