posted on October 31, 2007 07:12:52 AM new
I have made my core auctions private for a while now. Last night, I was watching Canadian Antiques Road show, and here was a guy with a really nice antique toy car. They asked him where he got it, and he said that he was bidding on eBay for something else, and someone sent him an email to say that if he was interested in antique toys, he had a good one, so he photographed it and sent it, and the guy bought it for $3,300! A bit risky I would have thought. Anyway, I wonder how often that happens? One of the reasons I will keep my auctions private, because anyone can email the bidders via the eBay messages.
posted on October 31, 2007 07:15:30 AM new
Unsolicited contact with bidders to sell an item off eBay is an excellent way to get booted off eBay permanently.
posted on October 31, 2007 08:04:49 AM new
I guess not everyone considers them spam, if they are bidding on an item and someone offers it for a lower price, how many people would report them? That guy who sold the antique toy got a good response.
posted on October 31, 2007 08:28:26 AM new
I think the chances of getting turned in are higher than the chances of making a sale. A stupid risk to take.
[ edited by pixiamom on Oct 31, 2007 08:28 AM ]
posted on October 31, 2007 08:35:30 AM new
I agree, certainly not one I would take. Not just for the risk of being turned in, but it is just not fair when someone else has gone to the trouble and expense of listing, it really is stealing.
posted on October 31, 2007 08:39:25 AM newBut how would eBay find out?
Amber, you seem like a sweet person, but c'mon really, wake up and smell the latte.
eBay finds out because it's their messaging system! It is very very (VERY) simple to write a filtering routine that looks for certain words in message traffic.
If I were writing this simple script, as a first pass I'd be looking for dollar signs and the words "will you accept", "sell it to me", etc. There are only so many ways to say it.
posted on October 31, 2007 09:06:12 AM new
Fluffy, people are clever, all they need to do is ask someone to contact them on their email address. I know it happens, because countless times I have sent "second chance" offers, only to have people write and say that someone sent them an email and offered the same item, I am sure at a lower price, that is one of the reasons why I went to private auctions. I also have a lot of regular buyers who tell me that it has happened to them, I guess I should have told them to report it to eBay. I sell craft books and put on a lot of pictures which take me hours to scan. I don't see why someone should offer the same item to my bidders, sometimes it is listed with just a poor picture of a cover, but they can look at my auctions and see all my pictures.
posted on October 31, 2007 11:23:23 AM new
I had an antique chair one time for sale on ebay and was literally bombarded with emails from people who either wanted to buy it off site or who wanted to sell me similar items. I reported every cotton pickin' one of them.
