Posted By:
Kevin CummingsI'm not familiar enough with other auction houses to speak intelligently to their practices, but eBay, in my mind, is not strict enough with sellers to prevent this from happening.
If a trade was the reason for canceling this particular auction I can't say that I'd totally disagree with the seller's motive. Chances are he was selling the item to raise money to buy something else he wanted/needed. But having the cash to buy a rare sports collectible and actually being able to find what you want/need are two different things. If he was presented with the opportunity to fill a hole in his collection, it's hard not to say he made the right choice. If the only reason he canceled the auction was to scoot out from under the eBay final value fee, then it was just a cheesy way to save some money.
Good motive or not, however, anyone who was a bidder or might have eventually been a bidder (and perhaps the winner) got shut out. The only way to cut down on the frequency of canceled auctions is to penalize the seller monetarily for ending an auction early and then suspend him if he does it too often.