I really hate when people don't know how to bid on ebay

[imenja]

and drive prices up early. Isn't the law of ebay bidding that you wait until close to when the auction closes rather that raising high bids early and driving the price up and up?

[Cadence]

1. Yes. I think that way when I'm trying to buy something

but when I'm trying to sell something I think.. where are all those people that artificially drive the prices up when I'm trying to buy? Why aren't they bidding???

[imenja]

3. true

I've only bought things, never sold. So my perspective is only as a bidder. One thing that I wanted to bid on is now well over twice what I paid for it last time. So I'm not going to bid. Pisses me off though, cause I wanted it.

[despairing optimist]

6. Situational ethics are the key to successful entrepreneurship

I too used to feel hypocritical, torn between my role as a seller to pray for bidding wars to raise my selling prices to the stratosphere and my more common role as a buyer, loathing newbies who do just that and spoilers who come in after I foolishly put in an early bid.

The best strategy, if you really want something, is to get a digital watch and synchronize it to the auction page by refreshing the screen. Go through several dry runs and see how long it takes your computer to refresh the screen while checking on the elapsed time. Then, about 45 seconds before the auction ends, begin to make your bid at the highest price you'd be willing to pay. Push the first button to get to the page where you check your bid, but don't press the Confirm Bid button until 15-20 seconds before the auction ends. That way you get the bid in under the wire and no one receives an outbid notice in time to respond. It's perfectly legal. Ruthless, yes, but legal nonetheless.

Of course, when I'm selling something, I love bidding wars, but remember that sellers have to please buyers with accurate descriptions, good communication, and fast shipping. Also, eBay and PayPal get sizable pieces of the action with their cut based on a percentage of the final selling price. It's a business, so it's best not to let emotions run interference on either the buying or the selling end.

[imenja]

7. yep, that's how I do it

but I have missed the auction closing a couple of times when my computer is slow.

I don't think you have an ethical dilemma as a seller. People are free to bid as they choose. As long as you aren't bidding yourself to inflate the price, there is no ethical transgression.

One of the things I hate on ebay are reserve prices. I hate when seller start with a low opening bid and then set a reserve. In those cases, you can't even bid to the reserve price if someone isn't prepared to also bid up. I just wish they'd set their minimum price at the opening bid. I've quit even saving onto my favorites auctions where the seller sets an unknown reserve.

[MrSlayer]

2. Well sometimes people have multiple accounts.

And they pump up their own auctions. Sometimes you get a friend to do it.

[imenja]

4. that's illegal

I know some sellers were busted over this. I think they may have faced criminal charges. I remember seeing it on the news a while back. I've bought a number of times from this same seller, so I don't think that is what is going on in this particular case. I've never seen him do that before.

[MrSlayer]

5. Yeah it's illegal but people do it anyway.

Of course if you have a trusted seller it's probably just be one of the many fools who simply do not know how to bid.

[KurtNYC]

16. Another trick is to shill bid on competing auctions

Two similar items, one they are selling, one they aren't. The use a new account to bid on the competing item, raising it to some rediculously dollar amount then their auction gets all the action. They stiff on the shill bid of course.

If you suspect something like this, reject bids by accounts with zero feedback.

[cynatnite]

8. I was naive when I first hit ebay

I would bid early on and the last minute I'd wind up losing what I wanted.

I won't seriously consider anything that's more than 8 hours old. I'll spend the next four hours or so following it and if it still looks good for the money I'm willing to spend, I'll bid. The last five minutes if I've been outbidded, I'll bid one more time.

It's worked 90% of the time and I'm not overly disappointed when I lose out on something.

[fujiyama]

9. I don't know

On some items it never hurts to get an early bid.

For example, I snagged a decent cell phone off eBay for 20 bucks and I bid early. Usually this same item goes for double the price.

I'll admit though that it was a flook. Other times, I've failed miserably but I usually set an early bid just in case people aren't interested in the item I want (sometimes I get lucky but usually I lose).

I've lost a few times by simply getting outbidden in the last few seconds. That was my own fault though. I didn't time it right.

BTW are those sniper programs ethical and legal? How exactly do they work?

[imenja]

10. sniper programs?

I'm not familiar with those.

[nytemare]

17. E-Snipe, it is legal

I use it when I know I will be at work or away when bidding ends on an item I am looking at. It bids up to your highest amount about 4 seconds from the end of the auction.

You just go to esnipe.com and put in your ebay user name, blah blah. After a few wins, you have to pay a very small amount for each winning bid, which is small considering the money you might save by placing a proxy bid early, and the price gets driven up.

I am not sure if it is considered ethical, really. I don't use it that often for that reason.

[WoodrowFan]

11. I usually bid early

I usually bid on items for a hobby and there are a group of us that don't bid against each other. Bidding early is a way of claiming "dibs"

(That doesn't mean that folks from outside our little group don't bid against me!)

[imenja]

14. an initial bid is fine

but say someone is bidding against you. Are you determined to have the winning bid four days in advance, or do you wait to bid up at the end so someone can't counter your bid and raise the price even higher?

[WoodrowFan]

19. I wait (NT)

[kanrok]

12. So, how does one bid on E-bay?

[imenja]

13. well, this is what you don't do

You don't run up the price to three times what it should be going for because you want to have the highest bid days before the auction closes. You wait until the last day, as close to the end of the auction as your schedule can accommodate. That gives others less time to bid the price up even higher.

[Moms Baby Democrat]

15. I use an auction sniper

I won't shop without it. As for when I'm selling, I love the newbies who push it up and up. That's just the way it goes. Ebay isn't all it's cracked up to be anymore though, alot of the really good sellers have left due to all the conflict.


Here's a link to a good program, and yes it is legit, Ebay even acknowledges it. Very handy tool for the Ebay shopper

http://www.auctionsniper.com/default.aspx

*edit link*

[KurtNYC]

18. I see a lot fewer listings since rates went up a month ago

Fee-bay