I really hate waking up to see this over and over again...

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Another ended auction...I had the high bid when it was ended and I had a signifigant snipe set. Oh well.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=011&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWA%3AIT&viewitem=&item=320085117750&rd=1&rd=1

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Posted By: David Smith

You mean like the J=K Candy card the other day??

I totally agree on both. The board also better not hear about who won these bitching later about auctions ending early.


David

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

All's fair in love, war and emailing ebay sellers so I emailed the seller to let them know they probably got screwed. Perhaps the didn't, but hey....all's fair. Right?

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Posted By: Frank Wakefield

Not wanting to rub salt in the wounds,

but what if you tried a serious bid instead of a serious snipe? Or email the seller up front and let him know he's got a good card there, and folks will try to steal it by asking him to end it early? Or what if you start emailing and asking them to end early??

Your serious snipe strategy has failed again, maybe another strategy is in order.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Frank is right. In perhaps my best ebay buy ever, I emailed the seller early in the week and insisted that she not sell early, that there would be plenty of bidding. There is nothing wrong with letting on that the seller has a good piece; in fact, that may be the best way to make sure the auction stays live.

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Posted By: David Smith

Frank,

Good advice but what happens when you try to E mail and eBay gives you that "because you and the seller have no prior business" message and will not let your E mail go through??

David

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Well...it's not like this was sitting at the opening bid. Both Jamie Wasserman and myself had bid this up to $400 with a lot of time left in the auction. I figured that was probably good enough to show the seller that he had a serious auction going. I guess I was wrong.

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Posted By: Steve M.

Create two ebay accounts. Bid it up one against the other to show the seller that there is some interest in the item. This is an especially good technique if it is a higher priced item but the $200 hasn't yet been hit. It will allow you to hide your identity.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

This auction was already up to $400. I'm guessing the seller got taken on this one though bacause the reserve on this auction was $125. The seller had no clue what they had. What do you suppose that Gehrig and Alexander will grade out at when the buyer soaks them off and sends them in?

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Posted By: Cobby33

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. If it's something you can't live without, beat the other guy (or gal) to emailing the seller. As long as eBay allows this practice, there's nothing we can do about it.

P.S. There is a way to email an eBay user without a "history" with them.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

My post should not be taken as sour grapes as I have partaken in the emailing the seller game in the past....Not once has it worked and in fact the last two times I have done it I got both items for far less than I offered the seller. I did not do it this time because I recognized Jamie as the other bidder.

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Posted By: Scott Mosley

David,

Could you post a link to the J=K auction that you said was ended early the other day?

I'm curious to know which card it was.

Regards,

Scott

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Posted By: dennis

there is the "ask seller a ? about this item"

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

The seller has emailed me back and he has not sold the album.

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Posted By: David Smith

Scott,

I had this on my watch list and then it disappeared. As far as I can tell, it was an uncatalogued card. Dan E mailed the seller to let them know what type of card it was.

c19160 Unlisted Strip (?) Card--FLYNN, Pitts. Nal. Item number: 200082411940

David

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Posted By: Glenn

It seems to me the seller probably "ended this listing early because of an error in the listing." What he or she is auctioning, after all, is not so much a scrapbook as the baseball cards inside. Once this becomes clear, it's reasonable (though unfair to the early bidders) to expect the seller to relist the item in the category that will generate the greatest revenue. Is that what the seller is indicating, Dan?

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

He told me that he was getting a lot of emails from people wanting confirmation that these were all York Caramel cards - he said he was going to remove them. I told him that he should not do that unless he knows exactly what he is doing or he could signifigantly lower the value of those cards. I told him if he didn't feel comfortable removing them he should auction off the pages seperately - the fact that they are attached to scrapbook paper will not affect the final value as there are buyers out there who will be able to remove these with no problem. I think we will see these relisted - they are no longer a secret, but hey I was pretty convinced they had already been sold offline. That's not the only auction in my watchlist that was ended this morning....I won't even mention the other one now other than to say "Christy Mathewson"

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Posted By: Glenn

Rough weekend. On the bright side, if you're finding all these ones that are ended early for this reason, you must also be finding some pretty sweet deals on the ones that aren't.

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Posted By: RC McKenzie

Because I often bid early on items to bookmark them, I've noticed a trend that many items end early on ebay. About 5 to 10 percent of my bids are cancelled. I've been on ebay since 1998 and I'd never seen this bid cancelling stuff until about 2 years ago. I had vowed to never try to email a seller and try to get them to end an item. After a while, I decided to try to email a seller. It was 2 weeks ago when I saw an n167 boxer pop up in the tobacco section. I emailed the seller right away because I was sure that she did not know what she had and would end it early. I sent an email to 'ask seller a question' stating that I'd like to buy the card outright if she would consider ending it early. She emailed back that it would be unfair to others if she ended it early and I was being inconsiderate of others by my suggestion and possibly breaking ebay rules. I emailed her back saying I agreed with her and that I apologize. I'm resigned to the fact that most decent stuff listed by non-dealer/collectors will end early. I've accepted it and will not contact a seller in the future.

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Posted By: Jim Clarke

We should all contact him... At least send him a thread/link of us talking about it... Many people try to get sellers to end auctions early.. I will fess up and say I have done it a couple of times. But I have also had people from this board blow it for me by griping at them and sending links where sellers backed out of deals as well. Plus I had two deals bought out from underneath me..

I know we all have a certain bonds we each other here. But if someone ended a complete run of zeenuts with coupons early for a small amount of money... Would you be happy to know that your friend from the board got a GREAT buy on the deal or inform the seller he got ripped and could have made at least double the price. I know it is hard to find out final sale price on these deals.. But most of the time if you just tell them what your snipe bid was, the seller comes clean.

Someone nailed me on the 1910 PC796 postcards last month on Ebay.. I'm sure no one will fess up to it and thank you for posting it by the way. I should have demanded the seller overnight ship them to me... My purchase price which was paid thru paypal was probally more than what they would have sold for....

JC

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

ARGHHHH!!!! I woke up this morning to another ended auction....the same seller who ended the Mathewson yesterday.

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Posted By: David Smith

I have decided that if I see anything on eBay that I am even remotely interested in or that I think is rare and apt to be sold before the auction ends, that I am going to E mail the seller (if I can get thru) and tell them the item is worth an exorbitant amount.


David

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

David, one would have to trust the seller not to shill bid if they believe that you are going to bid a certain amount. The last two times i have made an offer on an item before it ended I got the item for about $250 less each time....I was lucky that the seller didn't shill me because my proxy bid was already at my max.

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Posted By: Bob

It would be nice if whomever convinced the sellers in these ended auctions had the cahones to post on this board and let others know. I did this a few months ago (rarely do it) and got crucified by a couple of posters but at least I had the guts to do it. There are a lot of hypocrites on this board who convince sellers to end auctions early and yet keep mum about it and a few who even bad mouth buyers who do this and yet do it themselves. Pathetic...

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Posted By: Cobby33

Playing the proverbial Devil's Advocate...
If eBay allows this practice, then why should the participants "out" themselves? Why should there be any shame in partaking in this sanctioned activity?

And no, it wasn't me who emailed this seller.

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Posted By: Steve M.

I did it. Yes I did. Got three real nice Rose Postcards, including a Keeler, by being aggressive and making the seller an offer he could not refuse. Got a little slack when I posted the Keeler on the Recent Pickup Thread but so what.

I did it again. Yes I did. Seller's only condition was that he revise his listing with a BIN that we had agreed to and we did the deal. At least this guy was honest with ebay.

And come to think about it when a seller is honest and is unwilling to do something against ebay rules you might want to try the BIN method.

Edited to say "nor was it me who emailed the York seller"

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Posted By: Bob

Cobby- I wasn't taking a swing at you, hope you don't think I was.
Steve M.- No one ever accused you of not having cahones
My point is that when some one asks "who ended the auction early and would they identify themselves?" and then that person gets trashed, it certainly doesn't make anyone else eager to receive the same treatment especially when I know that a couple of the "trashers" have done the exact same thing in the past but don't have the guts to admit it.
Sorry if it sounds like I was venting, I guess I was. For example, I'll be honest, I needed the 1910 150 series Obak Wolverton to complete my set and yes I emailed the seller before there was a single bid to see if he might end the auction early and sell it to me. I had been looking for 8 years for the card. The seller said he preferred to let the auction run (I ALWAYS let my own auctions run full term) and I respect that. The main reason I emailed him was to make sure someone else didn't make an offer to him and the card would disappear. Based on my assurances from the seller, I felt comfortable and went all out on the card, having a snipe bid almost $600 more than the card sold for because I desperately needed the card. The funny thing is at auction the card went for almost the exact figure I offered the seller.
Would I do it again? You bet. I generally do this only once or twice a year but would do it again if it were a card that I just couldn't find anywhere else. What I DON'T like is someone posting some sanctimonious b.s. that ending auctions early is unethical and yet they have done it before but won't admit it, that's all.

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Posted By: Cobby33

tbob- no offense taken and trust me, i feel your pain- i've been a victim of this more than once.

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Posted By: barrysloate

I don't understand why a buyer should feel bad about this. You make an offer to an ebay seller, who has the right to accept or reject it. If he accepts, the buyer is doing no wrong. I think the burden lies with the seller, who either stupidly sells the item too cheaply, or at the least cuts ebay out of their fee.

We've discussed ways of preventing this, such as getting a couple of people to put in bids roughly equal to half the value, thus cluing the seller that he has something worthwhile. Now that everyone's identity is hidden, you can place these bids without tipping your hand.

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Posted By: Steve M.

And Barry as I posted above you don't even really need two people just two ebay handles.

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Posted By: barrysloate

That's true Steve. Sniping is a double edged sword. If everyone waits to snipe, the seller may think there is little interest in his item.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

I have started placing initial bids again now that it is impossible for another user to track my bidding - and I still use a sniping service. In the past with the old ebay system I rarely ever put a bid in until the auction was nearing the end.

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Posted By: Steve M.

You can be a your own shill.

On a high end item Bidder 1 (me) will bid $200 and immediately Bidder 2 (me too) will bid $202.50. This will keep the identies hidden under the new ebay format.

Now if its a real high end item and you want the seller to believe there's a couple of people really interested, then just keep topping yourself over and over within your limits.

Edit:

It just occured to me "whilst" I was doing this that I too am a "we".

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Posted By: barrysloate

That really exposes how bad the new ebay system of bidding is.

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Posted By: Steve M.

Bad for who?

This is not seller shill bidding. No one is hurt nor does ebay care if I, as a buyer, want to bid myself up. More moola for them and for the seller. Win-Win for ebay and the seller.

Edit:

And if you really want to fool the seller have three ebay handles. I do.

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Posted By: barrysloate

You could argue having three ebay handles doesn't hurt anyone...you could also argue that there is something wrong with it, too... especially when each handle is bidding against each other.

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Posted By: David Smith

Barry,

The way I see it the buyer is cheating. An example would be the uncatalogued J=K Candy (Flynn) card that ended early the other day. I don't have a lot of money to bid on cards but I thought that one was something that would be in my affordability range.

When I went to bed the night before, it was about $36 dollars. When I woke up and then left in the morning the price was the same. My plan was to come home later and bid $50 (not my maximum) but at least an increase to show the seller there was another person interested. However, when I came home, the auction had ended. To me, that is cheating.

If the listing had been a Fixed Price or Buy It Now type, then I wouldn't feel so bad because someone just beat me to it. However, an auction is an auction. All the cheater who won the card had to do was roll out of bed (naked for all I know), get a bowl of cereal, turn their computer on, find the card, contact the seller and then pay them. No real work and no real effort or sweating out the final minutes involved in a real auction.

David

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Posted By: Cobby33

Oops- wrong post.

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Posted By: barrysloate

David- I understand your point but in a perfect world, if a buyer made an offer, he would be turned down 100% of the time. But ebay allows it to happen, and if a seller says yes, what can you do? I get asked to close lots on ebay pretty regularly, and I turn the buyers down every time because my policy is not to close. But I likewise know I could if I wanted to without breaking any rules. The whole thing stinks, I know.

Could you imagine someone calling the Mastro people during one of their auctions and asking "what would you want to sell me lot #28 outright?" It's preposterous to even comprehend, but on ebay it's business as usual.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Maybe ebay should make a penalty for sellers who end auctions early. I think they have penalties for people who continuously cancel bids. Maybe they could be suspended for ending too many auctions???

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Posted By: Dylan

As far as i know when someone lists an item for sale on ebay they own it, and they can do what they want with it. I dont like the practice of ending auctions early, but if someone sent an offer you couldnt turn down, i think most would take the offer. All that talk above about bidding strategy and that, save it for Robert Edwards or Sothebys, this is ebay, the wild west of auctions, if you dont like it there are other, more policy dictated, formats available.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

I have never consigned anything to one of the major auction houses so I don't know their consignign policies, but what would they do if after three or four days into the auction you called them and said you wanted your item back?

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Posted By: Steve M.

I am reasonably sure that if I called Mastro and asked them to contact the consignor of Lot 28 with an over-the-top offer that Mastro would do so. In fact, unless its consignment contract prohibits it, I think Mastro has a duty to pass such an offer along to the consignor. I could be wrong? Comments?

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Posted By: barrysloate

Steve- that's interesting. Just how over the top would it have to be? Keep in mind that if they did it once, they would start getting offers left and right from wealthy bidders for rare items. If the practice became epidemic, I think their business would take a huge hit. I don't think they would do it.

And if a consignor called me in the middle of one of my auctions, I wouldn't return a lot. Why should I? If that were allowable, auctions would fall apart. Imagine if a consignor called and said "a friend of mine just made me a great offer for my T206 Cobb, so could I have it back?" It would just be a farce. Not allowable.

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Posted By: David Smith

Barry,

That was my thinking, also. I could just imagine Bill Gates deciding he wanted to start collecting baseball memorabilia and gets a Mastro catalog or checks on-line and decides he wants it ALL and makes an offer for everything before the auction starts.

Can you imagine people checking items on-line and getting their catalogs and seeing what they were going to bid on only to have Mastro Auctions call or contact them and say that there is not going to be an auction because everything has been sold already? That is the equivilant of what is happening now on eBay.

David

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Posted By: barrysloate

Ebay is too big to care.