Ebay drives me nuts!!!

[Canadian Ken]

Everytime I bid on an item, and have the high bid , I get outbid with 5 seconds left on the auction - how are some people playing the system? I watched an auction tonight that I was leading by 3 dollars -after it was over, I got an email saying I was outbid . What can I do to win these auctions other than bidding way high?
Thank Ken

 

[Canadian Ken]

I just rechecked the auction and the guy bid on the same second as the auction ended!Ended at 15:21:20 -his bid registered at 15:21:20 --
Ken

 

[Howard H.]

Some people use automated bidding programs that wait until the last moment, but a lot of people do it manually that way.

About the only defense is just bid the top dollar you will pay and let the chips fall where they may...


Howard

 

[coojjd4020]

I myself have 2 windows open one with the bid i want to place on it and the other window i watch the auction. Then about 10 sec before it is over i place just one bid. Most times i get it

 

[M-MAN]

If you are there when the bid is ending, do what they do. You might get lucky. Bid on an item & go to confirm page but don't hit enter. Check the item time, refresh untill you catch the minutes just turning over. Click confirm and a stopwatch at the same time. Then go back & see exactly what time your bid was confirmed. That will tell you how many second's before an item ends you need to hit confirm. It still isn't foolproof as connection speeds vary, but that's about all you can do.

I haven't bothered watching that close in years. I'll put in a good bid & if it win's ok & if it doesn't that's ok too. If it's something I want really bad, I'll put in a bid that's so outrageously high that anyone who outbids me will be crying for a week & then I'll laugh if I lose that item.

 

[Bob]

I'm GUESSING you've never heard of "sniping"???

 

[sds46a]

Try: Bidnapper.com or something like that.

Doug

 

[jd b puller]

Ken, I rarely use E-bay. Like it or don't, you got outbid. If you were willing to bid more, you should have done it. As Bob indicated, people do what's called "Sniping", where they basically wait until the last second to bid.

Would be nice if E-bay would change the ending time to keep going as long as there is a bid within 5 seconds or somehting along those lines. It would make them more money too, since they work off commission. Until then, bid what you think the item is worth and if it sells for more than that, either kick yourself in the shorts for not bidding enough, or be thankful that you didn't pay more than you put in.

 

[bj1]

go to purplewave.com when the last bid is in thay put 3 min . more on the item for sale you can not snip it at all used them all the time

 

[730d se]

Howard, that is best answer that I have read.
There are two sides to this story, and I have heard both sides complain.
IMHO, neither side has any room to complain. If you bid, bid as much as you want to pay. If you get outbid, someone else has deeper pockets, get over it.
If you do not like the way it works, find another way to purchase what you want. Online bidding sites have not always been around and people have bought what they wanted or needed for a long, long time.
Works the same way at a live auction. If someone goes higher than you limit, you do not win.

 

[MEANJDK]

Howard and 730,
You hit that nail Top Dead Center.
Ken needs to learn to snipe. Good luck Ken.

 

[730d se]

You may or may not be aware of the many issues with online bidding. These sites have their hands full with bogus ads, sellers bidding on their own stuff to run the prices up, etc.
Ever gone back and looked at how many items that you bidded on end up "relisted"? This can be legitimate, but in some cases it was the seller bidding on their own stuff, but got caught by the clock or rolled the dice too far. I have also seen cases where the seller would claim that they only had one of the item, yet the identical items shows up more than once for sale by the same seller, even after some have been sold.

Then you have the Nigerians who post a stolen photo and ad for a low price. When you mail the check, you are out of that amount of money.
It is a real mess if you peel the onion back and look at what all goes on.
Like most things, there are still some good sellers and good items, but you have to be very cautious.

 

[gtx1967jewison]

duh. thats the whole point. thats how people buy what they want. throw a really high bid a few seconds before the end & hope you beat the others in time. is there any other way to buy? You just throw in your max price your willing to pay at the last second & hope it didnt leave others enough time to bid higher, or that they didn't want it for that much.

 

[Will P]

Why are you mad???? You didn't bid high enough to win!! The winners are using snipe programs that bid on items in the last few seconds. If you are not using them to bid in the last few seconds, you will always be the looser.

 

[MEANJDK]

Well 730, I have to follow up with you again.

Before eBay stopped letting the losing bidders look at who the other bidders were on any particular auction that ended, it was easy to see that SOME sellers had hundreds of bogus bidders. Yes, HUNDREDS!! You can't see them any more. eBay put a stop to that.

Bogus bidders were commonly all less than about 20 feedbacks. I had watched several sellers with certain items that were not won for less than close to the full price by anyone with more than about 50 feedbacks. I looked up the feedback of the obviously bogus bidders, and most, if not all were feedbacks BY THE SAME SELLER! Then after weeks of watching some, I noticed a pattern of MORE crooked sellers in on the scam!

The most obvious problem that I had complained to eBay was...... the fact that the buyer, WITHIN MINUTES of winning the auction, wrote feedbacks such as, 'Fast Shipping! Works Great!'. And the seller would almost immediatly post feedback for the buyer likewise.

I had page after page saved and printed, and many hand written notes that I had sent to the 'powers that be' at eBay, thinking I could make a difference.

It did end in a futile effort when eBay put the kabosh to letting any losing bidders look at anyone else who else was bidding on the items that they kept losing to.

I still buy some items on eBay. Most of the sellers are honest and legit. The ones to watch out for are the 'Power Sellers' who obviously are selling hundreds of 'similar', usually imported items. But by no means not ALL of those sellers are crooked.

If anyone is curious, one of the worst are/were the mega-sellers of cheap versions of violins. I began this 'investigation' by attempting to win, and constantly losing, a 1/2 size violin to get my grandson started to learn to play a musical instrument. (Yeah, i'm a hick, I love fiddles)

I can say that I have been there and seen that, and I know that the crooked sellers are loving every minute of the way eBay has hidden their scams!!!!!!!

( OK, I'm done now. Umm, back to tractors.....)

 

[Drew]

I always bid in the last 5 or 10 seconds. I see bid sniping as a way to lessen my chances of getting the bid ran up by the seller/seller's friend. If no one bids until the end, bogus bidders have no one to run it up against.

I bought an item a couple weeks ago on ebay. There were about 30 bids at the end of the auction and half were from one person w/ zero feedback bidding $1 or $2 at a time until they were winning and would quit until someone outbid them, and then $1 or $2 again. Smelt fishy to me! I firmly believe that one big bid at the end saved me money.