Bidiots getting smart?

So this has happened twice in a week for me, from 2 different bidders. Someone wins a coin for WAY more than it's worth, then within a couple hours after the end of the auction, they email me something like this, "Please cancel this transaction. I thought this was the quarter, not the half dollar and don't want the coin." Now, the problem is, I have a full return policy. So even if I enforce their winning bid, one of two things can happen. 1. They never pay and 6 days later they get an unpaid item strike. or 2. They pay and take advantage of my return policy, then after we jump through those hoops I'm at risk of getting a bad feedback because they're irritated that I didn't cancel the transaction. I feel like I'm dodging negative feedback bullets, so I've just been granting their requests for cancellation. I know buyers have all the rights on eBay, but I am quite certain that these buyers simply have buyer's remorse. They want to win so they put in a giant bid, but if it goes too high, they make up excuses to back out. I wonder, should I ignore these type of e-mail requests and just open a case and let that process run it's course?

 

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seems unfair to me. If you clearly state it was a half-dollar, then the other guy clearly shouldn't get a refund. I mean, can his guy read or look at pictures? its not that hard.

 

I don't sell a lot on eBay but it seems easier to just cancel the item and not get the negative feedback. I would only do this for a first time offender. If someone did this to you more than once, then I would open a case. Or, if in the buyers past feedback he has a negative for doing the same thing, then I would open the cases as well. We all make mistakes but when it's shown that he/she has done the same thing in the past, then they don't get that courtesy of just canceling the transaction.

 

It isn't worth fighting them. Ebay will always find a way to side with the buyer.

I have never used it, but I believe there is a function to block certain users from bidding on any of your auctions. You could do that and at least you'll never have to deal with the same person twice.

 

I've never had this happen, but I've heard about it enough that it's among the top reasons I haven't sold on FeeBay in a long time.

IMHO - For auctions to work properly, bids need to be legally binding. If you're the top bidder, then you just bought the item. They way FeeBay is running it, the top bidder has first dibs on the item. If they want it, great! If not, just walk away.

I would assume the best thing to do in these circumstances is to offer the item to the next highest bidder. When you do, does FeeBay disregard all the bidding activity from the bidiot? For example:

Item starts at $1
Bidder A bids $100
Bidder B bids $50
Bidiot bids $101.01 and wins.

When you make an offer to the second highest bidder, in this case Bidder A, do you get to set the offer amount, or does FeeBay automatically select either $100 or $51? There are valid arguments for and against all three options.

 

I would file an unpaid item claim immediately. In the end, you may end up having to either cancel the transaction or give a refund, but that will protect you from negative feedback. Ebay will not allow negative feedback if the seller submitted an unpaid claim.

 

eBay has a "Second Chance Offer" feature. It's all legit, with eBay getting their cut.

 

If I recall correctly, last time I got a Second Chance offer, it was at my max bid.

 

I would also say just offer the coin out to the underbidder. If someone is trying to weasel out of their bid, they are just going to return the coin or worst. If someone really has such low class as to not honor their bid, don't you think they wouldn't feel bad about trying to play games like "returning" and empty envelope to you, claim a package was never received or the coin wasn't in the package, etc? I would, so I would simply block the bidder from future auctions and offer it out to the underbidder. If not, reauction it.

Life is not worth the hassles sending the coin out to someone who has already shown you his moral terpitude IMHO. I didn't wake up today thinking I would use the phrase "moral terpitude", but there you go.

 

I'd provide the bidder an out, then place him.her on your blocked bidders list as Doug says.

As to the 2nd chance offerings, I hate them. They are always at your max bid and I NEVER accept them because they provide an avenue for seller abuse. The last one I got I was 2nd bidder.
High bidder: 89
My bid: 88
Next highest bid: 50
Now assuming the high bidder drops out, then the current bid price should drop to an amount just above the next highest bid, or $51... NOT my max bid !!

NEVER EVER,, I mean NEVER, accept a 2nd chance offering ebayers. Very easy to abuse this feature.

 

I had a string of deadbeats one week. One of the lamest excuses was when a girl claimed that her little brother thought it would be funny to bid using her account.

It is not your responsibility to play ebay police. Just cancel the bid, block the buyer and relist your item.

 

You can also report the buyers if you want, just click on their feedback and there should be a link on that page that allows you to report them.

 

I always block them so they don't do it to me twice. Also, I've used second chance offer probably 30 or more times over the past year (Yes, that many. I sell 125-185 coins a month on eBay and average 4 non-paying bidders a month). And of those roughly 30 second chance offers, I've had two accepted that I can recall. And one of those two was a repeat customer. The two coins I am refering to in the OP are currently up for second chance offers. Another piece of interesting data... over the past year I can only recall 4 or 5 of my coins that had to be totally relisted (due to non-paying bidders), sell for more than the original bid. I should follow-though with opening cases, so they see some sort of consequence, but I'm still stuck on how "it doesn't seem worth it" when it comes to vengeful buyers.

 

BTW here are a few excuses/reasons I can recall (for your entertainment):
1. My kid got on my account and went crazy bidding. We can't pay.
2. I thought it was the half dime, not the dime.
3. I don't know what happened. I only bid $___, not that much. eBay's system must have messed up.
4. My daughter had to be rushed to the hospital, I need the money for bills.
5. I thought I needed an 1835, but it's the 1836 I need. I can't buy this because I don't need it.
6. I didn't see the scratch in the pic until after I won, so I'm just going to return it unless you agree to cancel instead.

 

I was a moron once (maybe more times) and put in a quick bid on one of those silver plated bars that read "In Clad We Trust" Recognizing it immediately I sent the seller an e-mail and admitted I screwed up and would go through with the sale, but requested that he let me back out. He did. Don't know if he blocked me, but sure hope he did, don't really want any of those bars!

 

That's one of the ways that it can be abused.

But put yourself in the shoes of the seller. It could very well be there was someone else out there with a snipe set up for 85, but since the bidding went to 89 before the final seconds, the other bid never got placed.

But I wouldn't go that far either. What if the bids were closer:

High bidder: 89
Your bid: 88
Next highest (and not the same bidder as the high bidder): 87
Next highest (and not the same bidder as the high bidder): 86
Next highest (and not the same bidder as the high bidder): 85

If they offer it to you for 88, there's probably not any seller abuse going on. Or if there was, it probably didn't work the way they wanted it to.

 

One of the lamest excuses I've heard is a guy I know who regularly bids on car parts for restoring cars. He says he doesn't have time to follow auctions and get in bidding wars, so he just takes whatever he would normally bid, and multiplies it by 50x or so. For example: A part that he might be willing to pay $100 for, he'll bid $5099. When he wins it, then he checks the closing price to see if it's acceptable. If not, he just tells the seller he meant to bid $50.99, but must not have put in the decimal. He said he's never had to pay for an item he didn't want. The worst part is he somehow thinks he's sticking to FeeBay when he does this. He refuses to believe that he's making life hard on sellers since they can just offer it to the next guy in line. :rollling:

ETA: Oh yeah, and to make things worse, I think he's 22 or 23. But when he contacts the seller, he says he pretends to be elderly and that he can't figure out these darn computers.