Fed up with last second bids

[dercoggins]

I getting outbid 4 seconds before the end of an auction, when there has been no other prior bids. These bids are made by anonymous bidders, obviously professionals as they have 30 or so going at the same time. It's no fun any more - eBay must be losing buyers in droves - it's just becoming a commercial marketplace. There needs to be some changes made somehow - of course you can't contact anyone in eBay to complain directly. David

[peternt2001]

 but with sniping I don't get the chance to go "just one dollar more" and take the item.

There lies your problem dercoggins  , if you want to increase your bid even more to try and beat another bidder, you havent put the highest price you are prepared to pay.

And that is a trap that lots of people on ebay do, and it forces the prices up. It is something i used to do, i would think i can go a few dollars higher and then a few more dollars higher and then a few more dollars higher. And before you know it you have won the item and paid much more than you think the item is worth. But i stopped doing that, and now i only bid what i predetermine what i think an item is worth.

This is ebay ,and it is like a bus, if you miss out on one auction there is always another one coming along.

And like someone else said, even increasing your bid by a dollar or two, there is still a good chance that you will not be the winner as the snipe bidder may have entered an amount much greater than a dollar or two. All you are doing is forcing up the end price for the eventual winner.

[thegrump179]

I have great success with last minute bidds.   Not all item on ebay have snippers. Just last night I put a $15 each, last minute bid on 2 items I wanted.  I got them for $5.50 and $4.50

[zenremix777]

The only time when a bid is placed matters is if the snipe bid and your max bid are the same, if you have placed a proxy bid earlier you will win.

Yeah, if you place a bid of $20 earlier than someone else who also bid $20, your earlier bid will remain the highest out of those two. eBay actually encourages placing a bid earlier, as the earlier bid gets priority if two people bid the exact same amount.

[purple.cow]

When I bid for anything on Ebay I start off by entering the smallest bid possible just to get it lined up for later, then the last few seconds of bidding time I hit it with the max price I'm willing to pay for the item.

Sometimes I lose, but many times I win the day, but whatever happens there's nothing to gain in getting upset about being outbid, it's just the luck of the game.

If I wanted to think badly for the bidding winner I suppose I could always think of my contribution as having forced them to pay more than if I had never bid in the first place ]:);-)

[leader-of-the-band]

If real life auctions allowed the same sort of bidding, they would very likely cease to exist.

eBay auctions are nothing like real-life auctions.  For a start, they have fixed end times, they rise in increments, the highest bidder does not always pay their bid amount, and buyers pay no fees/premiums.  Think of it as a tender process where you submit your price, where the highest tender gets to win at one increment above the second highest tender.

[ausgeoff1946]

These bids are made by anonymous bidders...

ALL bidders are "anonymous" to every other bidder.

And because of that, you incorrectly assume that they're "professionals"—whatever that means?

Winning has nothing at all to do with sniping.  A sniper is simply someone who submits his/her highest bid during the last minutes of the auction.  A sniper loses as many times as he/she wins, but at least—unlike nibblers such as yourself—they submit a true and honest bid.

In reality, it's the nibblers that are the bane of eBay auctions, and not the snipers.

[stonehaven10mel]

dercoggins wrote:

"If real life auctions allowed the same sort of bidding, they would very likely cease to exist."

If ebay changes to "real life auction format" like Grays Online I feel they will lose a lot of business. I like to know when an auction is going to finish rather than have it drag on like Grays. I have seen an auction on Grays continue for an hour and a half after the close time because of the "going, going, gone" 15 minute waiting time. I have better things to do with my time. I actually find it more exciting to see who wins the snipe rather than see the creep of prices until someone gives up 🙂

[holdenwise]

haha now that made me laugh...it's an auction...a person can bid to the very last second and right before the fall of the hammer...just like a real live auction...wake up, if you haven't learn't a strategy your doing it wrong.

my strategy is...make a bid, now up your own max bid, do it again and again until you have reached your absolute maximum...I will sometimes make up to 10 max bids until I am happy I have made my Max bid...and don't forget to use odd cents.

those that think auctions are not like real auction are wrong...because it has an end time...the time is the virtual hammer.

Going once Going twice going three times....Sold to the person who really wants the item.

[patchoo78]

haha now that made me laugh...it's an auction...a person can bid to the very last second and right before the fall of the hammer...just like a real live auction...wake up, if you haven't learn't a strategy your doing it wrong.

my strategy is...make a bid, now up your own max bid, do it again and again until you have reached your absolute maximum...I will sometimes make up to 10 max bids until I am happy I have made my Max bid...and don't forget to use odd cents.

those that think auctions are not like real auction are wrong...because it has an end time...the time is the virtual hammer.

Going once Going twice going three times....Sold to the person who really wants the item.

Unlike a real auction if you bid your maximum and no one else bids then you just pay the starting price not your maximum bid. In a real auction if you bid an amount and no one else bids and you win, then you still pay what you have bid... 

[surfajo]

Sniping is great. If you are complaining that people are winning items with 4-second bids, put yours down to 3-seconds. Simple.