Regards,
Every once in a while I have a Bidder retract their bid instead of messaging me and asking for a bid cancellation. The Bid Retraction flow needs some work so it complies with the Policy which reads:
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"When you can retract a bid
You can retract a bid if (Note: these options are only applicable for up to 1 hour after making the bid when the listing is ending in less than 12 hours):
- The seller significantly changed the description of the item
- You accidentally bid the wrong amount. For example, you meant to bid $20, not $200. In this case, enter the price you intended to bid as soon as you've retracted the incorrect bid
Any other bids can't be retracted, but you can still contact the seller to see if they'll agree to cancel a bid for you. Remember, the seller isn't obligated to cancel the bid so they may not agree."
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In all the instances where Bidders have retracted their bids the first bullet point reason did NOT apply, meaning no changes were made to the listing. Therefore, the second bullet point would apply but NONE of the Bidders who retracted their bids have replaced them with another bid. The retraction flow needs a step added that requires the Bidder to enter a new amount before their bid in question can be retracted.
One happened today and in checking the Bidder's FB profile they have 17 retracted bids in the last year. While I have seen Buyers with much higher bid retraction counts I would classify this particular Bidder as a potential policy abuser. Granted I don't know how the other 16 retractions were handled by the Bidder but I suspect they did not replace their retracted bids with a new bid.
Further to this topic, Buyers should be LIMITED to the number of bid retractions they are permitted each year or month. One Bid Retraction per month to me would be a good place to start with the caveat that if they actually use the policy as described and AS INTENDED and then replace their retracted bid with a new bid then the retraction would NOT be counted against their annual or monthly retraction limit. If eBay would implement a system like this (and actually enforce their own Policy) the number of illicit bid retractions would drop rather abruptly.
Another approach would be a new setting in a Seller's Buyer Management section whereby they could set a block for Bidders with "X" or more Bid retractions in the last 12 months ... this would be based on only those bids that were retracted and NOT replaced. A properly retracted and replaced bid would not count against the Buyer.
@mr_lincoln wrote:
Every once in a while I have a Bidder retract their bid instead of messaging me and asking for a bid cancellation. The Bid Retraction flow needs some work so it complies with the Policy which reads:
***************************************
"When you can retract a bid
You can retract a bid if (Note: these options are only applicable for up to 1 hour after making the bid when the listing is ending in less than 12 hours):
- The seller significantly changed the description of the item
- You accidentally bid the wrong amount. For example, you meant to bid $20, not $200. In this case, enter the price you intended to bid as soon as you've retracted the incorrect bid
Any other bids can't be retracted, but you can still contact the seller to see if they'll agree to cancel a bid for you. Remember, the seller isn't obligated to cancel the bid so they may not agree."
*****************************
In all the instances where Bidders have retracted their bids the first bullet point reason did NOT apply, meaning no changes were made to the listing. Therefore, the second bullet point would apply but NONE of the Bidders who retracted their bids have replaced them with another bid. The retraction flow needs a step added that requires the Bidder to enter a new amount before their bid in question can be retracted.
One happened today and in checking the Bidder's FB profile they have 17 retracted bids in the last year. While I have seen Buyers with much higher bid retraction counts I would classify this particular Bidder as a potential policy abuser. Granted I don't know how the other 16 retractions were handled by the Bidder but I suspect they did not replace their retracted bids with a new bid.
Further to this topic, Buyers should be LIMITED to the number of bid retractions they are permitted each year or month. One Bid Retraction per month to me would be a good place to start with the caveat that if they actually use the policy as described and AS INTENDED and then replace their retracted bid with a new bid then the retraction would NOT be counted against their annual or monthly retraction limit. If eBay would implement a system like this (and actually enforce their own Policy) the number of illicit bid retractions would drop rather abruptly.
Another approach would be a new setting in a Seller's Buyer Management section whereby they could set a block for Bidders with "X" or more Bid retractions in the last 12 months ... this would be based on only those bids that were retracted and NOT replaced. A properly retracted and replaced bid would not count against the Buyer.
Hey @mr_lincoln! This is a very good call out and some great suggestions. I can get this over to the correct team to look into and if anything comes from it I will let you know!.
Devon,
devon@ebay wrote:
@mr_lincoln wrote:
Every once in a while I have a Bidder retract their bid instead of messaging me and asking for a bid cancellation. The Bid Retraction flow needs some work so it complies with the Policy which reads:
***************************************
"When you can retract a bid
You can retract a bid if (Note: these options are only applicable for up to 1 hour after making the bid when the listing is ending in less than 12 hours):
- The seller significantly changed the description of the item
- You accidentally bid the wrong amount. For example, you meant to bid $20, not $200. In this case, enter the price you intended to bid as soon as you've retracted the incorrect bid
Any other bids can't be retracted, but you can still contact the seller to see if they'll agree to cancel a bid for you. Remember, the seller isn't obligated to cancel the bid so they may not agree."
*****************************
In all the instances where Bidders have retracted their bids the first bullet point reason did NOT apply, meaning no changes were made to the listing. Therefore, the second bullet point would apply but NONE of the Bidders who retracted their bids have replaced them with another bid. The retraction flow needs a step added that requires the Bidder to enter a new amount before their bid in question can be retracted.
One happened today and in checking the Bidder's FB profile they have 17 retracted bids in the last year. While I have seen Buyers with much higher bid retraction counts I would classify this particular Bidder as a potential policy abuser. Granted I don't know how the other 16 retractions were handled by the Bidder but I suspect they did not replace their retracted bids with a new bid.
Further to this topic, Buyers should be LIMITED to the number of bid retractions they are permitted each year or month. One Bid Retraction per month to me would be a good place to start with the caveat that if they actually use the policy as described and AS INTENDED and then replace their retracted bid with a new bid then the retraction would NOT be counted against their annual or monthly retraction limit. If eBay would implement a system like this (and actually enforce their own Policy) the number of illicit bid retractions would drop rather abruptly.
Another approach would be a new setting in a Seller's Buyer Management section whereby they could set a block for Bidders with "X" or more Bid retractions in the last 12 months ... this would be based on only those bids that were retracted and NOT replaced. A properly retracted and replaced bid would not count against the Buyer.
Hey @mr_lincoln! This is a very good call out and some great suggestions. I can get this over to the correct team to look into and if anything comes from it I will let you know!.
That would be great and thank you for moving it along ... I think it is certainly worth looking into and hopefully the team will put their heads together and come up with a workable solution.
@ericodapro wrote:I was about to start a thread about a bid retraction that just happened to me but saw this post and decided to just give my issue.
I have an item on auction that was bid up over $600 then someone retracted their bid and it is now down to $300. Obviously the bidder that retracted just wanted to see how high the other bidder was willing to go and didnt want to go that high so he retracted. Now other bidders know how high one is willing to go so they wont bid anymore if not willing to pay that much. It basically killed any potential bid war. I dont believe this is fair for the seller and there is no way to stop this from happening again.
I've had that happen too in the recent past where a $ 152 item dropped to about $ 95 then only recovered to a final sale of $127 ... and while my starting price around $ 75 included normal profit AND the $ 127 had good profit the $ 152 would have been nicer.
You can see how many retractions a Bidder has by going to their Feedback history and selecting the "Received as Buyer" tab ... then you look over to the right above the list of Feedbacks and will see how many bids they retracted in the past year. Bidders with a high count I immediately put them on my blocked list while some with lower counts I let slide ...
@luckythewinner wrote:The Bid Retraction flow needs some work so it complies with the Policy which reads
The bid retraction flow has been this way for over a decade.
eBay will not change it to conform to "policy" because the policy is a farce.
The policy is just a placebo to make sellers feel better.
eBay does not want to force a buyer to purchase an item he clearly does not want. That will just result in a cancellation request, a return, or a false SNAD.
Plus there are cases where a bidder cannot rebid the amount they intended because other bidders have exceeded it.
@luckythewinner Yes, I've read that before in other places and on other topics, however I am making an effort to effect a change. But I appreciate the post.
