The person who had bid and bid against me then retracted did so over 24 hours after their last bid, but before the end of the auction, which is how I came to find myself a winner.

I was really annoyed because when I checked out what comes up with retracting a bid, it had a drop down menu of reasons eg wrong amount entered', and said that after retracting an incorrect bid, a buyer then had to enter the correct amount.

Well, that other bidder's reason was listed as 'wrong amount entered', yet they had not amended their bid. They didn't want to, I suppose, because they had only outbid me by about a dollar so whatever they entered would still have been leading. So it wasn't they had bid an incorrect amount, it was just they expected me to outbid again & I hadn't.

What annoyed me was I felt I had been suckered & that all their other bids were probably bogus too.

It's hard to explain, because I know people will say oh well, you did bid that amount, but it leaves a bad taste in your mouth when it happens and I have to admit I was shocked as I had checked that auction for 2 days after I was outbid, simply to see how it was going, and it stayed the same, & then I didn't go back on ebay for several days, came back and was shocked to find I had an item listed as won/unpaid for.

I notice that nowadays ebay put a message up after bidding that 'you may still be the winner' etc but I don't think they did back in those days.

In my opinion, that is one policy they should change. If a leading bid is retracted more than 30 minutes after having been made, and no higher bids are placed, then I think the second placed bidder should not be obliged to go ahead, it should become a second chance offer.

The way it is at present is a person could bid and be outbid on day one & they are expected to keep an eye on that auction for up to another 9 or 10 days, in case that leading bidder withdraws eg 13 hours before end of auction.

It's unreasonable & I just don't think most buyers work that way.

Ebay should follow their own policies anyway and not allow retractions for incorrect amount entered unless the person then immediately places a bid with correct amount.