What good is a 24hr offer period on an auction item if a lowball bid can override it?
I posted an auction item with a $15 starting price. The same day, I received an email from E-Bay with an offer for $50 that was good for 24 hours. Yet with current policy, someone else placed a $15 bid on the item 8 hours later, which cancelled the $50 offer way prior to the end of the 24 hour period. It would seem that if an offer is higher than an "official" bid, it should be valid for the whole 24 hours. I have had this happen in a previous sale also. (However, in that case, when the auction closed, the winning bid was way more that the cancelled offer amount.)
I guess I'll just wait it out until the end of the auction period.
Does the offeror receive an e-mail stating why the offer was not accepted?
It appears that the options I have are setting a buy it now price, or setting an automatically accepted offer level which in one way or another effectively caps the possible amount of the sale and negates the possibility of getting an unexpected high return on the item. Or I could continue on and ignore offers that I would be happy with and just accept the final auction price.
One other point I will have to research is it possible to set a minimum price where the item will automatically be withdrawn from offer? I have a few items that have been automatically relisted at lower starting prices and are at a level that the "only" entity that sees significant money from the sale would be the shipper. If the item gets down to the $1.00 range, it is not worth it to me to have to package it up and take it to the post office. I might as well just donate it to a thrift store.
a_c_green
·3 years agoeBay's logic behind automatically cancelling an offer once bids are received is twofold, as near as I can tell:
The bidder may ultimately have the better price for you. You can always accept the offer, in which case the auction will end right there, but if bids come in before you act on the offer, they will take precedence.
All that aside, if you do plan to haggle with offers, it's probably better to list the item as Fixed Price with the Make Offer option on it, and that way you can go back and forth with hagglers who don't want to pay full price. Be aware that if you have Make Offer, you're likely to get lowball offers coming in, in which case you'll want to set a minimum offer price, below which the lowballs will be automatically declined for you, and won't be seen by you.
Also be aware that both auctions and Make Offers can be won by scammers who may attempt to pry a text or phone number out of you in order to send you fake payment notifications and fake directives to ship. It's probably best to use Fixed Price with no Make Offer and with the Immediate Payment Required option set (it's found under the Payment subhead of the Preferences section of the listing form), setting the price to be whatever you want to get for it, and that way no one can snatch your item off the market without actually paying you for it first. Save the auction format for those items that may be rare, collectible, or have no commonly-accepted retail price above which it would be unlikely to sell.
Yes, they get a message saying that the offer has been automatically declined. They're still free to bid against their competition, which will benefit you.
Yes, I think you've got an eBay option set whose name escapes me right now ("Smart Pricing," maybe?), so you'll want to find that and turn it off.
buyselljack2016
·3 years agoThere was no "lowball" bid.
The bid was not lower than the amount that you listed at.
There is an eBay learning curve. You will get there 🙂
nobody*s_perfect
·3 years agoOr if you get an offer you'd be happy with, accept it immediately rather than taking a chance on getting a higher selling price either through auction bidding or a better offer.
There's no way to set a minimum or a cancellation level for listings that are automatically reduced when relisted. You have to just keep an eye on them and end them if they get down to a price that's not worthwhile.
lamber9347
·3 years agoThis paragraph actually is the correct answer. You are new to selling and you are now learning how auctions work. There is no guarantee on your final price. You are the seller, and you determine what your lowest price is. If you receive an offer, then you need to quickly determine if that is what you want to accept. You don't get to sit on the offer for the full 24 hrs hoping another better offer comes in or that someone doesn't place a bid- not how auctions work. Best of luck to you....
eburtonlab
·3 years agoIt would seem that if an offer is higher than an "official" bid, it should be valid for the whole 24 hours.
That is not how offers work on auctions. In most categories, once an auction receives a valid bid, bidding takes precedence and the auction must proceed with the highest bid winning. Any offers expire as soon as a valid bid is placed, and no offers can be made after the first bid.
If you do not want offers to expire like that, do not list your item for auction. Use a fixed price listing, and then offers can last the full 24 or 48 hours, unless the item sells for the buy it now price.
soh.maryl
·3 years agoCan you explain how anyone other than the seller could set the price at $1 on an item?
And I don't see anything that you have sold for $1. There is an item that sold for $2, and guess who set that as the starting price?
There is an old saying among sellers here: Never set the starting price at a level that won't satisfy you if the item gets only one bid.
maxine*j
·3 years agoYou are in total control of the minimum price you get for any item you list on eBay.
You may list it at that minimum as fixed price, and even require immediate payment.
Or, you can make that price the opening bid in an auction.
And, you are not required to solicit or take offers.
I guess I do not understand the problem, as there is no way to force you to sell anything for less than you wish to sell it for on eBay.
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niwe2855
OP3 years agoI know that, my complaint is about how offers are terminated prior to the "stated" 24hour life of the offer. It means that I cannot sell the item for the offered price because the offer was automatically withdrawn because someone bid, in this case the items auction starting price which was much lower than the offer. Yes the starting price was the minimum I would like to get for the item but a 24 hour period for an offer should be 24 hours, not cut off after only 4 hours because of a minimal bid being made. (As stated, the first time this happened, the item auction winning price turned out to be over twice what the original offer that was "auto" rejected was. I was happy with the result, but in the second case since the auction has not finished the "what could be's" could mean is that the person whose offer was prematurely rejected, will not bother to submit a bid and the item sells for the starting price which was 1/4 of the offered price.
luckythewinner
·3 years agoI'm not sure I follow. You as the seller set the starting price of an auction.
If you don't want an item selling for $1, set the starting price higher than $1.
niwe2855
OP3 years agoThank you. The items(s) started at a higher value and were voluntarily relisted at a lower starting price. (It would be nicer if the ebay query about relisting stated what the lower price would be). The items that went down to $1 were not relisted. It is just that a price threshold where the item would be automatically withdrawn from the auction (and Ebay) would be nice and eliminate some unnecessary emails.