You are correct, it is nothing more than hearsay. But when he takes 4 months to actually list something and then doesn't even list it and ends up sending it back to me and it is several times the value of the auction in question - that is the determination I make.

Personally I feel that Rick Probstein and PWCC have the greatest anti-shilling defenses of any sports memorabilia auction house in the known universe. You can see who you're bidding against, how many bids this person has placed and how frequently he has retracted his bid! Do you honestly think no one shills REA auctions? or Heritage auctions? or any other auctions?

I dare you to find an auction house with better shilling safe guards than Rick and PWCC.

Rick gets singled out because the shill bidders are in plain site. Would you prefer an auction house that hides the shillers or one that lets you determine the auction's integrity before bidding?

Shill Bidding
 

I am little confused about all of this shill bidding. I have never bought from Rick but have seen many of his auctions. Seemed like some pretty strong prices but also looked like real nice stuff. If I understand everything from this thread, people consign items to him for various reasons and then (the consignors) bid on their own stuff to hopefully jack-up the prices. If that is the case, and the bidder wins his own item, isnt he legally bound to purchase his own item? Even if you get lucky and bump up the prices on 90% of the things and only occasionally buy back your item, this seems like an extremely reckless thing to do especially if it is big ticket item. Perhaps I am just naive but this just doesnt make much sense to me.

I agree with this 100 percent.

Wrong! Rick gets singled out because he's made aware of the shill bidding in his auctions, but does nothing about it.

How easy would it be for Rick to tell Panky that he can no longer do business with him - ban him as a bidder and as a consignor? Is it really that hard? Is that really asking too much for someone (Panky) that's been caught multiple times shilling his own auctions?

I guarantee you that if Rick would take some action when things like this are brought to his attention (and it has been brought to his attention multiple times), he would be looked upon much more favorably by most board members.

I highly doubt that. Rick isn't even the only auction house that conducts business with Panky, yet you single him out for some reason.

I cannot blame Rick for allowing Panky to consign (especially since other auction houses do the same). This guy will go anywhere else because every other auction house would gladly take him in. The only difference between Rick and the other auction houses is that Rick highlights in big bold letters that this is Panky's collection. Is there any other auction house that would do that?

David, if you had the urge to buy a card from Rick (it's a hypothetical) you would know right away if it was a Panky special or not (because it would be under "The GEM Collection") and you would avoid it. You would also be able to tell with 95% certainty whether or not you were being shilled by looking at the bid history.

Now, if you were to purchase the same card from Heritage, REA, Greg B, Mile High, Memory Lane or any other non-ebay auction house you would have no clue whether or not you were being shilled (because AH's choose to hide the bidding history from us); and you would have no clue if the card came from Panky!

Why are you not furious with all the others? It is unfair to single out the only AH that still provides us the tools we need to protect ourselves.

Huh? What are you talking about? You entire post makes no sense, especially the part I quoted. What tools does Rick provide to us (or anybody) that we need to protect ourselves?

Reread the posts above.

If you were to purchase an item from a Probstein123 auction you would have the following tools at your disposal:

- You would be able to see what collection the consignment came from, allowing you to avoid certain consignors (i.e. The GEM Collection).
- You can see how many unique bidders you are bidding against (a handy tool used to spot shill bidding).
- You can see how many bid retractions other bidders have (a handy tool to decide if you're up against shady characters)
- You can see how often someone is bidding and their bidding patterns (vital to spot shill bidding)

Name one auction house that provides these tools.

Are you saying the onus is on the buyer to root out shill bidding??
And if it is happening, the best way to handle it is to not bid?

Wow, I don't even know where to begin. Let me start by giving you a friendly suggestion. Stop typing. You sound ridiculous at this point. You really do.

Rick and PWCC don't have anything. This is provided to anyone that wants to list an item on the eBay site...and I'm surprised eBay still allows people to see the bid history as they have gone out of their way to protect shill bidders by blocking eBay usernames, but that's a whole different conversation. To hear you tell it though it's some kind of exclusive service only offered by Rick and PWCC. Not!

But, ok, I'll bite. I'll play along with it. So now that Rick and PWCC offer these wonderful tools to protect us bidders (Praises to Rick), what happens when it's discovered there is shilling taking place and it can be pinpointed to a certain consignor? Huh, what then? What good is it to have these wonderful tools that Rick has provided to us (Praises to Rick), if nothing is done about the shilling when it's pointed out?

As far as I know this just simply isn't true? Show me were you see the name of the consignor or the collection it belongs to. Here is one of Panky's listings, show me where it says it is his (The GEM Collection). Edited to add: You can search for a certain consignor (e.g. The GEM Collection), but if you are just browsing eBay auctions and open up one of Rick's listings at random, there is no way to know which consignor it belongs to (as far as I know).

http://www.ebay.com/itm/2003-Fleer-U...item53fd3386b4

Again, just friendly advice. Stop typing and save some face. Your comments are ridiculous.

Jason - I have no stake in this but it would seem to me that these protections that you refer to are provided by ebay, with the exception being able to see The Gem Collection.
I wonder if Mr Probstein would provide such protections if ebay did not.
I have been reading this thread with curiosity and interest but I don't know Mr Probstein nor have I ever bid in his auctions.
I would be curious to know if you think he would provide such protection and information if he was not using ebay and perhaps used simpleauctionsite.com

This post is pretty awesome. Rick should probably pay you to post here.

No, I am saying Rick Probstein provides more tools for the bidder to detect and defend themselves against shill bidding than any other auction house.

Panky aside, Rick has banned shill bidders and he is usually pretty good about it if it's obvious. When was the last time REA or HA or Mile High banned one of their bidders?

I'm thinking he already does. :D

I am still challenging anyone here to name one auction house that has more safe-guards in place to prevent shilling.

You can't completely prevent shill bidding...the auctioneer will never know 100% if an item is being shilled or not. What you can do when you are made aware of a shiller is ban them from your auctions. One very obvious shiller seems to be immune from banishment.

jhs - one more time, what do you think Mr Probstein would do if ebay did not provide all the protections you have mentioned, would he go through the time and trouble to list all those things himself if he ran his auctions on an independent platform?

Of course he wouldn't...the fact that his chosen platform shows bidder activity is a thorn in his side.

Could you please specify which of these tools Mr. Probstein provides? Because these are all eBay's tools, from what I can see.

Also, can you please give any examples of times Mr. Probstein has ended items with apparently blatant shill bidding or any other of the shenanigans that have been pointed out?

How do you know he's banned any shill bidders?

Question.. I never dealt with probstein but just realized an item I have been watching is a BIN from him. I know he consigns for others, but is his stuff usually legit? Comes with a COA from Hollywood Collectibles in FL. After reading the posts not sure I want to deal with him, but I like the item.

This is simply deflection. You're trying to make one person's faults seem OK by finding fault with others, others who were not even the subject of this particular thread. Ever hear of two wrongs don't make a right?

My opinion would be the same for any seller who followed these practices, I don't have an agenda for or against Probstein either way. But reading this thread, there seems to be more than enough proof that Probstein is aware of the issue and is choosing to simply ignore it. For you to say Probstein has no accountability only because eBay happens to provide a way to see that shilling is going on is ludicrous. He could stop it from happening altogether and make this a moot point, yet instead he chooses to allow it to go on. I'm positive many bidders do not go through the trouble of looking at bid history and the like. By Probstein allowing this Panky guy to continue shilling, my opinion is that he is banking on the fly-by-night buyers who are going to get shilled and never know it happened to them. That is completely shady. If you have a problem and it's made blatantly clear to you, you fix it, or you suffer the ramifications to your reputation. Sounds like he's made his choice.

Der.ek Oue.llette

Hollywood Collectibles is Rich Altman's operation and I've always understood him to be very reputable.

Thanks Derek.