canceling a bid

Question

I contacted the seller and canceled a bid within a few minutes of making the bid and before several hours before the bid process closed. The seller ignored my request and now want payment even thought I retracted minutes after placing the bid. The seller is saying I am obligated but according to what the rules are I am within my rights to have the bid retracted. Yet the seller is not being cooperative.

woodland_gnome · Answer

Bidders are VERY rarely "within their rights" to retract.* And if they are they must actually go through the retraction process which does NOT involve contacting the seller in order to retract. Asking the seller to cancel a bid is a totally different process which the seller is very much "within their rights" to ignore or deny, and to expect payment if the buyer does not pay and cancel for non-payment if the buyer does not pay within 4 days, giving the buyer a strike.

* ETA: In addition to the deadlines for retracting the buyer must have a VALID reason to retract. The ONLY valid reasons under eBay rules for retracting a bid are:

1. The seller changed the description of the item after the bid was placed. Since there was already a bid in place this would have to be in an addendum at the bottom of the description contradicting something written or implied (e.g. "Used" in item condition in item specifics implies that the item is working under eBay's definition of that term for most categories).

2. You are going to CORRECT a typo you made when entering the bid amount, and you will CORRECT the amount by rebidding the CORRECT amount (the amount you intended to type but hit the wrong keys or hit a key too many times or missed the decimal divider key) immediately after the retraction goes through.

Other than that, it is up to the seller as to whether your bid should be removed, since s/he is the one who suffers from bid retractions and cancellations (lower prices, increased suspicion of shill bidding). S/he may but is under absolutely no requirement to cancel your bid at your request, and s/he cannot give you permission to retract it yourself--either you have one of the two valid reasons or you don't.

lady_madonna · Answer

@gjackson40

You do not have any bid retractions on your record.

The seller was not obligated to agree to your request to cancel your bid.

You are required per Ebay rules to pay for the item you won.

Per Ebay:

When you bid on or buy an item, you're agreeing to the rules we've put in place for our community. A bid is a binding contract that's active until an auction-style listing ends. Once you place a bid, you need to pay for the item if you're the winning bidder.

https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/rules-policies-buyers/rules-policies-buyers?id=4206