What is the policy on cheating buyers who retract their high bid, then bid lower and buy the item?

[bee1956nut]

There is a buyer who lurks around the Thai jewellery stores. 

She/he likes to make huge bids on items, thern once he/she has seen how high the other bidders have goneor are prepared to go, she retracts her high bid, he/she goes back and places a lower bid.

ie she places 380 bid on an item, then watches how high the other bids go, then she retracts her high bid and goes back and bids lower.

I thought if you retracted a bid on an item, that you were not supposed to bid again, unless it was a mistyped amount, in which case you must bid again immediately. She rebids days later.

Is what she is doing agaisnt policy? The sellers lose out too!

[bee1956nut]

Thanks for the help springyzone and others  (except dave)

Very kind and I appreciate it : ))

Cheers

[digital*ghost]

I was basically going to say the same thing as dave, but with kope's reasoning...

That is, there is absolutely no point it vastly outbidding literally everyone else to find out their max bids, then retracting that bid to place a lower amount and still end up the winner and paying one bid increment higher than the next highest bidder regardless. (eg if an item is sells for $100, it doesn't matter if the max bid is $101 or $5000). 

The only logical point to that kind of practice, or object to it, would be to lose the auction but maximise the sale price, which is shill bidding, but having days in between retracting and replacing the bid is odd, especially if there's been further bid activity, though it could just be a way to avoid suspicion of shilling and guaranteeing a minimum sale amount (traditional shill method is to nudge up the price continually without going over). 

Just out of curiosity, how many auctions does this member actually win? 

[bee1956nut]

They win hundreds of auctions ( personally I think they are buying for a shop) and retract bids on almost every item they bid on.

[bee1956nut · Accepted solution]

Excuse me, I came here for the FIRST time to ask a question
.
Instead of being polite and helpful, Dave implied that I was a cheater too, and said that I am just griping because i was beaten on a few auctions because I din't bid high enough.

I doubt the sellers I deal with think that considering the tens of thousands of dollars I spend with them!.

If his way of helping is to disparage a person for asking a question, well i find THAT offensive.

[imastawka]

Instead of being polite and helpful, Dave implied that I was a cheater too, and said that I am just griping because i was beaten on a few auctions because I din't bid high enough.

Nope, I didn't get that from Dave's answer.

In fact I agreed with his post.

If his way of helping is to disparage a person for asking a question, well i find THAT offensive

Didn't pick up on any disparagement either.

As I said, if you don't like his answers, then ignore them and choose the answers

you like.   Most people do that when they come here asking for help

It would be a strange world if we all agreed

[bee1956nut]

RE digital ghost

My error - not every item, but nearly half.

Out of 1116 they have retracted 521 times.



Cheers

[springyzone]

Out of 1116 they have retracted 521 times.

----------------------------

That is shocking. Truly staggering.

If they are buying a lot though, I can't work out why they are doing so many retractions.

I can understand it if they retract and leave someone else to carry the can of a higher price, that's shill bidding.

But if they want the items, then exposing the top bids of other buyers is useful, but not totally so as sometimes buyers change their mind and go a bit higher or else someone else comes along and bids at the last moment.

Whatever is driving them, it should be stopped. Ebay should have acted on that account long ago. It is ridiculous for anyone to have 521 retractions. No excuse for that.

[platypusseeker]

dave the question made perfect sense, perhaps you should not be so quick to be answer if you dont get what someone is asking

[*tippy*toes*]

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@platypusseeker wrote:

dave the question made perfect sense, perhaps you should not be so quick to be answer if you dont get what someone is asking

---

Dave's reply makes perfect sense. Maybe you should not be so quick to reply to long term, very experienced, respected forum members when you have no idea yourself.

[bee1956nut]

This is what I mean and here are some specific items to refer to:

She is still at it. ---  go look at these items:

232056577813
232056577859
232056577892
232056434064

see how she bids high, then waits to see what others are bidding, then retracts her bid and bids lower.

I always undersdtood that this was not allowed and is cheating