Buyer cancels his bid on one of my coins the other day… no big deal. Happens frequently in this business. But then he does it again two days later. Same coin. So I send him a message that he’s done bidding on my coins from now on, and I block him. He proceeds to send me a message explaining that he’s just trying to see the top bid so he can come in and snipe it at the end of the auction. You heard right…. He openly admits that he’s abusing the bid cancellation policy to manipulate the bidding so he can pay the least amount possible to win. Hope that makes sense to everyone: In other words there’s no hidden top bid anymore because he’s throwing in a big bid to see what it will take to win and then canceling until the end of the auction. So in this case he bid $575 and saw that he was “winning” at $550. So he cancels his bid and then plans to bid $551 in the last second, all to save himself a few bucks and manipulate the system. And this guy is PROUD enough to think there’s nothing wrong with this. Anyway he proceeds to send me a half dozen more messages calling me names, cursing me out, and telling me he’s a cop who’s 6’4” 290 etc…. I told him to quit being a Karen and reported him to eBay twice. They flagged his account but he’s still selling and apparently able to buy and bid still. PM me for his eBay i.d. if you want it.
Ouch lol sounds like another selfish insane nut job sorry you had to go through what happened.Some people are just that way and weren't tought better or are just pure ass.
Admitting to the crime was pure arrogance on his part. And hiding behind a keyboard cussing you out was pure cowardice. Take him to the cleaners bud.
eBay’s response was just that they would be watching his account. He just messaged me again (poking fun?) of the fact that the coin has a low number of bids. Idk. Trying to draw me into a keyboard war, I guess. I’m done responding, but he keeps yapping.
All he really has to do is bid $5000 at the end of the auction instead of $50.00 and he will find out what the high bid was Ask me how I know...
Yes, he's pretty scuzzy which just shows the extent some people will go to save a couple of bucks. And his response to you clearly shows the kind of person he is. If he's actually a cop, that's kinda scary! But I have to admit to being puzzled about his strategy. Yes, he's doing a price discovery strategy but only regarding other bidder's CURRENT maximum bids. His strategy ignores other bidders' sniping activities. If other bidders are static, then his strategy might work. But other bidders are not static, they also are looking to put in last minute bids. So, bidding $1 over his "price discovery" information doesn't seem likely to win, at least not often. I have no objection to sniping, I do it myself. But I always snipe in the maximum amount I'm willing to pay and then let events unfold as they will since I can only control myself and not others.
My father taught us when we were young'ens that during a heated 'discussion' if someone starts raising their voice, lower yours. This little act of calm actually works to infuriate the other person because you're not buying into their anger and raised voice. I equate this to today's internet trolls. That being said, after you reporting them to eBay I'd have ignored, with no response, any antagonistic message your eBay troll attempted to bait you with. YMMV but this strategy has worked well for me over the years. Good luck with this keyboard warrior coward.
Right, me too, I consider it "sniping" when I put in my max bid in the last 5 seconds of the auction in an effort to not give anyone a chance to bid higher if my bid is the highest.
Yes this has been happening a lot lately. I don't auction anymore and am starting to remove the 14 day return to returns not accepted. Some will hold the high bid until the last 12 hours and retract. Then it kills the auction. Most bidders have moved on and the retraction hurts. And yes, the first time I have any problem I block them. I have blocked some who pm ridiculous offers just because I don't want a future problem.
If you're puzzled about his strategy, consider that he may in fact be a real live moron. I did, and then found it made sense.
This is an even more sleazy strategy. The 2 highest bids are sometimes the same person using different accounts. It creates an artificially high price to discourage other buyers from bidding. Near the end, the buyer cancels his highest bid and it reverts to his other account's next highest bid (typically a lot less)..... so they win at a more modest price than it might otherwise have been. Sleazy buyer wins, seller loses money. I changed to fixed pricing with best offer many years ago because of this. You can verify by looking at the bidding history of the winner's other auctions.
Even more agitating are sellers who cancel the sales because the price didn't reach their exaggerated expectations.
While I always wait until a few seconds before the auction close to bid, I throw out a realistic number very close to market average. But what he does, is where I draw the line. Simply unethical. Most might consider my logic wrong, but bidding closer to the market average with seconds left actually favors the seller more often than not if the next highest bid was maxed just below my own as opposed to half of the value before my bid.
