Confusion with proxy bids....

dawnylou

More and more often I find myself bidding on items, just for someone to come along at the last minute and somehow know exactly how much I have bid so that they can just out bid me??

I.E. There is an item on 99p. I put in a proxy bid for £6.10. At the last minute someone comes along and bids £6.50.... They haven't had to try to outbid me... they just 'happen' to put in a slightly higher bid... is there something I am missing here?? It's like they know how much I have bidded.
I just don't understand

jaffa30

Hi ebays words on proxy bidding

Here's how it works:


When you place a bid, you enter the maximum amount you'd be willing to pay for the item. Your maximum amount is kept confidential from other bidders and the seller.
The eBay system compares your bid to those of the other bidders.
The system places bids on your behalf, using only as much of your bid as is necessary to maintain your high bid position (or to meet the reserve price). The system will bid up to your maximum amount.
If another bidder has a higher maximum, you'll be outbid. BUT, if no other bidder has a higher maximum, you win the item. And you could pay significantly less than your maximum price.

This means you don't have to keep coming back to re-bid every time another bid is placed.

Jaffa

dawnylou

Yes but how do people know how much to place the bid to 'just' outdo you? I don't mean someone is bidding and bidding until they get above me, they just guess and manage to get the figure just 20/30p above what I bid

danmanchester

It's not that the rival bidder actually "guesses" that amount, it's just that ebay's proxy bidding system will have stopped at your maximum bid and then placed your rival's (who may have set his maximum at say £8) bid at the next available highest increment.

Bids increase at 20p increments at prices between £1.01 to £5.00.

You can see how ebay works out their bidding increments here

Marvo434

... so if you had bid, say, £6.50 and then with a few minutes to go someone else bid £11.37, they would win the auction at a cost to them of £6.70 and you would have no way of knowing that they were in fact prepared to pay much more.
I use a sniping tool which bids for me with 6 SECONDS or less to go in the auction!

dawnylou

Thank you Marvo. Sorry for being so stupid but that is the kind of simple explanation I needed!

dawnylou

And thank you to the rest of you for trying to help me understand! lol

s30jok

dawnylou wrote:

Yes but how do people know how much to place the bid to 'just' outdo you? I don't mean someone is bidding and bidding until they get above me, they just guess and manage to get the figure just 20/30p above what I bid

i use https://www.bidnip.com first 5 go's are free put in your maximum bid and set the timer for 5 seconds it puts in your highest amount you are willing to pay at the last 5 seconds.

i have saved over £300 doing this as i set my final price and know that it will not go over the maximum i am willing to pay.

it is a very good site very secure and you can buy more bids using money with paypal.
Use this site and you will always get your item, if the item closes at £6.50 if you have set your max at £7.03 you will win the item for £6.51 and the bid will go in at the last 5 seconds stopping the other guy from retaliating with another bid

good luck

dawnylou

Thanks!

Marvo434

.... and there is no such thing as a stupid question in these forums.

Except possibly "What makes teflon stick to the pan?"
and "Why is there only one Monopolies commision?"

oldagetraveller

s30jok wrote:

Use this site and you will always get your item, if the item closes at £6.50 if you have set your max at £7.03 you will win the item for £6.51 and the bid will go in at the last 5 seconds stopping the other guy from retaliating with another bid

Genuine question, not trying to be a smart@rse but what happens if two bidders for the same item are using bidnip?