Shill bidding !

psj3809

Blimey, its good theyve got serious about it but was still surprised to read this...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/hi/technology/newsid_10500000/newsid_10508900/10508913.stm

Like the guy didnt know what he was doing was wrong ! Come on !

fog

i posted about it when he first got caught.. or someone did a few months back

it goes on , it's widespread.. and well lets face it .. yer they caught him at it, but there loads more obvious people doing it. I had that problem when i bought a printer cart.. it was obviously bid up and I reported em for doing it.

they can stop a lot of snipe tool and shrill bidding very simply... make the auction finish a random time within the last hour or less. and keep altering it to mess up snipe tools... if they had that option on ebay, i would mind it even as a seller.

of course, maybe I'm being cynical.. but the more things sell for .. the more ebay / paypals cut.

Mousey

A colleague of mine was suspended from eBay for shill bidding, although he was allowed back on there after choosing which account to keep live. This was some time ago though (maybe 3 years or so).

Scottie_uk

Good, but that's just a drop in the ocean.

psj3809

Hope they dont stop sniping ! Flipping love it ! I snipe all the time, no longer have to wait in for the end of an auction, can bid on things from the US finishing at 4am etc.

fog

but doesn't the shipping from the US mess it up?

all the ntsc c64 stuff is no good to me.. and sadly the UK versions I wanna get are tricky to find.

I buy the rare thing from states, but not a lot

Mousey

I know fog engages in shill bidding. I tried to buy a copy of Scrabble and he bumped up the price all the way to 2p! I withdrew my bid and got Make a Chip instead. ;)

psj3809

fog wrote: »

but doesn't the shipping from the US mess it up?

all the ntsc c64 stuff is no good to me.. and sadly the UK versions I wanna get are tricky to find.

I'm into american sports so i've bought a fair few things from ebay.com. Recently bought a small UMPC from Canada, transaction was fine but customs got me sadly !!

fog

Mousey wrote: »

I know fog engages in shill bidding. I tried to buy a copy of Scrabble and he bumped up the price all the way to 2p! I withdrew my bid and got Make a Chip instead. ;)

:-o what will buy your silence? a Horace /skiing (only have 17 or so) .. or perhaps a chequered flag (have 21 of em) hehe

I did originally list em for 1p.. then thought nah.. 10 / 20p for later ones.. so yer as ya can see.. big money..

jdanddiet

the only time I ever sniped I ended up paying waaaaaaaaaaaaay more than I wanted to, so that was that!

As for shilling, well, it goes on of course, made me reluctant on many occasions to bid on things.

fog

go on , buy a make-a-chip.. makes an ideal gift for friends n family...

or if ya really care.. chequered flag :D

(I need to see if I can flog em on qvc or something)

JuanF. Ramirez

I (supposed to) won an auction in ebay of the whole collection of Microhobby magazine (217 issues) plus 'some issues of english magazines', at the end of the year 2000, but the seller didn't contact me. :-(
The best thing was I didn't pay.

Fortunately, some weeks after, I got the issue 1 of Microhobby magazine in another ebay auction for 12 euros aprox. This time was ok. I put away this issue like gold in a woolen cloth! :smile:

Graz

I'm suprised that he's the only one to be done by it. What happens to all the other shill-bidders of the past who have been reported. Do they just get a warning or are they ignored?

JuanF. Ramirez wrote: »

I (supposed to) won an auction in ebay of the whole collection of Microhobby magazine (217 issues)

The best thing was I didn't pay.

:lol: That'll be why you never got them then! :lol:

JuanF. Ramirez

Well, maybe I didn't explain myself correctly. (bbrrr!, f*ck*ng foreign languages! ;))

I reach the end of the auction in 1st position. I waited for an e-mail from the seller, and never came. :-(

Better? :smile:

Graz

JuanF. Ramirez wrote: »

Well, maybe I didn't explain myself correctly. (bbrrr!, f*ck*ng foreign languages! ;))

I reach the end of the auction in 1st position. I waited for an e-mail from the seller, and never came. :-(

Better? :smile:

Ahhh, I get ya.


I think. ;)

fog

Graz wrote: »

What happens to all the other shill-bidders of the past who have been reported. Do they just get a warning or are they ignored?

it probably gets looked into, and if maybe warned ..or maybe watched. they need to prove there is a connection I guess. OR it's like the start scene of green beret ;) .. hehe

I got warned for being truthful about a mis-selling fool... they said "oh it's nothing to do with the transaction".. i said.. perhaps.. but it's a damn good warning to others..



Juan I had a few of them also, and one I paid and he couldn't be a**** to go out in the snow to post it.. and it went on for 2 months

AndyC

I've found ebay to be pretty good at removing the accounts where there is blatantly something iffy going on.

I remember one guy who kept selling the same phone, which was always "bought" by the same bidder and both leaving feedback within minutes of the auction ending; i reported it and both accounts were suspended within the hour. I guess a lot of the time it depends on just how suspicious the activity is, I guess they often have to err on the side of caution if they can't be sure it's a scam.

Still, it's definitely worth reporting suspicious behaviour if you ask me.

fog

my fav so far is some chump abroad in italy.. he bought stuff in the UK.. said it didn't work / didn't arrive... then used another name to re-flog the stuff..

sure he's not the first to do it, but his feedback read like a massive warning sign...

I wouldn't ship, so he decided to trash my feedback (like that french ****) , and since he didn't ask if I shipped abroad I got out of it that way and all the BS comments removed ;) :D

Matt_B

I'm pretty sure that a lot of people use shill bidding as a cheap way of getting a reserve auction, rather than paying eBay a hefty fee for the privilege.