www.telebid.com

jjuk2k2

Not sure if this is the right forum, but I've just been to www.telebid.com having seen an advert on Facebook offering what appear to be really cheap electrical items.

It is an 'auction' site, you have to pre buy your bids in 10's 20's etc and these cost 50p each but when you use them to 'bid' they only count for 7p, the other 43p going to, presumably, the sites running costs...


Currently a 37" Panasonic TV has been around the few minutes to go mark for ages, then a huge amount of bidders appeared pushing it to over an hour to go..

Now by my working out, currently at £434.70 divide that by £0.07 gives you 6210 bids so far (these cost the bidders 50p) so £0.50 x 6210 = £3105 taken by the site on this item alone.
This item is fixed at £98 to the winner and claims to be worth £1099 so if we assume Telebid paid full RRP for it, they need £1001 to break even.. currently they stand at a profit of £2104 on this to date... I'm sure it will continue to skyrocket.

If you do decide to use the site, please read the help section of the site and understand what you are doing before you go chasing that bargain....

One other thing, the £20 voucher they give you CAN’T be used for bids, only against a successful win… This isn’t clear unless you trawl the help either…

Hope this helps

Regards

James

custardy

lol i looked on this site yesterday via facebook too.
you can see how they entice people in with the low sales price but as soon as i saw a premium phone and they way the bid system works i lost interest

Hizz

I've just looked too and was startled to see a laptop at £20 with 18 minutes to go.

custardy

yeah but how many bids? stuff goes for low prices but they offset this with premium phone bidding and the enforced bidding increments

sbenahmed

Well I registered today, bought 20 bids and I won a Samsung 225BW 22" LCD monitor and all I had to pay is £9.80. Don't know if it was a stroke of luck or what but if it does come then it bloody well was considering it costs £250 brand new. Might have to sell it if it does come :rotfl:

Bamber19

surely people will realise it makes no sense to bid on items until the last second with this site?

ah right, i see now, they add 30 seconds on when you bid so you can't do that... hmm, seems a very odd site, i can't imagine sane people being interested in it.

custardy

sbenahmed wrote: »

Well I registered today, bought 20 bids and I won a Samsung 225BW 22" LCD monitor and all I had to pay is £9.80. Don't know if it was a stroke of luck or what but if it does come then it bloody well was considering it costs £250 brand new. Might have to sell it if it does come :rotfl:

wow and you felt the need to post on another site as a 1st post.that is lucky!!




:rolleyes:

sbenahmed

No the purpose of posting on here was to try give a different viewpoint as the site isn't that bad at all.

Bamber19

sbenahmed wrote: »

No the purpose of posting on here was to try give a different viewpoint as the site isn't that bad at all.

It's obvious from the OP's post and example that although that it is that bad though. In many cases the winning bidder gets a good deal, perhaps getting an item worth £300 for £60 but by that stage telebid have already made their £300 (600 bids of 10p costing 50p each) plus another £60 so it's a system where the winning bidder and the company get a good deal but no-one else does. At the same time they have an odd bidding system that means an item that ends at 12.00 can still be running hours later.

mojam55

Just seen an advert for Telebid and thought I would pay it a visit since I am an experienced ebay seller.

Was stunned at the first auction I viewed.

A Panasonic widescreen TV with a current bid price of £1741.95 this could be purchased from any reputable online retailer for around £1100.

I can see why someone might invest a couple of quid trying to bid on something that would made less than its market value but why on earth would anyone still be bidding on this.

http://www.telebid.com/auction/panasonic-viera-42-full-hd-ready-plasma-/53007.html

Alex

Anetares

This outfit looks great.. I just took a look at their site and one of the front page auctions is for 1000 Free Bids! Yes, 1000 free bids voucher, currently selling for only £88.83. According to the auction page, 1000 bids usually retails at £500.00, but instead they are giving you the golden opportunity of paying 50p to use a premium rate phone line to bid.. on some bids.. so you can pay 50p a go to use them again.. This site must be for people with enough money to waste that they could go and buy the premium electronics in Dixons etc. with no discounts anyway. Amusing concept.