Hello again. Hopefully you guys can help me out with an Ebay problem. I thought I've seen a lot on Ebay but I haven't seen this one yet. Has anyone else bid on an item(and had the high bid) only to have the item removed with under a minute to go on the auction? Obviously the guy is removing the item if it doesn't get the price he wanted to get around Ebay's reserve fees(and having bidders frown on a reserve). I don't bid unless I intend to pay and I expect sellers to follow the same rules. It's really sad that people have to play games like that on Ebay and can't conduct business the right way. Oh yeah, the seller had high feedback. So he fully understands the way it works. Any comments? Thanks!

yep. lots of times ebay sucks

I thought you couldn't do that with less than 12 hours of the ending date?

you're allowed to end an auction anytime before it ends you just cancel the bids.

yea, I've had this happen while watching auctions, I didn't know you could cancel after 12 hrs

I have put up a couple of auctions lately and had one end about $30.00 less than I wanted to sell it for, but I lived with it. The guy ended up buying $50.00 more dollars worth of stuff from me off of ebay. So I guess it pays sometimes to loose a little. ;)

Hmmz, weird. I thought you weren't allowed to end it like 5 mins before end. Strange that they allow such things. Then again, if they wouldn't allow it, you know for sure some loosers just are going to be difficult and even leave you a retaliatorie neg...

I lost a complete eel for about $9.00. I let it go, and didn't whine. I belive COMPLETELY in karma. Moral, I'ma loose a lot of stuff cheap before finding my heavy metal mic cheap.

yeah it stinks....what happened to me was a few auctions i won that ended last weekend i haven't been able to pay through yet b/c for whatever reason it won't let me pay through paypal on ebay using the combined auctions option.......all i want is my $9 complete v1 dusty w/ bipod smile.gif

I'll probably get hammered for speaking up and saying anything, but.... what is the difference between a buyer sniping a lot with 10 seconds left and a seller pulling an auction they do not feel is going well so that it doesn't get sniped for $.99?

I'm OK with sniping, EBay lets you do it, so it's cool, I do it.

But on the flip side, Ebay lets you pull auctions as well, which I have done too.

I pulled an auction for a Halo Jumper/Tele-Viper on the card, because for 5 days, no one bid on it (started at 3.99) and 30 minutes before it was schedualed to end, I got 5 emails from people who were planning on sniping it.

They were planning on a sweet score, I protected my investment (as much as 2 plastic figures encased in plastic and cardboard can be considered an investment). Who would have suffered if it went for 5.00? Me. Who suffered when I pulled it? Nobody.

Probably not a popular opinion, but somthing to think about.

While I'm sure, as Evergreen stated, pulling an auction is not a popular option, it is the seller's option to chose. The only person that is really hurt is the seller, who has incured listing costs and what not.

The only time a buyer would be hurt is if they passed up bidding on a similar item. However, contrary to popular belief, the buyer does not obtain a possessory interest an item up for auction simply because they have bid on it. Unless the auction has ended, a person could outbid them, thereby negating any claim that they might have. Of course, once the auction ends, a contract is formed thereby obligating the parties to go forward with the transaction.

One thing everyone should remember is that, from a contract standpoint, a seller does not form a contract with a bidder simply by placing the item up for auction. By placing the item up for auction, the seller indicates that he is willing to take "offers" for the item. It is then up to the seller whether or not to "accept" any of the said offers.

While it is well within the seller's rights to pull an auction on ebay, it is still a pretty sh*** thing to do. If someone is afraid they will not get what they want for an item, they should simply put a higher reserve on it.

Just my two cents.

[ June 14, 2004: Message edited by: Crimson Guard Jayhawk ]