@gurlcat wrote:
@broto_64 wrote:
One more question, how exactly would we "ban" sniping?
There is a way; it's called "soft close" auctioning. It's where if any bids come in during the final X seconds of the scheduled close, then X minutes get added to the clock, which also happens again if someone bids in those same number of seconds before the 'new' closing time. Some of the online estate and storage unit auction sites I use employ soft close. Some people prefer it I guess, namely because it makes it more like an old school in-person auction. But (unless I'm mistaken) it's still a hybrid, because there is still proxy bidding which stays hidden and places bids only when necessary to beat live bids, and the soft clock only adds time when a sniper bid would beat the highest proxy bid. -I could have that wrong though; the added minutes might happen even if a sniper bid would have failed to win. I'm usually too blitzed on adrenaline to understand exactly what's going on in those situations.
People have come here to the forums to advocate for eBay having soft close a bazillion times. And I'm kind of surprised eBay doesn't use it, because theoretically it would increase winning bid amounts on average. Then again, would it? -There might be a significant enough portion of buyers who would be turned off by it, thereby flattening or decreasing the advantage. Now that I really think about it, it's weird that there's no "industry standard" to use either hard or soft close for online auctions. It seems like the kind of thing a business research entity would have done experiments on long ago, to determine which is more advantageous. But it appears random to me, like each time I check out a new auction platform, their closing type is no more predictable than a coin flip. Maybe research has been done and the answer is "it depends" (like depends on what categories of sale items or some other factor) ... or maybe it's just platform ownership/leadership trusting their gut prejudices.
That's right, and how about all items won sold "as is" No Refunds and buyers have to pre-authorize their credit card (and get approved) for each and every auction they bid on so that when they win it gets immediately charged to their credit card, there is an additional 15 to 50 percent buyer's fee AND shipping / picking up the item is the buyer's responsibility and they have a certain amount of time (usually days, like 2 or 3) in which to do so and if they fail to take care of that then the item reverts back to the seller.
Sound outrageous?
Most ebayers have no idea how vanilla ebay auctions are.
Ebay isn't the only auction I attend, and most are far more hardcore than ebay.
Ebay auctions are down right sweet, especially in terms of shipping and buyer fees and payment requirements and the MBG, of course someone will find reason to complain however I have thought of your soft-close auction method before as well, only I wonder if it would garner enough seller and buyer interest as a soft close also has its drawbacks.
That said I don't know the answer, and you're right every auction is different from the other, every single one. In fact one auction house I keep my eye on has variable buyer fees so you really have to pay attention and read the fine print because one auction it might be 15% the next 30% and it can really bite if one assumes they're all the same. Predictability with these auction houses is that they usually cater to the same sellers time and again, so they hold regular sales and the terms from one sale to the next from the same seller vary little if any.
