ebay .. outbid ... what the point ?

[markmarkymark]

Yo all ...

Ok, I'm new to ebay and do not know all the tricks. ..

Anyway, I bid on an item I know would not be required by many - it was a specific piece of radiation monitoring equipment for which only a few of us would want (or have any idea was it was).

I put a bid in on Friday (the only bid) .... then 10 seconds before the bid closed this Sunday evening, somone came in with a higher bid ....

Its got to be a bot ...seriously, I do not believe someone was sitting there clicking the mouse ready to out bid me ...

Am I missing something here ... ??

cheers

MArk

It happens, to be fair Ebay does advise you to monitor the item you have bid on.
I guess someone ou there knew what it was and wanted it. After all they are now obliged to pay for it.

he would have seen the date the thing eneded and then got as close to possible and waitied

[aliferste]

Its called sniping. You wait untill the last minute and then bid. Most people do it, its pretty common practise really.

If your prepared to pay more you could have bid more and then the snipe might not have reached your bid.

Sniping can be automated as well, so the person that sniped you may not have even been logged on.

[ZrByte]

Originally Posted by gary_580

If your prepared to pay more you could have bid more and then the snipe might not have reached your bid.

Yeah, I do this often, use the proxy feature of ebay to try and outbid anybody who waits until the last possible second.

Kind of makes a mockery of the auction being open for several days if all the action takes place by bot in the last few seconds!

[Tricky]

I've just sold something on EBay this evening, 10 day auction item sat at £30 until 2 hours before closure and it went to £60 and in the last 10 minutes went to £95 (mostly in the last 60 seconds) - If you want something put your Max bid on proxy and hope it's enough

[Julian]

Originally Posted by Chris T

Kind of makes a mockery of the auction being open for several days if all the action takes place by bot in the last few seconds!

Exactly - what ebay should do is to randomly close an auction 1 minute early to stop that nonsense.

Originally Posted by Julian

Exactly - what ebay should do is to randomly close an auction 1 minute early to stop that nonsense.

Or extend the auction after every bid. After all thats what happens in a really auction.

[aliferste]

Originally Posted by gary_580

Or extend the auction after every bid. After all thats what happens in a really auction.

Thats what used to happen with Yahoo auctions.........a great feature!!

[MadGamer]

Originally Posted by Tricky

I've just sold something on EBay this evening, 10 day auction item sat at £30 until 2 hours before closure and it went to £60 and in the last 10 minutes went to £95 (mostly in the last 60 seconds) - If you want something put your Max bid on proxy and hope it's enough

That happened with my dads old JVC Video Camera. It went upto something like £230 in the last 30 seconds.

[Matth]

ALWAYS proxy bid the amount you would be happy to pay, and not just the amount required to currently hold a winning bid - you can raise your bid, even if you are currently holding the winning bid.

The anti-snipe measure that I recall at another one, was the option to automatically extend by 5 minutes on any activity - ok, a bidder that's WATCHING, could still snipe, but it would take the advantage away from robot autosniping - that is just unsporting!

I've sniped, and I probably never bid early unless probing to see if the reserve is within my limit.

[Julian]

Originally Posted by gary_580

Or extend the auction after every bid. After all thats what happens in a really auction.

I like that idea.

Originally Posted by gary_580

Or extend the auction after every bid. After all thats what happens in a really auction.

In *some* types of auction...!

Ever been to a (Reverse) "Dutch Auction"?

In a Dutch Auction the price starts at, eg £200 and drops by eg £5 increments until someone bids, at which point the auction closes.

In a Reverse Dutch Auction, there's a timer (IIRC it used to be a candle set to burn through a string that would drop a hammer on a bell) that determines when the auction closes, the last bid received before the bell gets the item.

It's a way of ensuring that auctions don't go on too long.