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If you buy or sell items on eBay, you will find tips and advice on this forum.

Original poster

HOW DO YOU USE AN AUTOMATIC BIDDER?

22 replies

Kitsandbits · 31/10/2007 08:52

Hiya

Desperatly need to win a dress on ebay tonight (its a bridesmaids dress that matches my other dresses)

But Im going to be out with the kids going to relatives houses as its Halloween!

And I dont want to bid now as it will just bump the price up if anyone else bids and I want to keep it as cheap as possible!

How do you use a bidding assistant thing??

Do you have to pay?

OP posts:
auntypurple · 31/10/2007 09:00

I have used one called just snipe before or something like that. First 5 snipes are free. They are with most snipers, bid nappers. Good Luck

Beelliesebub · 31/10/2007 09:18

Ebay's got it's own one called bid assistant but when I used it you had to have 2 things scheduled IYSWIM. The easiest way to do it is to schedule the dress and then schedule anything you like really for about a weeks time and then when you've won your dress just take the other one off..... HTH

ninedragons · 31/10/2007 11:11

I use auctionstealer.com, which has been really quite reliable (1 cock-up in four years).

Beelliesebub · 01/11/2007 08:34

Did you win it kb?

lemonaidtreasonandplot · 01/11/2007 08:45

AuctionSniper -- fairly self-explanatory once you get there. It offers three(?) snipes for free, then you have to pay (but very reasonable fees IMO and I'm sure it saves me far more than they charge).

Original poster
Kitsandbits · 01/11/2007 08:46

No, i was home but my net wouldnt connect and by the time it did the auction had finished ... 1 minute before

OP posts:
vacaloca · 02/11/2007 10:23

Quick question about these auction sniper things... So you put the maximum amount you want to spend - does that mean that if an item is £6 at the moment and I want to pay £10 max for it, would it just increase my bid enough to win (say £6.50) or will it go straight for £10?

Beelliesebub · 02/11/2007 13:20

Oh no....
Have you still got it on watch because on the odd occasion the people that win stuff don't pay for it, so they come on again. In fact it might even be worth emailing them just in case......

FlightAttendant · 02/11/2007 13:27

Vacaloca, it would only go up enough to win over the next erson, up to a maximum of £10 - so if the other person only bid £4, you would only pay £4.50 or whatever it is.

vacaloca · 02/11/2007 13:42

Ah great, FlightAttendant, I'm going to try and see if it works because I fancy a couple of things finishing in an hour and I have to go out.

ThePhantomToiletFlusher · 02/11/2007 13:45

Sorry to butt in but what I've wanted to know is how is this different to just putting your maximum bid on e-bay as normal? Am confused.....

FlightAttendant · 02/11/2007 16:45

It's because when you put in your max bid, say a day before the end, people who are interested might be encouraged to bid higher in order to a) establish what the limit is and whether it is affordable any more, b) feel that the article is 'theirs' again if they have been outbid by you, or c) ensure that they have the highest bid before the end, if they aren't going to be around.

Therefore a lot of people put in a bid in the closing seconds, in order to maintain a low final price expectation in other watchers' minds...also I've found if something increases, I am suddenly prepared to pay more for it iyswim...so it avoids encouraging others to bid higher than they already have.

It can work the other way - if something reaches the 'ending today' page at a low price, this can encourage people to bid on it as they like a bargain...

Anyway if you use a sniper tool, (which I don't very often as I think they're a bit unfair!) you can place your bid in the final few seconds, as a sort of surprise tactic, and it might save you a few pounds.

I don't know about the research on this, strikes me it would be hard to prove it was effective for saving money - but very useful if you are desperate for something and have to be away from your computer when it ends.

HTH

helenhismadwife · 02/11/2007 19:46

I use snipe tools most of the time if there is something I really want, for a few reasons. I have a terrible memory and would forget an auction was ending, I have been known to get carried away and bid more than I wanted to pay, and it bids in the last fedw seconds of an aution.

sorry to hear you didnt get your dress kits put a link up and we can look for one for you

GunpowderPlottingToiletFlusher · 03/11/2007 15:21

Thanks FlightAttendant. I have been on that link to AuctionSniper and for the first time ever have used the sniper tool on something I reallllllly want (I feel stupidly guilty about it.....a bit like I'm cheating in an exam, I am such a goody two shoes....).

Anyway, I have set my max bid with the sniper. Now do I need to bid on e-bay (the item currently has no bids but has 2 days to go), or do I just leave the sniper to it?

ninedragons · 03/11/2007 16:23

Nope, nothing more to do - it's all automatic. I think that there may be things that the seller can do to change or remove the auction if there are no bids (e.g. extend the finish time - not sure though), so if you want to freeze it the way it is now, you could place a bid at the minimum.

The sniper won't let you bid against yourself - if nobody else bids and you've bid at the minimum, that will stand.

CatBert · 03/11/2007 16:30

So um, if there are 10 people bidding using a sniper bidding tool, and some bidders have placed a maximum bid of the same price - then how does the sniper tool choose which gets there first (if this is all done in the last few seconds?)

Or is that something unlikely to ever happen?

GunpowderPlottingToiletFlusher · 03/11/2007 16:33

Thanks ninedragons - I was also wondering what happenned if 2 people with snipers set to bid in the last 4 seconds bid at once - who wins?

ninedragons · 04/11/2007 12:03

I don't know - I would think it would be fairly rare for two people to bid exactly the same amount at exactly the same time. I suppose it would come down to microseconds - whose bid landed at eBay's server a fraction of a second before the other.

nappyaddict · 04/11/2007 12:40

i use auction stealer.

nappyaddict · 23/11/2007 14:32

if anyone wants to join please use this link it will give me some free sniper credits

Housemum · 24/11/2007 23:50

Just wondering, how safe are these sniper sites - don't you have to input your eBay ID and password to use them? I don't sell much but am v proud of having kept 100% positive feedback, and would hate to lose it if something were to happen with my ID. Or would you set up a new user ID to use the sniper site, just for those "must have" things where you will not be around to put the last-minute bid in?

ninedragons · 25/11/2007 10:11

You have to put in your eBay ID and password - their computer has to log in as you to place the bid. The bigger sniping engines (anything that has had a recommendation here - auctionstealer, auctionsniper, bidnapper) seem to have excellent security and I've never heard of a problem with mis-use of eBay IDs resulting from them.

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