I placed a $1.00 opening bid for a nice pair of vintage speakers. Several
days went by and no one else bided. I watched the auction to the bitter end
and at the last second the seller stopped the auction! His official excuse
.... "Item is no longer available." I emailed him a few times...no response.
I complained to eBay and they said "a non-selling seller is a serious
offence and a seller can not remove an item if there is a bid with 12 hours
or less left." I wrote again explaining that there was only 1 second left
and received 2 frustrating and obfuscating canned answers from eBay that was
apologetic but totally biased for the seller. Rat jury???
Cordially,
west

in article , west at
wrote on 3/26/05 11:58 PM:

I placed a $1.00 opening bid for a nice pair of vintage speakers. Several
days went by and no one else bided. I watched the auction to the bitter end
and at the last second the seller stopped the auction! His official excuse
... "Item is no longer available." I emailed him a few times...no response.

I complained to eBay and they said "a non-selling seller is a serious
offence and a seller can not remove an item if there is a bid with 12 hours
or less left." I wrote again explaining that there was only 1 second left
and received 2 frustrating and obfuscating canned answers from eBay that was
apologetic but totally biased for the seller. Rat jury???
Cordially,
west



West,

In my experience, eBay is loathe to take any action except in the most
blatant and egregious of offenses.

There are a couple of reasons for this:

1. Someone who is disciplined wrongly by eBay might have a cause for legal
action;

2. eBay is put in the difficult position of trying to determine which
version of events is actionable and the "truth" or closest to it;

3. eBay's bread and butter is sellers (who pay the fees) and they don't
want to lose paying customers, and

4. eBay is lame and greedy. They need a viable competitor in a big way.

Jon

On Sun, 27 Mar 2005 04:58:30 GMT, "west"
wrote:

I placed a $1.00 opening bid for a nice pair of vintage speakers. Several
days went by and no one else bided. I watched the auction to the bitter end
and at the last second the seller stopped the auction! His official excuse
... "Item is no longer available." I emailed him a few times...no response.
I complained to eBay and they said "a non-selling seller is a serious
offence and a seller can not remove an item if there is a bid with 12 hours
or less left." I wrote again explaining that there was only 1 second left
and received 2 frustrating and obfuscating canned answers from eBay that was
apologetic but totally biased for the seller. Rat jury???
Cordially,
west


Ebay exists to do two things;
-Charge money to sellers.
-Deny massive levels of fraud take place.

-Rich

"west" wrote in message
...
I placed a $1.00 opening bid for a nice pair of vintage speakers. Several
days went by and no one else bided. I watched the auction to the bitter
end
and at the last second the seller stopped the auction! His official excuse
... "Item is no longer available." I emailed him a few times...no
response.
I complained to eBay and they said "a non-selling seller is a serious
offence and a seller can not remove an item if there is a bid with 12
hours
or less left." I wrote again explaining that there was only 1 second left
and received 2 frustrating and obfuscating canned answers from eBay that
was
apologetic but totally biased for the seller. Rat jury???
Cordially,
west

West:

It would have been helpful to provide a link to the auction OR the auction
number. Regardless, in order for the seller to end the auction early
without having to sell to you, he deleted your bid as part of the auction
ending process. Unless eBay changed their rules, the "12 hour" rule is BS
and deleting a bid(s) is how a seller gets around it.

All of the above assumes that there was no reserve price and/or it hadn't
been met. Many sellers don't use a reserve price because if it's not met,
they are still charged half of the sales fee (based on the reserve). To get
around this, they list the auction without a reserve and kill it at the end
if they are not happy with the bidding.

Yes, eBay is extremely one-sided for the seller. Not to mention that it is
a cesspool for scammers and shill bidding.

Gerry

SNIP

In my experience, eBay is loathe to take any action except in the most
blatant and egregious of offenses.

Qualified - Involving $bay's losing money not just offense.

SNIP

Ebay exists to do two things;
-Charge money to sellers.
-Deny massive levels of fraud take place.

-Rich

Key words, charge money, massive.

SNIP
ending process. Unless eBay changed their rules, the "12 hour" rule is BS
and deleting a bid(s) is how a seller gets around it.

But reading it does instill fear into the unaware. So it's semi effective.

All of the above assumes that there was no reserve price and/or it hadn't
been met. Many sellers don't use a reserve price because if it's not met,
they are still charged half of the sales fee (based on the reserve). To get

You must know what you are talking about I'm going to look it up but if
the reserve is not met and there is no sale there is no final auction
value fee that I have ever been charged. Do you mean up front in
listing fees with a reserve?

around this, they list the auction without a reserve and kill it at the end
if they are not happy with the bidding.

It's a poor man's(sellers) reserve, LOL.

Ebay is not interested in problems, all they want is their money.
Same thing happened to me on a mint Sansui 1000, in-box, with manuals.

Seller did not like the going bid rate so he cancelled and wrote:

'Item is broken'

Verdict: "Ebay is not a reliable mediator"

Getting burned on the buying side is peanuts for Ebay.

But if you owe them money....... I am sure that you will hear
from them faster than a bidding bullet!

Cheers,

Rich

west wrote in article
...
I placed a $1.00 opening bid for a nice pair of vintage speakers.
Several
days went by and no one else bided. I watched the auction to the bitter
end
and at the last second the seller stopped the auction! His official
excuse
... "Item is no longer available." I emailed him a few times...no
response.
I complained to eBay and they said "a non-selling seller is a serious
offence and a seller can not remove an item if there is a bid with 12
hours
or less left." I wrote again explaining that there was only 1 second
left
and received 2 frustrating and obfuscating canned answers from eBay that
was
apologetic but totally biased for the seller. Rat jury???
Cordially,
west