Confused

jafsie

You were outbid so you went elsewhere, why should you be stuck with two because of someone else's fault.

DON'T pay, let seller list again.

pinkshoes

soolin wrote: »

If I received a neg from a non payer I would be straight on the phone to ebay reporting a malicious bidder.

pinkshoes wrote: »

If they refuse, then you'll have to pay for the item and buy it (unless you want a strike), but given the seller would have had to agree to the bid retraction, it would be pretty mean of them not to agree a mutual, so in this case I would contemplate leaving them a neg once I'd received the item.

??????

I didn't say anything about not paying!! Only a numpty leaves a neg when they haven't paid!

Hence my suggestion of a neg was a last resort if the seller wouldn't agree to cancel their bid too, and thus they (the buyer) had to pay for it...

If the seller agreed to cancel/retract the winning bid, then it's somewhat mean not to agree the same for the next highest bidder when it's quite likely they might have then bought elsewhere after discovering they were no longer the highest bidder.

danielley

I had no idea that if I am outbid I could still be liable if the bid above me gets retracted! I would have been caught out on this more than a couple of times in the past!

Errata

Neither had I, and it would seem to negate the whole point of an auction.

Crowqueen

pinkshoes wrote: »

??????

I didn't say anything about not paying!! Only a numpty leaves a neg when they haven't paid!

Hence my suggestion of a neg was a last resort if the seller wouldn't agree to cancel their bid too, and thus they (the buyer) had to pay for it...

If the seller agreed to cancel/retract the winning bid, then it's somewhat mean not to agree the same for the next highest bidder when it's quite likely they might have then bought elsewhere after discovering they were no longer the highest bidder.

I would still have an objection to that, since the seller hasn't done anything wrong and the buyer is still liable by eBay's standards as well as by ours.

The seller may well allow the OP to cancel, but they are well within their rights not to, and buyer cannot bank on this and then suddenly throw a wobbly when a bid they are liable for until the item finishes wins it.

It is part of running an auction online, I'm afraid, part of the software system, part of what you sign up to as a buyer - just because it doesn't fit an arbitrary perspective of what an auction is doesn't give you any permission to opt out of part of the system when you don't like that part or don't realise it until you've been a member for X number of years or whatever. It's part and parcel of the set-up of eBay, and there's no disputing that as long as you still want to use eBay as a buyer.

macfly

Any rules, laws etc., auction or not, have to be fair and applied equally to all customers/bidders.
The answer is fairly simple though. Contact the seller, ask to withdraw. If they are stubborn, either take the strike, or pay and give them a negative. They would deserve it on the basis that they dealt with the bidder who caused the problem more fairly than yourself.

ayngelsaf29

Thanks for the advice everyone. I emailed the seller, and she agreed to cancel the sale. Was just a bit nervous as don't ebay much at all.
Thanks anyway,
Saf

jafsie

danielley wrote: »

I had no idea that if I am outbid I could still be liable if the bid above me gets retracted! I would have been caught out on this more than a couple of times in the past!

You can't be held to it, consider this:

seller lists item, asks friend to jack up the bid, so you are the "rope a dope"

seller: starts at £100
friend bids
rope a dope £105
friend £110
rope a dope £115 and so on up till £150
friend £155
rope a dope (YOU) step out of auction it is beyond what you are prepared to pay.

You buy elswhere.

seller asks friend (who never was a real bidder in the first place) to retract bid.

You are now the winner at £150 for an item you should have won at £100

But only if you are stupid enough to pay.

ebay don't make English law, parliament do.
paypal """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""

You are NOT liable once you have been outbid, you are NOT obliged to stick around to see if someone welches on the deal and leaves you holding an overpriced baby.

soolin

jafsie wrote: »

You can't be held to it, consider this:

seller lists item, asks friend to jack up the bid, so you are the "rope a dope"

seller: starts at £100
friend bids
rope a dope £105
friend £110
rope a dope £115 and so on up till £150
friend £155
rope a dope (YOU) step out of auction it is beyond what you are prepared to pay.

You buy elswhere.

seller asks friend (who never was a real bidder in the first place) to retract bid.

You are now the winner at £150 for an item you should have won at £100

But only if you are stupid enough to pay.

ebay don't make English law, parliament do.
paypal """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""

You are NOT liable once you have been outbid, you are NOT obliged to stick around to see if someone welches on the deal and leaves you holding an overpriced baby.

Oh dear another one who cannot differentiate between laws and terms and conditions.

Crowqueen

eBay and Paypal have a user agreement that buyers have to agree to when they sign up for the site, and some courts have ruled that once an online auction ends, that's when the contract is formed. The law is not clear cut on this, I will grant you that, but although eBay and Paypal don't make the law, in this situation, if you aren't prepared to accept the consequences if you bid and are held to that bid, then you are breaking the user agreement and the seller is perfectly entitled to insist on you paying for the item and sanctioning you when you don't. It's only on BIN items from business sellers that an absolute legal right of cancellation exists.

By the way, many consumer laws are EU-wide now, so it's not even Parliament that make the rules, it's the European Commission.