Ebayer wanting to gazump winning bidder

Pennylane

I sold something (approx £50) on Ebay and the next day I got an email from somebody who said they missed the auction end but "I will pay £60 immediately and can I gazump the winning bidder".

I couldn't believe this! I didn't reply to them, as of course I would never do this anyway. I contacted Ebay and, despite all their rantings about fair trading, honesty etc., they showed little interest.

Crowqueen

eBay aren't really responsible for the actions of their members. It's been made more difficult for outsiders to interfere with auctions by concealing the names of winning bidders and restricting rights to contact sellers, but it is not eBay's fault this person decided to try their luck.

It's not exactly dishonest of them or eBay - they thought they might try their luck - but you have a contract with the other person, so you were right to refuse. If it had ended unsold personally I might have even relisted it for them at a BIN if they expressed an interest like that and there was no-one else involved.

Just block them from your auctions and ignore their other messages.

clive12

Pennylane wrote: »

I sold something (approx £50) on Ebay and the next day I got an email from somebody who said they missed the auction end but "I will pay £60 immediately and can I gazump the winning bidder".

I couldn't believe this! I didn't reply to them, as of course I would never do this anyway. I contacted Ebay and, despite all their rantings about fair trading, honesty etc., they showed little interest.

welcome to ebays great attitude to sellers.

in my experience they couldnt care less about sellers and are totally in favour of buyers even though seller fees make them a profit.

try asking them why sellers can no longer leave negative feedback and to refund fees when your buyer doesnt pay.

RFW

clive12 wrote: »

welcome to ebays great attitude to sellers.

in my experience they couldnt care less about sellers and are totally in favour of buyers even though seller fees make them a profit.

try asking them why sellers can no longer leave negative feedback and to refund fees when your buyer doesnt pay.

If you really don't understand the importance of buyers you probably shouldn't be selling anyway. As for who makes the profits, buyers or sellers, they really aren't mutually exclusive. No other sales outlet grades their customers, so why is the ability to leave negative feedback for customers even remotely important? Listing fees may not get refunded, but final value fees do if you do it right.

I'm not really sure why Ebay getting involved in this case has anything to do with a bad attitude to sellers, surely if this seller had taken up the gazumper, it would have been the other buyer affected, the seller would have been £10 up.

Pennylane

Rightly or wrongly I thought Ebay might ban them.

RFW

Pennylane wrote: »

Rightly or wrongly I thought Ebay might ban them.

If they had definitely stated that they wanted to "gazump" then you may be right. They could have legitimately asked that you sell it to them and give the other buyer an extra £10. It all boils down to how much you want Ebay to intervene, they occasionally reprimand users without letting the complainer know. It's usually a case of them getting involved more in buyer and seller issues arising from transactions, in this case the 'rogue' user was not a buyer, so difficult to see how much they could do, after all there's nothing to stop anyone from contacting you after a sale, they don't really even have to be an active Ebay user, if your email address is accessible.

Crowqueen

Ban them for asking a simple (albeit cheeky) question? I don't think that's necessarily fair. They may get a policy strike, eBay may feel they have done nothing wrong - but I don't think you can ban them for just one silly email.

Even sellers who annoy their customers or buyers who forget to pay once don't get banned for one offence. I think you were being slightly 'optimistic', and I don't think you can really hold eBay responsible in this situation for this person's foolishness.

Pennylane

RFW wrote: »

If they had definitely stated that they wanted to "gazump" then you may be right. They could have legitimately asked that you sell it to them and give the other buyer an extra £10. It all boils down to how much you want Ebay to intervene, they occasionally reprimand users without letting the complainer know. It's usually a case of them getting involved more in buyer and seller issues arising from transactions, in this case the 'rogue' user was not a buyer, so difficult to see how much they could do, after all there's nothing to stop anyone from contacting you after a sale, they don't really even have to be an active Ebay user, if your email address is accessible.

Yes, they used the word "gazump". What's the point of an auction if people feel they can come on afterwards wanting you to cancel a transaction and sell to them?

Not sure what you mean about giving "the other buyer an extra £10"

RFW

Pennylane wrote: »

Yes, they used the word "gazump". What's the point of an auction if people feel they can come on afterwards wanting you to cancel a transaction and sell to them?

Not sure what you mean about giving "the other buyer an extra £10"

If they had said "I missed your auction and desperately need that item, would you mind asking the person who purchased it if they would sell it to me for £10 extra and then you can send the item direct to me".

The gazumping attitude isn't exclusive to Ebay, they do it on live auctions too, there's always some chancers around, there are worse crimes.

soolin

RFW wrote: »

The gazumping attitude isn't exclusive to Ebay, they do it on live auctions too, there's always some chancers around, there are worse crimes.

I've had people try and persuade an auction house to sell my properly won item to them instead of to me (I know the auction house quite well and they warned me that the buyer might cause me some problems as they were quite aggresive). I've also been approached by a buyer in the car park offering to buy my newly won item- however they were not prepared to pay the premium I wanted so I declined and got a torrent of abuse.

RFW

soolin wrote: »

I've had people try and persuade an auction house to sell my properly won item to them instead of to me (I know the auction house quite well and they warned me that the buyer might cause me some problems as they were quite aggresive). I've also been approached by a buyer in the car park offering to buy my newly won item- however they were not prepared to pay the premium I wanted so I declined and got a torrent of abuse.

Most auction houses will have something along the lines of "buyers are not permitted to transfer lots on the premises". It used to happen a lot more than it does now, as a buyer you end up with a thick skin deflecting people who want to purchase some or all of your purchase.

As an auctioneer it's mighty annoying when someone stood in front of you doesn't bid and then after it's sold decide they want it for more than it went for, that happened way too often, they are either really slow or don't believe you're actually selling it at the time.