how long is a proper time to wait for payment on an auction before offering it to the next highest bidder after contacting winner?
As a general rule, 4 days is plenty of time. After that, if haven't heard from them, then open an unpaid item case. Their are lots of non paying bidders on eBay. A common excuse is "I was on vacation." If you really were on vacation, then you should of at least told the seller ahead of time.
Hello Riff, Please allow some time for other folks to answer your question. There are some people at CT that have much more experience selling on Ebay & I'm sure they will respond to your query. I've had buyers mail payment which of course can take several days. Perhaps you could post a link to the auction for which you are awaiting payment? The specific payment instructions for the auction would be a good place to start.
Write to the original bidder first. Some people just don't know how things work. I've had people waiting on payment from another person, but never told me that until I asked if they were still interested in the item. Instead of investing 30 seconds of their time, they just "assume" you're a patient person. Before offering it to someone else or lodging a non-paying bidder complaint and leaving negative sounding positive feedback, try communicating with the original winner.
Also did you send an invoice? Did you list something about a payment time frame in the auction? In the past I have paid for auctions as soon as I won them - but on some they say wait for invoice(one case took 2 days for them to send invoice)? I think as already mentioned you just need to drop a message to the original winner and maybe they just forgot. I know I won a heritage coin once, missed the invoice and forgot about the auction.
I would just wait about 3 days, and if no payment is received, just send them a message. If they don't respond within a day or 2, then you could offer it to the next highest bidder
im not stressing. i am new to selling on ebay and just trying to get a general idea of what i can expect, and what is an acceptable amount of time to wait after an auction. just wanted to know when to say "hey buddy...".
You can`t offer to the next bidder until the original transactioon is completed. I give people 4 days to pay, if they havn`t paid by then they get two reminders in two days. If still no payment then I open a NPB dispute, if they don`t pay after 4 days then the dispute is closed in your favour and you receive a final value fee refund and the high bidder gets a non payment strike. You are then free to relist or do a second chance offer.
I do what Daveydempsey said. Also when you list your auctions, set the bidder requirements to remove people who have two non-payment strikes against them in 6 or 12 months. All of my auctions are listed that way now and I have a lot fewer problems. And there's somewhere on eBay where you can look and see who tried to bid on your item and was blocked. I have a surprisingly large number of people like that.
Listings on eBay can state from the seller(s) that buyers have 3 days after the close of auction, or BIN, to pay for their items.
