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  #1  
Old 11-22-2025, 02:46 AM
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Gary G01db3rg
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Default How is this even possible?

I like to think I'm pretty savvy with eBay, but today I've experienced something that has me truly flumoxed. I received a notification for a card on my want list. It had no bids and a starting bid of 99 cents. So I make a max bid of $150 expecting that it'd be the hugh bid (at least for a while until someone outbid me). But no - immediately I'm outbid...even though I was the opening bid. When I look at the bid history is shows that a higher bid was placed 5 hours before.



How can that be the case? If they bid higher than me, wouldn't there have been at least one bid at 99 cents before me? How can I be the opening bidder at 99 cents but a bid was submitted 5 hours before?

Its highly probable that I'm just being stupid. If so, please educate me.

Thanks.
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Last edited by UKCardGuy; 11-22-2025 at 03:03 AM. Reason: Added photo link
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  #2  
Old 11-22-2025, 04:06 AM
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Geoff Bedine
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Default How is this even possible?

Quote:
Originally Posted by UKCardGuy View Post
I like to think I'm pretty savvy with eBay, but today I've experienced something that has me truly flumoxed. I received a notification for a card on my want list. It had no bids and a starting bid of 99 cents. So I make a max bid of $150 expecting that it'd be the hugh bid (at least for a while until someone outbid me). But no - immediately I'm outbid...even though I was the opening bid. When I look at the bid history is shows that a higher bid was placed 5 hours before.



How can that be the case? If they bid higher than me, wouldn't there have been at least one bid at 99 cents before me? How can I be the opening bidder at 99 cents but a bid was submitted 5 hours before?

Its highly probable that I'm just being stupid. If so, please educate me.

Thanks.
Gary G01db3rg

It looks like the Bidder above you placed his bid 5 hours before you with a Max Bid of $152.5 or higher. Since you placed a max bid of $150 it automatically bumped his bid to $152.50.

You must not have actually been the opening bidder as there was already a bid at .99 according to the bid history.

You may have seen Opening Bid 0.99 but it probably said “1 Bid”.


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Last edited by premiercardcollectors; 11-22-2025 at 04:08 AM.
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  #3  
Old 11-22-2025, 04:33 AM
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If you are "g*" then it appears you're right.
According to the history shown, the opening bid seems to have been made by you, as there's nothing between your bid and the starting price.
Is it possible that the phantom bidder had a snipe bid that kicked in because it was triggered by your $150 amount??
I don't use (or have enough knowledge about) any of those apps, but could that potentially be the reason??
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  #4  
Old 11-22-2025, 05:11 AM
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Yep, i'm g... in that bid history.

The bidder at 152.50 couldnt have nid before me because i was the first bidder. When i placed my bid it showed no bids. I was the first bid at 99 cents.
I dont think it could be a snipe app, because that would just look like another bid and it wouldn't be 5 hours before mine.

I've seen soemthing similar on Pristine where i bid on a pennant that had no bids....and then i was automatically outbid even though my bid was the first bid. I just stopped bidding there because it seemed iffy.

I'm now seeing this on ebay. Something doesn't feel right to me.
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Last edited by UKCardGuy; 11-22-2025 at 05:13 AM.
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  #5  
Old 11-22-2025, 07:11 AM
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Default Simple explanation

Other bidder has a DeLorean with a flux capacitor.
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  #6  
Old 11-22-2025, 07:13 AM
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I use snipe tools but they usually don’t place a bid until the last 3-5 seconds of an auction. So much BS going on with auctions now.


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  #7  
Old 11-22-2025, 07:28 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by premiercardcollectors View Post
It looks like the Bidder above you placed his bid 5 hours before you with a Max Bid of $152.5 or higher. Since you placed a max bid of $150 it automatically bumped his bid to $152.50.

You must not have actually been the opening bidder as there was already a bid at .99 according to the bid history.

You may have seen Opening Bid 0.99 but it probably said �1 Bid�.


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If there had already been an opening bid of $0.99 made, the OP wouldn't have been able to place a bid for $0.99. I don't have any other explanation for what could have happened, but it is definitely strange.
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  #8  
Old 11-22-2025, 08:51 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by UKCardGuy View Post
Yep, i'm g... in that bid history.

The bidder at 152.50 couldnt have nid before me because i was the first bidder. When i placed my bid it showed no bids. I was the first bid at 99 cents.
I dont think it could be a snipe app, because that would just look like another bid and it wouldn't be 5 hours before mine.

I've seen soemthing similar on Pristine where i bid on a pennant that had no bids....and then i was automatically outbid even though my bid was the first bid. I just stopped bidding there because it seemed iffy.

I'm now seeing this on ebay. Something doesn't feel right to me.
Are you bidding from the UK, as your signature suggests? I have noticed from time to time that timestamps are sometimes based on the location of the system server. For instance, I'm in central time zone USA, and when dealing with a website based on the west coast, timestamps sometimes appear relative to their time zone.

Can you post a link to that auction, so we can see what the bidding timestamps look like to us in the USA?
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  #9  
Old 11-22-2025, 09:15 AM
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Did the auction originally have a hidden reserve of $150?
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  #10  
Old 11-22-2025, 10:08 AM
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Default Definitely strange

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark17 View Post
Are you bidding from the UK, as your signature suggests? I have noticed from time to time that timestamps are sometimes based on the location of the system server. For instance, I'm in central time zone USA, and when dealing with a website based on the west coast, timestamps sometimes appear relative to their time zone.
This is the only thing I have read that even seems plausible. Definitely quite strange. I do not think Ebay is "shilling" - in a worst case scenario some type of glitch.
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  #11  
Old 11-22-2025, 11:14 AM
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Yes, im in the UK and using the ebay app set to the US region. Its a good suggestion about the timezone for the servers but ebay normally shows the times absolutely not by timezone. For the more technical amongst us, I'd expect ebay to be standardizing times to UTC and then converting the the local time for each user. I think I'll need to raise this with eBay for them to investigate.

I had thought about a hidden reserve too but that would show as reserve not met rather tha a competing bid. The the other bidder isn't the same at the one who listed the card. Is it possible that a large seller has some way of rigging the system?
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Last edited by UKCardGuy; 11-22-2025 at 11:21 AM.
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  #12  
Old 11-22-2025, 11:28 AM
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I though chatgpt might actually be useful for this as I couldn't think of any explanation. Does this fit your scenario?

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  #13  
Old 11-22-2025, 11:36 AM
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Does the auction show a cancelled bid? The high bidder could have bid an extremely high amount to feel out your bid and then cancelled his bid immediately. He would then know you were at $150 and bid above that.
It would only take two bids to get to $152.50.
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  #14  
Old 11-22-2025, 03:37 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by NiceDocter View Post
Other bidder has a DeLorean with a flux capacitor.
Bravo, sir!
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  #15  
Old 11-23-2025, 10:30 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JollyElm View Post
Bravo, sir!
Anytime you see a flux capacitor you know you need to be careful. Widgets fall into that category in certain circumstances.
.
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  #16  
Old 11-23-2025, 06:26 PM
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The whole situation is really weird. A quick look at a world time zone map tells me that I have bid from around 18 time zones and never had anything even remotely similar happen.

Last edited by doug.goodman; 11-23-2025 at 06:27 PM.
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  #17  
Old 11-25-2025, 02:35 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Leon View Post
Anytime you see a flux capacitor you know you need to be careful. Widgets fall into that category in certain circumstances.
.
Likewise, a rotating basel. They can be very nasty.
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