Bidding ends - 1 click bid not set to win

[jetmin5]

I dont often bid, and know the advice to lock in your max bid with auto bidding before.

But.. does anyone know about situation where I was outbid by small amount towards the end of auction.

Suddenly one click bid offered me a bit to $25.00 (well I assumed it offered this to get ahead, with 30 seconds to go).

But it did not get me ahead because the winning bid was also $25. 

Why would it offer me a click bid at the last minute which does not put you ahead (the winner had locked that in 3 minutes earlier but the highest bid was not showing $25 at that stage).

At the end, my bid of $25 came in several seconds to go but was not accepted owing to the auto bid.

Why does ebay offer a 1 click bid option if it is not high enough to beat the auto bid of another bidder?

Thanks!

Jetmin5

[padi*0409]

The eBay bidding system would not know what the winner's highest bid was, and because their maximum bid of $25.00 was entered before yours then they win the bidding.

[imastawka]

That screenshot shows you were outbid by 2 seconds.

Snooze and lose it seems.

[kopenhagen5]

What the other muskateers said.

If two bidders put the same amount, the first gets it.

(all for one...............stay safe) 

[springyzone · Accepted solution]

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@jetmin5 wrote:

I dont often bid, and know the advice to lock in your max bid with auto bidding before.

But.. does anyone know about situation where I was outbid by small amount towards the end of auction.

Suddenly one click bid offered me a bit to $25.00 (well I assumed it offered this to get ahead, with 30 seconds to go).

But it did not get me ahead because the winning bid was also $25. 

Why would it offer me a click bid at the last minute which does not put you ahead (the winner had locked that in 3 minutes earlier but the highest bid was not showing $25 at that stage).

At the end, my bid of $25 came in several seconds to go but was not accepted owing to the auto bid.

Why does ebay offer a 1 click bid option if it is not high enough to beat the auto bid of another bidder?

Thanks!

Jetmin5

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The suggestions that come up when you are bidding are always (I think this is correct, it is what i remember from the past) for one increment ahead.

So if the current highest bid was for $20, it might say 'bid $21 or higher'.

The thing you have to remember is the system cannot give away any bidder's secret maximum amount that they typed in days or hours earlier. That absolutely has to stay private.

The auto bidding will only go up an increment at a time from where the bidding is actually at. Often auctions might never even reach a person's maximum.

It sounds to me as if the bidding got to $24. So the prompt urged you to make another bid to take it above that amount. $25. Which you did.

Where you came unstuck is the other bidder had also popped in $25 earlier so their bid beat yours. What you did was push the price up for them though, from $24 to $25.

You ought to be glad it works this way.

Just for a moment,  think what the scenario could look like if it followed your suggestion.

Let's say the bidding on an item-any item, not necessarily the one you just missed, stood at $24. You went to bid and the prompt showed something like 'bid $41 to win'. You would think, aha, that winning bidder must have a max bid of $40. Nope, I am bowing out. I won't bid any more.

But if you could see that max, so could anyone else. The seller might have a mate sitting next to him with a phone, watching the bidding and what would stop him from making a bid for $39? He would know he wasn't going to win but he would push the price up for his friend.

My only suggestion is when bidding, don't always follow the prompt. Make your own mind up, especially if it is the closing seconds of an auction. Sometimes having an odd amount eg $25.30 can help win it too.

[lyndal1838]

I agree with springyzone......never ever blindly follow the amount suggested by ebay.   Every other bidder will do the same thing.

Make the bid your own amount with preferably a number of cents on the end.   If you had bid just one cent over the ebay suggested amount you would have won.

[jetmin5]

Thanks to everyone for their advice:-) That all makes sense.. and the lag time on my laptop would not help. 

I am curious that if ebay has geared its selling towards the ''silent auction'' via the automatic bidding system (makes sense) plus ''buy now'' which is making it a simple retail purchase..... then.... why have this silly last minute auction thing happening at all??

Apologies, delay in reply was that I found it hard to find my post going thru ebay customer service options. Will go via community.ebay.com which seems to take me to a different area with discussion board. 

thanks~!

[imastawka]

For future reference, to find your post, when you get to the discussion boards, just click on your user name.

It will show your posts there.

[lyndal1838]

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@jetmin5 wrote:

I am curious that if ebay has geared its selling towards the ''silent auction'' via the automatic bidding system (makes sense) plus ''buy now'' which is making it a simple retail purchase..... then.... why have this silly last minute auction thing happening at all??

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This "silly last minute auction thing" has been available for many years.....it is not new.

It only appears on an auction if you have placed a bid early.....the option becomes available so you can increase your bid at the end of the auction.

I very rarely ever saw it as I used to snipe at the last minute anyway and as auctions are not as popular as they used to be they often go with a single bid now.   I am sure there are many members who have no clue what it is all about as they have never seen it.

It is a left over relic of the time when there were bidding wars on ebay and many of us oldtimers found it useful.

[springyzone]

Back in the old days (about 15 years or so ago) just about every item was sold on ebay via auction. A lot of the items were being listed by what i would call mum & dad sellers, private sellers.

These days, a lot of the items seem to be listed as buy it now & they are being sold by small businesses or sometimes by big businesses. It is no longer the same sort of site it used to be ie a bit of an online garage sale.

You can still find some auctions and there are still sometimes several bidders on some items, so it is useful to know how the bidding system works and how to put in an auto bid. The thing is, even if you put in an auto bid, it will only go up to your secret maximum and not a cent over, so if someone else is online at the end of auction and bids higher or has put in a higher auto bid, you won't win.

I have occasionally won auctions in the closing seconds by making a decision to bid a bit higher. My computer can be a bit slow so i never leave it less than 10 seconds before the end. Even so, I don't win them all, have lost a few. It's a funny thing but you can put in an auto bid for x amount but if you are on in those closing minutes and someone bids higher, it can make you reconsider and decide to go just a dollar or two more. And when you get beaten by 50c it can be frustrating but realistically, you never know what actual maximum the winning bidder had. I once watched an auction for 5 sets of unused curtains & rods. I had an auto bid of about $200 or close to it. The bidding was $10 but went up to roughly $45 or so in the final seconds. I could see people madly upping their bids by $1 and $2 at a time. 33, 35, 40 etc. I knew though that they had no hope unless they went to my max of $190 or whatever it was. I guess the losing bidders later might have regretted not going a bit higher eg to $50 to try their luck, but the thing is, that would not have won it. They weren't to know that though.