Cancelling Bids

[pineapple_deliciousness]

I am selling a couple Waeco fridge freezer covers and have had quite a lot of difficulty with cancelled bids and withdrawn offers.

I have had to relist the items several times because the only bidder/buyer has "misread" the listing and the item has gone unsold. It clearly states in both the title and description that the items I am selling are for the cover only, but these people have claimed that they thought it was for the fridge as well.

The last time this happened, the bidder went to ebay before even messaging me about cancelling a bid. They were then extremely rude and obnoxious about wanting to cancel the bid - I was very tempted to leave the bid there and then open a UIC against him.

I have no issue with cancelling a bid/tranaction or declining an offer if a customer is polite and calm and asks to do so within a reasonable time frame - and usually if I have another bidder for a second chance offer. It is relatively easy to cancel a bid while the auction is still running, I can also give my own reasons for doing so - rather than select a reason that is always against the seller, as you do after the auction ends.

My question is whether I can deny a cancellation (before the item ends) if the bidder claims to have misread a listing? For these two items I want to add to my description something along the lines of "This listing is for the cover only. I will not cancel bids or transactions because you do not read a listing thoroughly." Am I within ebay policy to state this in my description? The help pages on ebay say that I can cancel a bid/transaction at my discretion but not whether I can state that in my terms of sale.

Thanks for any help.

[diecastcarsvicki]

my thought is you should put at the top of the listings in big bold writing in red this listing is for cover only. then buyers would have a hard time disputing that fact of what they are bidding or buying.

[k1ooo-slr-sales]

I suggest that the first picture that a member sees when they go to your listing be of the cover only WITHOUT showing a fridge at all.

The picture requirements changed recently, and I would have to go back and look them up to see how they would affect your fridge cover listing, but I think I remember that eBay really tightened up the picture requirements with regards to showing things in your pictures that are not part of the listing.

I know that you are showing the cover and how it would look on a fridge, but there is another way to do the same.  I will find some listings that demonstrate this and will post links to those listings.

[pineapple_deliciousness]

I was considering something like that. But I thought that even the price I'm selling at would indicate that these were not fridges. The fridges usually retail somewhere around $1000 new, so finding a new one for $140 should raise some eyebrows. I might just make any statement about the cover and cancelled bids in bold and capitals.

Thanks for the reply.

[pineapple_deliciousness]

I had read about the new requirements but I had only seen them in regards to the photo size now being 500 on one side. I'll definitely swap the photos around so that the photo of just the cover is the main image. I'll see if I can edit at least one of the others to remove the fridge so it can just look like the cover. I'll remove the one I can't edit.

Thanks for the heads up - I would be interested to see if you could find any examples.

[pineapple_deliciousness]

Update -

I have relisted both covers. I've updated the listing so that the main picture is of the packaged cover, and the second is of the cover, upright with no visible parts of the fridge.

I have also included the following line in bold.

"This listing is very clearly for the cover only. I will no longer cancel bids because of failure to read the title or description."


I don't know whether they may actually sell this time around - but it should hopefully remove any time wasters.

Thanks for the advice.

[k1ooo-slr-sales]

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@k1ooo-slr-sales wrote:

I will find some listings that demonstrate this and will post links to those listings.

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it was harder for me to find a listing with the type of picture I was looking for.  Anyway, take a look at the picture below from listing # 400667575942 for a camera lens accessory.  The actual item appears normal but the camera and lens which are not part of the listing have been made opaque in a photo editing program.

[*crikey*mate*]

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@pineapple_deliciousness wrote:

I am selling a couple Waeco fridge freezer covers and have had quite a lot of difficulty with cancelled bids and withdrawn offers.

I have had to relist the items several times because the only bidder/buyer has "misread" the listing and the item has gone unsold. It clearly states in both the title and description that the items I am selling are for the cover only, but these people have claimed that they thought it was for the fridge as well.

The last time this happened, the bidder went to ebay before even messaging me about cancelling a bid. They were then extremely rude and obnoxious about wanting to cancel the bid - I was very tempted to leave the bid there and then open a UIC against him.

I have no issue with cancelling a bid/tranaction or declining an offer if a customer is polite and calm and asks to do so within a reasonable time frame - and usually if I have another bidder for a second chance offer. It is relatively easy to cancel a bid while the auction is still running, I can also give my own reasons for doing so - rather than select a reason that is always against the seller, as you do after the auction ends.

My question is whether I can deny a cancellation (before the item ends) if the bidder claims to have misread a listing? For these two items I want to add to my description something along the lines of "This listing is for the cover only. I will not cancel bids or transactions because you do not read a listing thoroughly." Am I within ebay policy to state this in my description? The help pages on ebay say that I can cancel a bid/transaction at my discretion but not whether I can state that in my terms of sale.

Thanks for any help.

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By law, no, you can't. A bid is an offer which can be withdrawn or rejected at any time prior to acceptance (which in an online auction occurs when the auction finishes). Thus as the auction has not finished, the bid has not been accepted and can be withdrawn.

I think eBay has a policy though that you can't retract or reject a bid within 12 hours of auction end

Curious why, if the auction is still live why the buyer just doesn't retract their own bid?

*shrugs*

[*crikey*mate*]

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@pineapple_deliciousness wrote:

I was considering something like that. But I thought that even the price I'm selling at would indicate that these were not fridges. The fridges usually retail somewhere around $1000 new, so finding a new one for $140 should raise some eyebrows. I might just make any statement about the cover and cancelled bids in bold and capitals.

Thanks for the reply.

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don't forget that many sellers fall prey to the eBay Propaganda wagon of starting auctions at 99c to attract more bidders, so I don't think that in the current climate that anyone can claim "scammer" or apply the notion of common sense that an item worth a $1000 would be listed at a higher starting price.

Not everyone realizes that you're supposed to list an item at the lowest price you're prepared to accept for the item.

I don't even think that most people realize they're engaging within the realms of contract formation.