ebay found a new way to screw with buyers

[TrappedInTheOffSide]

But surely all irrelevant as the highest bid wins regardless of when it was placed. All this sniping stuff will at least stop possibly with the newer system.

Imagine you were at a real auction in person and there was a timer running for bids to come in by. Everyone would stand up shouting numbers out at the last 10 seconds and whoever shouts last wins. That bid likely wasn’t going to be the highest bid but the timer has ended.

So instead the bidding continues until someone is out. If you put your true highest bid , and someone wins it for £5 more then they were willing to pay more. If you say “I’d of paid £5 or £10 more “ then you should enter that amount …….

My method seems to be the opposite to most. I stick my bid in early and then when folk come along and place a bid , they immediately are outbid , realise someone wants it and they lose interest.

Im with you mate. Im never miffed, disappointed or irate.

 

[Dr Dremel]

I think you´re slightly missing the point. I´ve bid my max amount. After the auction ended I was the hightest bidder. Only to find that for others the auction apparently did not end and I was outbid after the fact.

Would you not be dissapointed/miffed/enraged?

 

[raidan73]

I've used a variety of methods to bid in the past...

Put in my maximum early on, and walk away
Bid in the dying seconds
Sniping

I don't think think the OP is looking for advice on how they should bid, but is commenting on how changes to the auction format might affect some of the bidding options. I've not noticed this change myself (haven't bid on anything for a while) but I feel if the format has changed (and this sounds like quite a significant change) then everyone should be made aware, without having to do a deep dive into eBay's T's and C's

 

[2manyoranges]

I think you´re slightly missing the point. I´ve bid my max amount. After the auction ended I was the hightest bidder. Only to find that for others the auction apparently did not end and I was outbid after the fact.

Would you not be dissapointed/miffed/enraged?

YES indeed I would be

I have been frustrated sometimes when I am sniping and simply because of level of traffic my bid has not been registered. So the new system would prevent that from happening. But that's a rare occurance.

Hmmm I prefer it how it was.

Ebay has become a weird place in the last five years - huge influx of low grade stuff from professional and semi-professional sellers which gums up/overloads searches.

 

[jmini23]

Be careful back in June I was bidding on a bike planning to bid in the last 30 secs, but got a message that the auction had ended 1 minute early!
Was most upset as I tried to bid a lot more than the winning bidder... I would recommend just putting your best bid in with circa 5 mins to go.

 

[eric_james]

90% of things are buy it now with offers now

I always used to put 1st bid in 5 seconds from the end and it actually used to get my heart going a bit

Never used a sniping tool though
All the fun was winning in the last second
Thanks for posting about this as I had no idea that it had changed now

 

[sjcprojects]

It does almost feel like eBay is trying to phase out actual auctions in favour of everything being Buy It Now, with the way they are messing with the auction format.

Yesterday I put in a last second bid for something, my max bid being £26. I won, and the item sold for £26. Okay, great. But considering how the bidding had been up to that point I was a bit surprised the end price was exactly my max bid. I checked the 7 bids, and the actual bidding took the final bid to £24.34.

So, apparently the buyer protection fee on an auction item is 4% of the final bid amount for items between £20-£300, but that doesn’t make the final amount £26. Something odd seems to be happening here. Obviously we’re only talking about a few pounds here, but it’s all a bit odd unless I’m missing something obvious?

I’ve been buying and selling on eBay since 2001, and I’m not against all the changes they’ve made recently, but doing things like messing with last second bids feels dodgy to me. And I just don’t get what’s going on with some of these end prices in auctions.

 

[bikeworkshop]

The number of auctions i have won on
exactly my highest bid amount
Is statistically improbable.

I can't find consistent evidence of shill bidding, although I'm sure mates bid high, seller sees your highest bid, mate withdraws and bids you up safely.
Withdrawing isn't allowed in the last 24hr, though, when I bid.

I often choose massively improbable numbers - like £124.62

So I think ebay pumps it up to get an extra few pence every time.

 

[sjcprojects]

So I think ebay pumps it up to get an extra few pence every time.

It definitely feels like that. I’m sure I’ve won other items where the end price has been exactly my highest bid. All rather odd.

I can’t blame eBay for the focus on BIN prices, though - people just don’t want to wait these days. I used to get so many people asking ‘what will you take for this?’ back when I had more listings as traditional auctions. Now I’ve relented because people just don’t expect to have to bid, especially on smaller items. But with the whole ‘promoted listing’ thing it can now take a lot longer to sell something.

 

[highlandsflyer]

Ebay is just a shitter version of Amazon these days. We've more or less given up on selling on it, though we buy a fair amount that is hard to find elsewhere.