Auction won - Seller Cancels - Seller re-posts
Summary: howie-dewitt expressed frustration over an experience on eBay where a seller canceled an auction, only to relist the item, suspecting lack of regulation on the platform. bonanza125 advised against naming the seller and suggested reporting the issue, acknowledging this as a common occurrence. kathiec mentioned it's a newer trend and noted that eBay does penalize sellers for canceling transactions. mudshark61369 explained reasons sellers might cancel, such as low bids or payment holds, and highlighted the importance of checking feedback profiles. gosimus reminded that rules exist but aren't always followed, using a personal speeding analogy to illustrate the point.
Has this happened to anybody else or just me and my bad luck??? I'm almost positive that there are no rules in place on Ebay and they allow pretty much anyone to sell on their site...including the lowest scum of the earth types. I had recently won an auction and within minutes, the seller cancels the order stating "item damaged or no longer available" which was total BS because he turned around and broke up the card lot and reposted for sale on Ebay. So first, this guy is a complete tool and nobody should be doing business with him, and second, shouldn't there be something in place where ebay shouldn't allow any auctions to be cancelled at all once the winning bid is in? Otherwise, what's the point of trying to buy anything on ebay or being part of an auction if the seller has all the power and can cancel at anytime for any reason?
Am I wrong or has this been going on since the dawn of Ebay?
gosimus
·3 weeks ago@howie-dewitt
< almost positive that there are no rules in place on Ebay >
There are tons of rules in place on eBay. As you should probably know, the mere existence of a rule doesn't guarantee that everyone will follow that rule.
As an example, I used to be a speeder on the interstate highways. I broke the rule of the speed limit. But now that most interstate speed limits – in my area, anyway – have been raised to 75 mph, I don't speed as much, because that's how fast I used to go when the speed limit was 65, and still do but it's legal now.
mudshark61369
·Aug 19, 2026 at 4:58 PM@howie-dewitt ,
While sellers shouldn't cancel purchases they sometimes do. Often it is New seller's like yours who despite their feedback number has yet to receive one for selling. New sellers on ebay often take ebay's poor advice to start auctions at a low price "To encourage bidding" which often does not work out well for them so they cancel. Your seller started the auction at $1.00 A more experienced seller would have started the bidding at a price that they would accept if there was only one bid.
Another reason why a seller might cancel, especially if they are new or a very occasional seller is they do not realize that ebay places a 30 hold on new/returning after a long time of not selling, sellers payments. On their account the payment shows Pending so they do not ship and often do not respond to messages about shipping, thinking they are an attempt to scam them some how.
What the above all means is that you should check each seller's feedback profile before bidding on or buying from their listings no matter what their feedback percentage is.
"they allow pretty much anyone to sell on their site...including the lowest scum of the earth types"
One could say the same thing about buyers, there are many to take advantage of ebay's buyer centric protections to scam sellers.
howie-dewitt
OP3 weeks agoThanks for the words of wisdom mudshark61369. Just want to let you know that I did check his feedback profile (as I always do before doing business with anybody on ebay)...and shockingly, he didn't have any negative reviews. Guess there's a first time for everything. Of course, he could've cancelled thousands of orders in the past and nobody would know as you can't give feedback/comment if there is no completed transaction.
"Too many people spend money they don't have to buy things they don't need to impress people they don't like."
mudshark61369
·3 weeks ago@howie-dewitt ,
I meant to say that your seller hadn't listed items as auctions before not that they hadn't sold anything before. See, we all make mistakes.
The rest of what I posted about ebay's suggestion does hold true however. If when the seller cancelled you were refunded, you couldn't give them a negative feedback, but they did face consequences, a defect on their account, lower seller rating and having to pay the final value fee for the listing. Too many defects and they can be limited on how many items they can list and eventually banned if they do not change their ways.
jonathanbrightlight
·3 weeks agoCancelling doesn't block negative feedback, unless the buyer initiates the cancellation request (or maybe in a rare few other set of circumstances).
kathiec
·Aug 19, 2026 at 4:04 PMNo, it hasn't been going on since the dawn of eBay. I've been a member since 1996, and it's a fairly recent trend. There are cases where items actually are damaged or lost after they're sold. In those cases eBay obviously can't force the seller to send the item. So what they do is give the seller an account defect for canceling. It doesn't take many of those to trigger penalties ranging from higher fees to account suspension.
bonanza125
·Aug 19, 2026 at 3:55 PMFirst thing you can't name shame here. That will get edited out. Second yes this does happen a lot there is nothing you can do about it other than report seller. Even that they will not get suspended. The way you should look at it is you received a refund and just purchase the item from someone else. Yes it's not good business to cancel a sale and then relist the item for higher then lie about the reason for cancellation but that's all part of dealing online. You will come across sellers like this. They sell an item or auction off an item. Then they don't like the amount of what it sold for. Yes many sellers cancel out due to not liking what it sold for.
howie-dewitt
OP3 weeks agoFirst thing bonanza125, I wasn't "name shaming" as you put it...only calling out the person who did me dirty with the hope that nobody else will do business with him so they don't fall for the same scam. Second, the item I was trying to purchase was a mix of hundreds of sports cards, so I can't just go purchase from somebody else as you suggested, doesn't always work like that. And lastly, isn't that why Ebay has "RESERVES" so they can set an amount that they would like to get in return at a minimum? He could have easily done that, or at least started the bid amount at a higher price, but he chose a different path. Again, what he did shouldn't be allowed...period!!! BTW...his name is still there.
bonanza125
·3 weeks agoCalling someone out by name is name shaming. That is prohibited here. We do not have there side of the story so mods don't allow that. You are allowed to tell your situation only. The name is still there as of this moment because it wasn't reported. As far as reserves I do agree with you yes Ebay does have that so sellers don't have to be locked into a transaction if it doesn't sell high enough however this seller choose to cancel and upset his buyer. They elected not to pay extra for that feature.