Buying from ebay

[Burnerman]

I lost an auction bid at the weekend.....I placed my maximum bid for the item (£1000) and as everything was stable at £840 for almost half a day before the auction ended I smugly thought I couldn't lose...... up to that point the incremental bids were going up at £20 a pop.
Literally 5 sec before the end, I was gazumped by 22p with no bids before that.
What's going on? Is it possible for someone to access my maximum bid without my knowledge?
To be beaten by 22p seems a little unlikely!
John

 

[Mottie]

You’ve been sniped! You should never put in a round number bid. I always put in a single bid seconds before auction end and have won things by a lot smaller margin than 22p. Someone obviously put in a bid for £1,000.22 just before the end which will trump anything below that leaving no time for a second bid. There are automated services that will do it too - one of them is owned by eBay. https://www.auctionsniper.com/

 

[HERTS P&D]

I think it's called 'ebay sniper' where they pay a company a percentage where it will go over the last bid in the last few seconds.

I have been caught out before and not been happy.

Andy

 

[JohnD]

there are autobid tools that can whiz in bids just before the auction ends, faster than you can press the buttons.

 

[Burnerman]

Fair comment, but surely a wild coincidence for that specific amount? That was £160 above the previous bid!
John

 

[Burnerman]

I think it's called 'ebay sniper' where they pay a company a percentage where it will go over the last bid in the last few seconds.

I have been caught out before and not been happy.

Andy

Hells bells that's a bit below the belt! I've got no problems being outbid at all but that sucks.....these companies obviously can access my maximum bid!
John

 

[SirGalahad]

In the English Auction method the price gets bid up until the auction closes so in theory you can hide your bid until the last moment. Some auctions have a rule if any bids come in the last minute then the auction get automatically extended for a predetermined period of 5 minutes.

You simply got sniped by an automated tool. If the bid is genuine then the item will be sold or not and will be relisted.

 

[Mottie]

No. Their tool will only snipe up to the buyers maximum bid. As I said, if you maximum price was £1,000 and you change that to £1,000.01 then that bid will automatically beat a bid of £1,000 put in at the last minute, even if the item was stuck at 50P! The fact that it beat you by 22p confirms that. A sniping tool would have beaten your bid by the bid increment which is in whole pounds.

 

[Burnerman]

Seems like I need to invest in an automated tool Live and learn!
John

 

[SFK]

Burnerman,
As other have said, it is because of the ebay system -> the highest bid at the close of bidding is the one that wins and will be charged (not the amount of the highest bid, but) slightly more (say £1) than the second highest bidder.

Hence, my rules of bidding on ebay:
1) Never bid [until seconds] before closing time as you are only increasing the price for yourself and others.
2) Never bid [until seconds] before closing time as its shows your interest so others will be more prepared to snipe you.
3) Decide how much the maximum is YOU are willing to pay for the item. <<< THIS IS CRITICAL
4) Use a good computer/PC (not tablet), to make you bid.
5) Logon to ebay 5mins before closing, and tell kids to stop downloading/streaming.
6) Type in your maximum you are willing to pay. So even if the item is at £3, if you are willing to pay say £100, type in £102.45 (always best to add some change to remove those that bid exact numbers)
7) Go through the biding screens till you get to the last one (I remember there being two boxes and the last being whiteish box with timer in corner), and then wait.
8) And then depending how good your Internet is, you computer connection is, and the slight error that ebay include.....
9) Press the bid button as close to 1 or 2 or 3 seconds left as you can (I normally chicken out at 4sec).
10) Then all the snipes (as others will have done the same) are compared by ebay.
11) If someone bid more than your £102.45 (in this case) then you lose, but as you selected the "maximum is YOU are willing to pay", you have not lost as you did not overpay.
12) If yours is the highest bid you will win, but note that you will not pay £102.45 (unless someone bid say £101), you will pay say £1 more then second highest snipe.
So in the end you may get a bargain, or you may pay up to the maximum YOU are willing to pay, or you may loose it because it is more expensive than you are willing to pay. So all win-win.

Risks.....
- I have lost bids because I pressed the Bid button too late and the ebay countdown is not 100% accurate and/or my internet connection not perfect.
- The automated systems can win. But I often beat the Automated systems as they seem to bid at 5-10 seconds, and remember, they will have have been instructed to only pay the maximum that their users is willing to pay.
- I kick myself because someone else bid is more than the "maximum is I was willing to pay" (buyers remorse - if only I had bid £1 more!). But this is foolish as the other bidder may have bid £200 more, but as the ebay system only charges the winner slightly more (say £1) than the second highest bidder (in this case you), you will never know that (This is a cleaver way that ebay uses to keep you bidding)..

SFK

 

[Burnerman]

Good advice and thanks to all that have replied!
Missed a gem, dammit
John

 

[alan333]

I'll sell you that item for £1001.22 plus postage.
Kind Regards
Mr Snipe

 

[Notch7]

I use Gixen $6 per year!

the time limit of 6 seconds is set as standard. But actually the time doesnt matter as Gixen submits an automated bid, so it will keep increasing its bid until it either wins by an increment above the other highest bid, or it reaches the maximum youve set.

Gixen is sent from an online server so you dont need to worry about your own internet connection.

The only advantage is that it hides the bid until close to the finish to stop other people seeing your hand.

You dont know how much you lost by, the other bidder might have bidded a maximum of £2000!

 

[Ian H]

I bought some 50mm Celotex yesterday got there is was 25mm.

I said that's 25mm, guy said no it's inch so 50mm

 

[Mottie]

1) Never bid before closing time as you are only increasing the price for yourself and others.
2) Never bid before closing time as its shows your interest so others will be more prepared to snipe you..

Err, you MUST bid before closing time or you won’t win anything! I think SFK means you need to bid as close to closing time as you dare.


Notch7 "You dont know how much you lost by, the other bidder might have bidded a maximum of £2000!”

The other bidder bid £1,000.22. If he had have put a maximum bid of £2,000, it would have gone to £1,002 or an exact pound bid depending on what the bid increments were.