Same buyer cancelling early bids late in auction

[medalsbadgespatches]

HAD a buyer who bids early then cancels his bid late in the auction. I have reported them to Ebay AGAIN and of course they will report them to Ebay Trust & Safety AGAIN as stated in the past. They are now blocked by me but why does ebay allow this type of member to continue with clearly deceitful / fraudulent behaviour??

[medalsbadgespatches]

Customer Support Chat Transcript - SR# 1-26905398455

[*crikey*mate*]

because a bid is an offer and an offer can be withdrawn at anytime before acceptance (ebay policy says 12 hours i think) so at the end of the day, nothing much eBay can really do as they can't overrule the law.

[2106greencat]

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@*crikey*mate* wrote:

because a bid is an offer and an offer can be withdrawn at anytime before acceptance (ebay policy says 12 hours i think) so at the end of the day, nothing much eBay can really do as they can't overrule the law.

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Except that there are only a few (acceptable) reasons to cancel a bid - so yes - once a buyer reaches a certain amount of bid retractions that are not acceptable by eBay's protocol, they should be suspened, but............. they are not.

Ads to the 12 hour rule - that is for the seller to remove an item from sale as far as I know.

[*crikey*mate*]

firstly, eBay would have to prove the bidder had breached policy by providing an invalid excuse. I doubt its a battle they would ever be prepared to take on - cos the return does not meet the cost.

So until they are faced with loads of overwhelming evidence in a quantity of enough significance to warrant any action.....

Not even Government policy trumps the law, so eBay's certainly doesn't.

oh, and FTR - Can I retract or cancel my bid?

[2106greencat]

Thaks crikey - couldn't really be bothered reading the link (helpful as it may have been) but just to confirm - so the 12 hours rule ?? for the bidder or the buyer??

[*crikey*mate*]

the winning bidder is the buyer?

[medalsbadgespatches]

My concern is that other watchers who see an early bid placed then removed later will automatically assume there is something wrong with the item and it devalues the item in their eyes which does affect the price realised.

So repeatedly placing an early bid then removing it later which causes a difference in the price realised is fraudulent.

In each occasion they have bid .05 cents above the starting price and excuse given when retracting bid later  is "entered wrong amount"

[*crikey*mate*]

I understand what you are saying, and if they don't enter another amount they are breaching policy, but they are NOT breaching the law.

So I guess, we just have to hope that they break policy often enough for eBay to decide it is worth their while to take action iykwim.

Cos leghally, they are doing nothing wrong (that is easy to prove such as purposely interfering with an auction or maybe removing the BIN price? dunno - but as i said, for eBay's Policy to hold, it has to be a really strong case.

Read between the lines in that link up there

read what it is actually saying. It is worded in a way to coerce the buyer to think that this is "the law", but then it is worded in a way that doesn't actually claim it is further on iykwim.

all the best with it, hopefully iot is just a buyer who doesn't realize how annoying their tradiong practises are and not one up to anything nefarious. I guess just make eBay aware so they can keeop an eye on the whole thing in the future.

[medalsbadgespatches]

Yeah thanks crikey. Ebay has been told again so hopefully there is a note made for future reference against this member. He has been blocked so it wont affect me again.