Hp toner shortages?

[gaz350]

Anyone experiencing a shortage? We've been experiencing long delays on some of our toner deliveries, especially black toner on smaller printers.

 

Apparently canon manufacture hp toner and all fActories are in japan!

[rush_tech]

This is what I supplier posted on there site

 

When parts of Japan were devastated by a terrible earthquake a month ago, there seemed little doubt that the printer and supplies industry would be seriously impacted and there would be shortages of some key products. HP, which is dependent on Canon for production of laser printers and MFPs and toner cartridges, has sent a letter to partners indicating that it is concerned about the future availability of certain toner cartridges and LaserJet devices. HP has warned its partners that in response to potential shortages it is restricting distribution of some toner cartridges.

 

 

We are now seeing that an increasing number of HP original cartridges are out of stock in the distribution channel and some of those that are in stock are increasing in price by up to 20%. It is reasonable to expect that as shortages bite we will see more cartridges becoming unavailable and prices going higher. Whilst we will always try to source product at the best possible price, we regret that we will have to pass on any price increases. Even so, we cannot guarantee availability of all cartridges. If they are not available in the UK distribution channel, we cannot deliver them to you. No ETA's (Estimated Time of Arrival) is being given for out of stock cartridges. We will contact you if price or availability affects you.

 

Epson, Konica Minolta, Oki and Ricoh have also reported 'severe' or 'major' disruptions to their manufacturing operations so we could see supply problems from these too.

 

Other OEM manufacturers have not yet reported manufacturing problems.

 

There are currently no supply problems with remanufactured or compatible cartridges.

[plexer]

What a crock lack of supply makes the price go higher, sell em at normal price you money grabbing gits and when they're gone they're gone.

 

Ben

[gaz350]

I dont think many IT Depts would notice, its just sods law we've moved into a new building, new printers and no "old stock" to fall back on.

but you can guess who's printers are still on back order?

 

The princpals and the college managers for the past month!

[Gibbo]

There's a thread here

[Great_Scott]

I fully understand and appreciate problems with HP/Canon toner supplies arising following the terrible devastation in Japan but I would urge fellow EduGeekers to be wary of toner suppliers who are seemingly cashing in by using the earthquake as a reason to increase all their prices.

According to a toner industry news article I have read, the most severly affected suppliers are HP and Canon but many of the reps of toner suppliers who are cold calling are claiming constraint on all makes of toner. They are often heard hyping up the severity of the issue by saying "this is the last of our stock" and "we just don't know when or where the next supply will come from" and even "we've had to increase our prices because of the problems in Japan".

The industry article I read from research firm Gap Intelligence stated: “...there exists key challenges for HP due to shortages in supply of toner cartridges which is likely to boost sales of compatibles, and compatibles are now widely available online for all HP toners. Customers who then become accustomed to spending much less on compatibles may not be eager to pay full price for OEM cartridges....”

Fair enough, but I interpret that as saying there are no problems with the supply of compatibles so why are UK toner suppliers hiking the price of compatibles claiming "it's because of the earthquake in Japan"?

If you only use originals then there will be problems with the supply of certain toners (not all...) but if you are happy using good quality compatibles you should not be having difficulties with supply or pricing.

Compatibles should be sourced from a manufacturer of toner cartridges and branded as such with their logo etc. In my experience you will only encounter operating issues with re-used re-manufactured cartridges that are assembled by homeless bare-footed children in such places as the slums of Shangai.

There are plenty of articles concerning this awful trade on the internet.

Thanks

Craig