SORRY BUT I STILL DON'T GET IT!

If you really want a certain price - or higher - for an item, it is best to put it on a Buy it Now, or even better, list it on a free listings weekend (like now) and start it at a price you would be reasonably happy with. Although I'm told that items started at 99p (for free) tend to attract the most bids and higher sale prices. No guarantee of that, however, unless you've got a very desirable item.

Personally, I would not wriggle out of a completed sale by saying the item was broken. I would end the auction early if things were not going in my favour, however, but not renege on a completed sale.

If you buy on Ebay as well as sell, the times when you've bought something for next to nothing tend to tend to balance out the times you've had to sell for next to nothing! We all love a bargain.

 

Surely though that is not how an auction works.
You can bid a higher price, (through automatic bids), and your bid only goes up if there is someone to bid against, if no one else bids, then you only pay the lowest price, it seems fair to me.

Surely that's why you can have a reserve price.
I think if I had been the winning bidder I would have been a bit upset.
I've noticed many sellers up the postage on items they dont think will fetch much money.

 

Or a minimum bid of a reasonable amount.

Never a popular move with buyers and Ebay hates it because it reduces their profits! If the postage is too high you run the risk of getting 1/2* ratings and losing your free listing priveleges.

 

You need to put a start price on it that you are happy to accept. Otherwise if you only get one bidder then that's the auction closing price.

If you put a reserve price you pay the auction final-fee for that price (regardless of whether it sells or not [and you pay a higher fee if it sells for more of course]), so its not a very popular device.

If you start the auction at your "reserve" price then you pay no extra for the listing. But the perception is that auctions that start off at 99p attract more custom ...

or get your mate to bid your reserve price on it ... and if it doesn't reach that amount, but you are happy with the price, then sell it to the under bidder as a second-chance-auction. When people do that to me I offer then one bid increment above MY under bidder, rather than one bid increment below THEIR shill bidder. Shill bidding is not allowed on eBay ... assuming you get caught

Best to use an Auction Sniper (I use www.gixen.com). That will bid in the dying seconds of the auction, and not give rivals time to re-bid. it doesn't guarantee that you have a winning bid, but it does mean that your top-bid does not participate in the competitive frenzy bidding.

For example: Your rival is prepared to bid £15 on a lens. You think its worth £20.

After you have both bid you are the lead bidder and the auction stands at £16. He gets an email saying "Outbid", he scratches his chin, persuades himself its worth more, and bids £18 ... still outbid. He tries £20 - still outbid - then he tried £22 and is the lead bidder. You then get an email - either you have lost the auction ... or you persuade yourself its worth more!!

Or: you use a Sniping service, put your £20 bid in, and forget about it. The others bid - maybe only the £15 bidder bids, or maybe someone else bid £17, and the original guy comes back at £18 ... when your snipe bid is placed 5 seconds before the auction closes you get it for £19

Another thing about sniping services is that you can put multiple auctions in - lets say that you see the same lens on 10 different auctions. You put them all into the Sniping service, with a £20 bid on each, and then "link" them. The first one that wins cancels all your other, pending, bids. You cannot do that with a "live" bid on eBay, as you can't [easily!] retract the bids on later auctions

 

Me neither ... all power to your elbow though

Worth giving Gixen a try next time you want to buy something on eBay - it doesn't ONLY work with camera lenses otherwise your open bid will just be driving up the price you pay :(

(I'll find & post an example if you don't believe me ...)

 

Mandi, it is an AUCTION
You do not go to an auction room, bidding against someone for an old house to do up and sell
then when the others have finally gone beyond their max figure, offer the auction house the next step in price, win it and say but I have bought it for£150k I really think it is worth £200k, take the extra

So as you can not be there to stick your card up on ebay, you decide what to you would be a fair price you would be willing to pay

Now today it is a wrought iron garden bench. the bids always go up in pounds

Only thing is I want it, too, I recon £24 would be my top bid
Zigs wants it too, he recons £30 max
Scrungee also wants it, he recons £12
You recon it is worth at least £80

The seller does not want to pay the money to ebay to set a price, so puts it up as a free auction

I spot it first, and bid £1 I have the winning bid as the sale is on for a full week, I do not want to sit at the comp all day, so I submit unseen by everyone else my max £24

A couple of days later Zigs sees it, and submits the next bid making it £2, again unseen by everyone else he places his max of £30 as he does not wish to sit in front of the comp bidding everyday

You come along wow what a nice bench for my garden so make the next bid making it £3 again submitting unseen your max bid of £80

Now the bidding is automated, as My bid is beaten, it autos Zigs bid making it £4

Scrungee pics the auction up on his save money site, and quite fancies it, so he bangs in his bid making it £5 and unseen by others makes his max worth £12

Again automatically, the system adds my pound, then Zigs, then yours then scrungees
until scrungee is outbid leaving you Zigs and I, when the auto has used up my max 24 it adds a pound for you making 25, then Zigs making it 26 and so on until Zigs max of 30 is outbid by you, ebay then adds one of your pounds making it 31, and there are no other bidders, when the sale time runs out, YOU GET IT FOR £31

If however some other people join in then it adds their pound etc matched by yours, until they give up at £60 the comp makes one more bid for you and you get it for £61, unless the other bidders keep going until they offer by then £81 you are then outbid and they get it for £81

That is the basic method, there are others where the seller can PAY to put the goods up, then he can set an unseen minimum price and the bids will just keep getting made until someone reaches the minimum price, then the normal bid procedure kicks in

Another more expensive way is for the seller to set a Buy it Now Price

Jack McHammocklashing

 

That's kind of you to say so, but an example can sometimes help

 

Because your original post stated you bid higher than you got it for
ie, the other buyer pulled out at his max, and although you bid a lot more You won the bid with the next pound higher
ie:- the last bidder pulled out at say £25, you bid say £30, THEN you get it for £26 the next increment of the auction ?

Jack McH (You know commercial airlines are hiring)

 

Armandii, when you place a bid with Ebay you are using an automated bidding system and Ebay does know your max, but, as Mr Mc CrummockSplashing ably explained, your max will only be achieved under certain circumstances.

I think Kristen (who is obviously a complete pro at this game) is talking about using an independent bid placer, who will send Ebay your max bid at the last possible minute, much the best way. I'm assuming that's what Gixen is? I use Goofbay, which mostly works.

In fact, if all the bidders in Jack's example used one there'd be even less sitting around in front of computers and probably more bargains!