posted on December 10, 2000 10:12:01 PM
I had a few hgih proxy bids placed on some similar items and I believe another bidder (possibly mad at my high bids) ran the price up on me!
My bid was in for a couple of days and suddenly this bidder comes out of nowhere and bids and bids and bids on one item until the price is really beyond what it might normally go for---but I am still the high bidder.
The other bidder then bid on the other similar items in the collection, no doubt knowing that my high bid was probably the same across the board, and bid up ALL of them to within a small amount of my maximum bid!
If you look at the bid history, you can really see this. There were NO bid retractions though.
posted on December 10, 2000 10:26:07 PM
There is no rule against it. Isn't it possible that the other bidder's max was just below yours? If you bid your max and won, then you got what you wanted for what you were willing to pay. Do you have some reason to believe the other bidder is in some way 'out to get you'? Your recourse is to snipe. BTW, I never bid until the very end if I can possibly help it. The last time I bid early instead of sniping (only because I thought I wouldn't be around to snipe that one) it cost me $4.
posted on December 10, 2000 10:38:53 PM
Doesn't it seem odd that this person would bid waaay up to around the same amount for each item, KNOWING that I likely bid around the same on each? It looks to me like they just decided to play games and bid the price up on me.
posted on December 10, 2000 10:52:25 PMDoesn't it seem odd that this person would bid waaay up
I'm having a hard time understanding a proxy which someone else would have to bid waaay up to. Cornering the market?
None the less, I might have been on the other side of this one on occasion. As a bidder, I'm interested in 1 of say 5 very similar listed things. On the first one, I overbid bidder "b", observe that bidder b was at $600, but my $610 is not yet at reserve.
So, exploring, I move on. There's "b" as the high bidder again. I bid $595 this time, and "b" ends up the high bidder at $600. I'm happy with this result. I know what the proxy is for "b", and I can tell if "b" raises that proxy (via the bid count). I'll be back later to snipe.
Note, while this story may appear to "b" that I'm jacking "b" up, the truth is, I'm willing to pay more than $600 or I wouldn't be fooling around.
In other words, "b"'s proxy isn't as high as "b" thinks.
We can speculate on whether such bidding tactics have a positive or negative effect on the final price.
posted on December 10, 2000 11:00:33 PM
The user has a medium to poor feedback record and has a couple of retractions to boot. I am not insinuating this is a shill bidder, I don't believe that, but it does look like someone running the oprice up on me for fun or something.
It's obvously NOT someone who wanted to WIN the auctions, as they seem to have recognized what my high bids were around, and they simply kept jacking it up to the same level and then stopped.
Would it be in bad taste to suggest to the seller that perhaps the prices werwe artificially high, and would he give me a break?
posted on December 10, 2000 11:22:39 PM
I don't want to come across as rude, but if you didn't want to pay that much, you probably shouldn't have had that high of a proxy bid. It makes sense that if someone was trying to buy something and their cap was just a little lower than yours that they'd try more than one auction trying to find one they could "beat" you at so they could win one. I think sg52 said something similar. Anyway...just a thought.
posted on December 10, 2000 11:36:14 PMWould it be in bad taste to suggest to the seller that perhaps the prices werwe artificially high, and would he give me a break?
Try it from the other side. You're the winning bidder, but seller sends email complaining about the price, and asks if perhaps would you pay a bit more?
If you really believe you were shilled, then I'd be the first to recommend that you not complete the transaction, but this story just doesn't have a "ring of shill" about it.
posted on December 10, 2000 11:47:03 PM
I myself stated that I DIDN'T think it was an issue of shilling. I just think some bidders get a kick out of running bids up on other users. Am I THAT off base?
posted on December 11, 2000 03:49:15 AM
sandradee -
It is possible that you were shilled, but it is also possible that someone didn't have as high a price in mind as you, by coincidence.
When you put an excessively high proxy on an item, remember that you MIGHT have to pay.
posted on December 11, 2000 04:12:47 AM
When I bid against someone I don't know what their proxy is. Sometimes I bid more and get the item but sometimes I stop bidding when I realize it will cost more than I want to pay. Of course I will try to get it at the lowest price possible which may involve multiple bids. I'm not trying to push anyones bid up, it's just how proxy bidding works. Never make a proxy bid for more than you are willing to pay. If I were the seller I would be upset if someone won my item then wanted to pay less than they bid.
posted on December 11, 2000 04:20:29 AM
SShhhh. Don't tell anyone but I have been known to bid-up items of bidders who bid against me agressively. Many bidders bid in very predictible amounts and patterns. Bumping them up to their max is sometimes an easy exercise. Fun too.
posted on December 11, 2000 04:51:14 AM
My husband bids on like items alot. It goes without saying that you will run into the same bidders over and over again. After a while you get a "feel" for how they bid.
Just the other night my husband bid and bid and bid trying to find the high bidder's proxy bid. Once he found it he waited until 7 seconds before the auction ended and put in a whopper.
Unfortunately for him, the high bidder was waiting as well as a couple of other people and he was outbid!
So, it may be that the other person was just trying to get a "feel" of where you were at and was just waiting to pounce. Sorry, but that's just the way eBay works.
I know someone that argues with me all the time that eBay should extend auctions as long as 3 minutes. If there are no bids in that 3 minutes then the auction closes. If there is action it keeps going for another 3 minutes and so on until everyone is done bidding.
I don't like that idea because as clearly indicated by the nature of this thread that could create someone saying "I didn't WANT to really pay that much" and sellers would have more NPB on their hands.
posted on December 11, 2000 05:29:44 AMWould it be in bad taste to suggest to the seller that perhaps the prices werwe artificially high, and would he give me a break?
Yes indeed, it would, particularly as YOU are the party who decided on the amount of your own proxy bid. If anybody drove the prices "artificially high," it was YOU, through the amount of the proxy bid YOU placed.
posted on December 11, 2000 09:19:38 AM
Well, here is a kinder and gentler answer...
It is a definite possibility that your proxy has been flushed out.
Maybe they are a crank, maybe they just want the same item.
Your proxy should be your highest price, not a price that you know you will nuke the competition with. Only with a history in a catagory where you and the competition know each other by site can you spook off opening bidders with the mere mention of your ID as opening bid. Even then comes along Mr. Zero Feedback and bids the item out of the park.
Essentially you are creating the market value for your item.
You could retract your bid, teach them a lesson, but I wouldn't bid on that sellers auctions again.
In fact be prepared for some fall out.
I know the sellers are prolly not going to like this, and as minor player in the seller end of things I would not be happy.
BUT, the second highest bidder can't be that much behind you. AND, if you end up as high bidder on the auction and can't pay, you might go to Negativeland.
I suggest you learn to snipe, use BIN or set your bid lower initially to shut down BIN.
I confess I use the latter a lot. If I find an item, and it's hanging it's BIN A$$ in the wind, I will jam on a low opening bid, then later I can snipe it. It's only reserve auctions that are a pain, but there are a lot of auctions out there.
Good luck.
Capriole
(Only here)
ps I would put on a smiley face, but Redeer and AnnieJean might get peed on! oops I cain't help myself!!!
Edited to add...I have used BIN as a buyer, it does groove. Sometimes I want to play my game at the auction. So don't think I am a miscreant - that's another poster!
posted on December 11, 2000 11:14:18 AMsandradee: It's possible this other bidder has a grudge against you, but it's also possible that he wants to be fair to the seller.
Look at it this way. Suppose I find a seller selling 5 identical items and I'm willing to buy all 5 for $50 each. Let's say another bidder has bid on all 5 and he's the high bidder on them all at the $10 starting price. I bid $50 on the first one and bump up the original bidder's bid to $51. Now, maybe he only really only wanted 3 and put a lower proxy on the last 2. So, I bid $50 on the fifth one. But, again, he's the high bidder at $51.
So, now I can reasonably assume that my $50 bid won't win any of the 5 items. So, do I walk away and leave the prices were they are? Not if I want to be fair to the seller. If no one else bids, the original bidder will win #1 and #5 for $51 each and 2,3,4 for the $10 each for a total of $132. That doesn't seem fair to the seller considering that he had 2 bidders who were each willing to pay at least $50 for each item and I was willing to pay $250 for all 5. So, I'd bid $50 on 2, 3, and 4 knowing that I wouldn't win unless he made a typo on one of his bids. This way the seller gets a fair price for each item and I stick it to a competitor. Maybe, tomorrow we'll find an item that we both want and he won't be able to afford it because he has to pay $255 for the 5 items that he won.
posted on December 11, 2000 12:09:39 PM
Hello SandraDee,
There is no rule against what that bidder did unless the bidder is a shill.
As you have indicated that you don't believe this is a case of shilling then you are faced with a choice or two...
1) Retract one or more of your bids. Email the sellers first and explain that you didn't anticipate being driven so close to your maximum bid on all of the items and you prefer to retract some of the bids rather than fail to follow through should you win the auctions.
2) Same kind of email as in #1 but ask if the seller will cancel your bid so that you don't take a hit on your retraction count in your feedback profile.
3) Hope that you are outbid on some of the auctions. But make good on each auction you win.
I would also suggest that you keep a watch on the bidder who ran you up on your bids. They may try this again in the future.
I had a similar situation about a year ago. I had emailed a seller about keyword spamming in their auction descriptions and they replied with a justification for doing what was clearly against eBay rules. I then reported them to eBay and they were warned about the spamming.
Because I had emailed the seller first he knew who had made the complaint to eBay and proceeded to bid on several auctions after I had placed a bid. The auctions were for items this seller had no previous interest in as a buyer or seller.
What I ended up doing was to lay a "trap" for this user.
When I saw an item I wanted I placed the minimum bid (instead of a higher proxy bid) on the item.
This fellow then came along and placed a bid hoping to make the item more expensive for me by pushing up my proxy.
Instead, he ended up the high bidder and was faced with buying the item he had no interest in, retracting the bid or becoming a deadbeat. To his credit, he completed the transaction. He has not bid against me outside his normal areas of interest since.
[ edited by codasaurus on Dec 11, 2000 12:13 PM ]
posted on December 11, 2000 01:08:30 PM
If the items were varied, I'd feel it was someone running you up out of spite.
If the items were all from one seller, it could be shilling, but I want to see more evidence.
If the items are similar, maybe the person chose to bid on them for the same reason you did? If you bid on all of the available ones, it would seem reasonable that they would as well.
One thing I learned from the live auction world, is that if you have any interest in an item, be prepared to bid on it. You never really know what your competition will do on that day. Even the person notorious for paying the most for a particular item may change their mind - and as someone already pointed out, for some unknown reason you may have not bid (or bid as high) on one or more of these, so the underbidder has nothing to lose by trying their luck.
posted on December 11, 2000 01:09:17 PM
I don't have much sympathy here unless this was a case of shill bidding. Even then, Sandradee DID have proxy bids on several items, and should not have done so unless she (assuming here) really was willing to come up with the money. If several buyers had been trying to outbid her, the outcome would have been no different.
There have been several times that I was concurrently bidding on identical items quite actively, and at some point chose to quit because I had predetermined price limits. Sandradee's competitor could simply have done the same thing.
As alluded to above, simply bid low at the beginning, if at all, and snipe late to avoid paying more than you want to.
posted on December 11, 2000 05:50:52 PM
OK...I'll confess to having done this in the past. There's nothing "illegal" in doing this when it's being done by a third party.
Another bidder and I were always fighting each other to win large "bulk" auctions of certain items from several sellers two years ago.
I quickly learned through bidding against him that he had a pat formula where he would consistently bid "so much" per item in these auctions. For over a month, I then ran his bids up to his "maximum proxy" on these auctions.
I finally got an e-mail from him crying "uncle". We came to an agreement where he would only bid on the auctions ending in even numbers and I would only bid on the ones ending in odd numbers in the future. Our "agreement" worked to our advantage for only a short while, since so many new buyers were coming into the marketplace and competition for these items increased to where neither one of us could win a bid. Yes, those were the "Good Ole Days" for sellers...when there were more buyers than sellers flocking to eBay.
A person should not place consistently high multiple "proxy bids" on items if they do not want someone else to bid them up to near those proxies. It's pretty easy to assume if a bidder bids a high proxy on one item, then they have bid equally high proxies on the other items of a group they are bidding on.
If you find yourself continually bidding against the same group of bidders, variation of your bidding "style" is essential. I study my competitor's bidding styles closely and have found them all to be somewhat predictable. That gives me the advantage when bidding against them.
It's just a matter of protecting yourself to know your competition...and it's certainly not the seller's fault if someone bids up your early proxies...as long as the seller is not the one bidding you up. Sandradee, if you didn't want to pay that much, you shouldn't have bid that high....or that early!
posted on December 11, 2000 06:20:18 PM
Two bidders getting together in order to hold down the final value of an item doesn't seem to me to be a whole lot different from two sellers getting together in order to raise the final value- in both cases, two users are colluding in order to benefit themselves at the expense of unsuspecting others.
posted on December 12, 2000 07:08:15 AMmrpotatoheadd, I agree with you. Only when I revealed to one of the sellers, whose auctions we were bidding on, that this bidder and I had reached an "alliance" of sorts....and that seller stated how unfair such an alliance was to him...did I fully realize that it was REALLY unfair...and definitely collusion of sorts. I never felt comfortable with it after that, and within a couple of weeks, stopped bidding altogether in the auctions...and e-mailed the other bidder that he was now free to bid on any auction, since I was no longer going to be bidding on those items in the near future.
I was still a novice in on-line auctions at the time. It was largely just a "sport" to me, then. Only later did I come to realize that many people's livelihoods depended on this "sport"....and, for this venue to survive longterm, it must be kept as honest as possible. Trust is the backbone of its survival. Today, I would neither enter into such an agreement, or bid another bidder up to their maximim proxy, just for the "sport" of it. I think both are wrong.
I was merely pointing out to sandradee that there ARE bidders out there who will do this...and a bidder must protect themself to keep it from happening to them. Also, the seller should NOT be held accountable when a third party does this...the bidder only has themself to blame.
I have to say I am impressed with your honesty and willingness to acknowledge the ramifications of your past decisions. It has been my experience that in a situation like this, many posters would become defensive and attempt to find a reason to excuse them for their actions. The fact that you did not do this, and did not immediately edit your post to remove any reference to the topic I commented on is (IMO) to your credit, also.
I am sorry if my previous post appeared to you to in any way to be a personal attack. I intended it only as an observation on the practice in general.
edited... spelling
[ edited by mrpotatoheadd on Dec 12, 2000 07:36 AM ]
oops I cain't help myself!!!