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Can't report shill bidding
Put a bid of $25 on a 6 iron head and a 0 buyer bids with 15 hrs to go. Price was low so the first thing that went through my head was a shill bid, seller wants more and I was not going to pay more. Well 2 days later it's back for sale with a BIN $60
If you think that another member is shill bidding, you don't need to report it to us. eBay has a number of systems in place to detect and monitor bidding patterns and practices. If we identify any malicious behavior, we'll take steps to prevent it.
7 comments
kh-gary
·3 years agoHi everyone,
Due to the age of this thread, it has been closed to further replies. Please feel free to start a new thread HERE if you wish to continue to discuss this topic.
Thank you for understanding.
7606dennis
·5 years agoI'm afraid I don't quite understand your reason for suspecting shilling. Did you place a bid and win or were you outbid? Your statement seems to to indicate tat the seller was asking for more money after the auction closed which, although not shilling, is not permitted. Shilling is a specific type of criminal activity and from what I gather, it is not what was being engaged in here.
Did you win the auction? If so, did you pay for the item as required by the UA? Failure to pay, regardless of any suspicions that you may have could result in an adverse affect on your account if the seller files a UID.
If you did not win the item, the seller is certainly free to relist the item and while you are certainly well within your right to report your suspicions to eBay, it is doubtful that eBay will offer you any information or relief in the matter.
eburtonlab
·5 years agoThe OP suspects the seller used a shill account to bid against the OP (who likely would have won at the opening price, otherwise), then when the shill won, the seller apparently cancelled the sale and relisted for a much higher price. Presumably if the OP had actually outbid the shill, the seller would have been satisfied with the winning amount.
If the seller is actually shilling and has been careless, perhaps eBay can connect the bidding account to the seller's account; if so, eBay may take some action. If there is no connection, or the connection is not apparent, it is unlikely to result in anything one way or the other.
7606dennis
·5 years agoAlas! The OP's suspicions do not appear to be credible examples of shilling, in my opinion. Since eBay has protocols in place to detect shilling it is unlikely that eBay would find shilling to have taken place in this situation. Of course, the OP can report their suspicions but eBay's Privacy policy will prohibit them from advising the OP of any results of their investigation directly.
Shilling is an extremely difficult crime to prove even with the access to evidence available to eBay. Suspicions always seem to run rampant but being outbid on something does not, criminal activity prove.
albertabrightalberta
·3 years agoI didn't see the listing in question prior to the post being edited but I disagree that shilling is difficult to detect and prove.
I've had a seller on my watch list for over 3 years, have reported dozens of shilled listings and have yet to see any action taken on the seller. Why should ebay take action? The higher the bidding, the larger FVF collected by ebay.
These are several different shills who are bidding on listings from a single seller. (I have no idea how this seller keeps track of all the IDs and passwords!)
nobody*s_perfect
·3 years agoIt wouldn't have mattered about the post being edited, since the OP is from over 2 years ago!
albertabrightalberta
·3 years agoUgh! I didn't even look at the date!
I wonder why it showed up at the top of my new posts page.