eBay bidders, bidding immediately, why?

[coansha]

I have been lusting after something for a while but they are pretty pricey £360-£500 and already another of said item but different model.
It will make my life much easier and found one , nearly new on eBay , oh I was very excited and happy with myself and my bargain "buy" anyways some bugger has bollocking well put a bid on it 6 days 22 hrs to go, followed by 2 other bids an hour later!!! Bastards have discovered it, but why bid soooooooo early?
This is not over, this might get ugly....

Theyre really useful when a listing ends at an inconvenient time. You can just bid your maximum and forget about it

But that's what I do without a sniper...

...and you can set them to bid 3 seconds before a listing ends, so nobody has a chance to outbid you

...and if I bid early at my max, I'll beat the sniper if my max is bigger than theirs.

So I still don't get it.

Your max should be that strict, if you're prepared to pay 10p more than your max it's not your max

I'm convinced shill-bidding definitely still happens. I was bidding on one particular pair of shoes. There were several pairs on the market at the time. I was the only bidder on my pair, and no-one else was bidding on the other pairs. Then suddenly, someone outbid me on my pair... Something just seemed fishy.

So I switched to one of the other pairs which were more of a bargain anyway to start with. Next day, I got a second chance offer...

No, I didn't take it.

That's one of the reasons I'm really strict on my max bid and put it in early.

I do a bit of research to find out what a realistic price is for an item and decide what I'm prepared to pay based on the description. Then I stick to it: put the bid on early and ignore it until the auction is finished.

If there's shill-bidding happening I don't get sucked in and still get the item (if I win) at a price I'm prepared to pay. If there isn't then I might get a bargain, but either way I don't pay a penny more than I'm prepared to. And the price I'm prepared to pay is generally pretty much what it's 'worth' anyway, so a single-item shill-bid doesn't make a lot of difference.

Im not prepared to increase my bid on the sofa I suspect of shill budding (is that what's its called? Learn something every day). I've found another one identical apart from colour and nearer to me to pick up.

Chub, when you get your sofa, you'll feel smug every time you look at it! I feel smug every time I look at the bargain shoes, and the spare pair that was included in the deal!

Silly seller. I'd never ever heard of shill bidding under any name at that point. But it just didn't make sense. It had to be someone pushing the price up!

I know! I will as well!

So can someone share how to use a sniper?

Many thanks

I never bid early, always snipe at 3 seconds and have never not won the item! it's quite an adrenalin rush.

I think everyone should snipe that way one of us will get a bargain, it's silly when you see something with a 99p starting bid that gradually increases thoroughout the week to around what it'd cost in the shops.

More frustrating than early bidders pushing the price up is the sellers who list something with a reserve price, if you want a certain price then start the auction at that price, I never bid if there's a reserve because I can't be bothered to guess what the seller wants.

Ok I hate reserves too. Is it cos listing fees are less?

I will look up what something costs new or what similar things go for on eBay quite often, but I use that to set and forget my bid!

I guess starting with low price attracts more attention, on average, but people don't want to commit to sell, really, at that price. It seems like a risky strategy.

Um if everyone just bids in the last three seconds wouldn't that have the same effect as everyone just bidding early?

I'm desperately hoping someone outbids me, because I've changed my mind. This is the downside to early bidding.

Some people get a friend to put a bid on to get other people interested.

Naice try Goofbay

Pretty self explanatory, v easy to use.

Jessie you can cancel a bid if there is less than 12 hours to run.

I didn't know you could cancel your bid. Why if there are less than 12 hours to run though?

No idea - maybe to stop shill bidders withdrawing from an auction, but then the seller can still cancel bids.

When you sell you can also cancel someone's bid too. I used to sell a lot of techie stuff and refused to sell to people with no feedback as I'd had some major problems in the past. Then realised I was an idiot. I stated in the auctions I don't sell to people with no feedback and these people we're upping my price . And for some reason someone with no feedback ever won my auctions.

I dunno Bander. I guess I treat eBay as more like a shop with a REALLY big selection than anything else. So I look at an item, think I'd Be happy to pay £6.53 for it and just put that as my bid. If I get outbid, I shrug. If I get it for less, great. So I'm happy and I hope the seller is happy too. If someone else bid £6.84, well, they should get it as they were prepared to pay more than me.

If sellers only ever get 99p for stuff, won't they just stop selling?

Thanks fergoose!

People do it to 'get in there first'. Totally their perogative, it's an auction. You need to buy brand new if you want the luxury of not competing with other buyers!

Does anyone know of a good free sniper? The one I use only allows 3 bids per week (for the free version).