Bidding process

[bela-1370]

I bid on an item an upped my bis in the last two minutes of the bidding process and I could see on the bidding page the time was passing away and there was no change on new new bids that came up. To my surprise I got an email telling me that I lost my bid by $1.00.  How can that be when I had the bidding page with the time lapse opened right to the last second and it showed no new bid.

I tried to reach customer service or a chat line but to no avail.  I am not impressed with eBay and would welcome any constructive comment.

bela

[retroman_studios · Accepted solution]

There are programs that can "snipe" or place a bid in the last second of an auction, too fast for the timer you saw to even register.

When you make a bid, place your full bid, the full amount you are willing to bid, and walk away and don't worry about the timer. The only way to win against snipers is to use a sniper app yourself or bid your absolutely max amount and try and reason that the sniper has a budget and he won't be able to change his max fast enough because when he snipes, he only has a micro second to make changes.

[reallynicestamps]

In addition.

The winning bid could have been for $100 more than your maximum bid, or even $1000.

Or $1.50.

The eBay automatic bidding program will only add one "increment" to the underbid (yours) when processing the bids.

So if you bid $20 maximum and I bid $25 maximum, I would win at $21.00.

No one sees the winning bidder's maximum bid.

[shoppingchannel-us]

Hi Bela:

Like the other replies bid sniping is a common practice at almost all auctions these days even live ones lol. The more attention the auction gets, the more chances at last second bidding. ( Called bid sniping).  As for these so called tech programs even they can't knowingly predict the outcome because it too comes down to how much the sniper is willing to pay.

It's perfectly legal in most countries and really it comes down to how much someone is willing to pay for the item. You should take a moment and think about how much you are willing to pay then enter it and let the chips fall where they may..

Professional bid snipers usually gauge how how many bidders there are and how many times the item has been bid on, the less bidders on the auction means a perfect opportunity to get the item they think is worth it.  But the flip side of the coin also means that a low price doesn't mean they could win the auction, if your bid that you put in is higher that what they are willing to pay then chances are you may win that auction.

It really comes down to how much you think it's worth and enter that amount in the bid. If you win hey that's great.

Hope this is helpful.