Ebay Reserve Auctions

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Posted By: Steve M.

I suppose that sellers having a reserve on their listing do so for a legitimate purpose, i.e. to protect their investment. Some sellers will disclose the reserve in the item description, some will not. Some sellers will specifically state in the description that they will not disclose the reserve. Now here is the rub:

An item on which I am the high bidder has not met reserve. Let us say that my bid is in the low four (4) digits. Another bidder places a bid in the low five (5) digits that meets the reserve. The reserve is in the mid four (4) digits. The bidder then discovers that he bid the wrong amount and immediately retracts his bid. Now two things have happened. The second bidder knows the reserve and I get an email telling me that I have been outbid. The email naturally tells me the current bid which is the reserve.

Now my question is this...how does our seller feel about the fact that two people know his reserve?

Oh, and by the way, the second bidder then placed another bid over my high bid but still under the reserve. I thought that once you retracted a bid that you were not allowed to again bid on that item.

Comments?