How eBay Sellers Fix Auctions

Boj writes "The Times online is carrying stories on fraud carried out on eBay using shill bidding. Citing eBay's changes to security as aiding the shill bidders and this fraud: "Last November eBay changed its rules to conceal bidders' identity — making it even more difficult for customers to see whether sellers are bidding on their own lots.""

Comments

Reserve Not Yet Met

[eldavojohn]

Am I the only one failing to see the damage done here?

Ok, so I've used eBay and I know there's a "Reserve Price" option for an auction. You set it when you start the auction and if the bids never crest that benchmark, you are under no obligation to provide product/service for amount tendered.

Now, that said, I will concede that a "Reserve Not Yet Met" sign on an auction will cause me to over look an auction. I feel less like I'm getting a deal if that phrase is staring me down. I will also mention that the more bids on an auction the more desirable it is to me (childish, I know, but hey I'm human).

Now, on the other hand, if I were an seller, I could think of a thousand ways to simulate bids. Configure a friend's computer on the other side of the country to forward my internet traffic, for one. And then the cat and mouse game between eBay and I would begin. And what would happen? eBay would have to spend a lot of time investigating this stuff. A lot of time and resources. Only to do what? Send me a nastygram asking me to use Reserve Prices next time? Place a black star next to my name to let bidders know I've been known to use shill bids? Social stigmas of some other sort?

In the end, who cares? eBay should keep it in their TOS & simply let people know that professional seller often practice this. You're not going to find the same deals on eBay that you'd find at some middle of nowhere country farm house liquidation auction where you have to show up in person and stomach 8 hours of farm tools and the worst BBQ lunch sandwiches you've ever tasted.

Re:Reserve Not Yet Met

[corbettw]

You'd be surprised how poorly that tends to work. First off, when you set a higher starting price, you pay higher listing fees. Second, when the price is set low initially, it can help trigger a bidding frenzy. Especially when someone decides they're willing to pay $100 for your item, so they put that in as their max bid, but their initial bid only shows up as $1. So when someone else enters a bid, it quickly starts going up and up and up. Next thing you, people are bidding hundreds of dollars because they're now emotionally invested in getting *that* item.

The psychology of eBay is pretty fascinating. I used to buy and sell on there quite a bit, and have a friend who started his own sell-it-on-eBay company, using just the tactics I described above. Sometimes you'll end up selling for less than you wanted, but more often than not you make a killing.

Hmm

[Anon-Admin]

I don't have a problem with it. It has happened and will continue to happen. What I have the biggest problem with is the "Second Chance Offer." I have bid fair price on many (one of a kind) items only to get out bid by something that looks like a shill account. After the auction ends the seller makes a second chance offer to me at the price of the highest bidder.

So I bid 10$ on an item that I am willing to pay 10$ for, Some one outbids me and the number goes to $11, I up the bid to $15 and am again outbid 1$ at a time. At this point I walk away. I then get a second chance offer to buy the item for the 17$ high bid. What makes me even more suspicious is when the same item is then relisted and the pattern repeats itself.

In all honesty, it's e-bay, It is not worth getting worked up over! You win some and you loose some. If you think the seller is a ripoff, add them to your favorite sellers list and put a note stating your opinion of them. Then make sure you do not buy from them again. It would be nice if E-Bay offered a way to tag sellers you do not want to do business with and let you ignore there listings.

Re:now wait a sec...

[Se7enLC]

Let's say there's an auction for an item you want. Nobody has bid on it, yet, so you throw in a $50 bid. You would pay $50 for it, but for the moment, it's sitting at the $10 starting price.

You end up winning the auction for exactly $50. Is it because the other guy only wanted to spend $49.50 and you happen to have outbid him? No, it's because the shill bidder put in increasingly higher bids until they outbid you, then canceled the bid saying "oops, I put in the wrong amount". Or they keep the bid, default on the payment, and the seller will use eBay's "Second Chance" bid to allow you to pay for it at your previous bid (which was the $49 or whatever).

If the seller wants to guarantee a minimum price, they should use the reserve price. Or better yet, use the STARTING BID. You're not fooling anyone listing an item at $1 and then setting a reserve for $30, just start it at $30. If it's worth $30, somebody will buy it. In my opinion you should be required the validate by address, credit card, bank account or other form before you are allowed to have an eBay account. That way fraudulent bidders can be held accountable.

Re:Ebay - Where there is a sucker born every minut

[JudgeFurious]

ebay is a great place to find automobiles but admittedly you have to be careful and you have to be willing to get up off of your butt and go look at the car. I've bought two cars off of ebay and in both cases it took me a long time to find the vehicle I was looking for. When I did I was entirely comfortable paying that sellers "Buy it Now" price and in both cases I went to look at the car in person.

  For basic transportation it's not necessarily the way to go. Chances are most people have at least as good a selection within driving distance of them at various dealerships in their area. If you want something a little out of the ordinary though it's a good place to find it.

Ebay's Shill Bidding is even WORSE than that

[arete]

I had a shill bidder push me up, then literally bid OVER my price, winning the bid themselves. And I stopped bidding. Then they RETRACTED their bid (which is supposed to already be suspicious) to make sure they didn't win.

I reported them to Ebay, back when the names showed, along with various evidence that the accounts were tied together. (The previous-name of one of them was real-name type username with the same last name as the real-name type username the other one was using... from the same city.)

I did not get my money back - although it was only $1, and it was still a reasonable deal on the item. And I wasn't willing to refuse to pay because I didn't want to screw up MY feedback, and I didn't have enough transactions to make it unimportant.