Huge fee for cancelled auction?

[jinsaku_edo]

I had an auction up for a laptop with a starting bid of $1000 and had "allow offers" turned on. A few days into the auction, the laptop was around $2300 and I received a message from someone making a really good offer. However, the auction wasn't allowing him to actually make the offer. I looked on my side and didn't seem to have an option to send him an offer, so I figured the best way to do it was cancel the auction, relist it fixed price with a BIN of the amount, and have him hit the button.

So we did all that, life is good, and I shipped him out the laptop. This was yesterday. I noticed today that eBay charged me almost $300 for the cancelled auction. Is this common practice? I've been on ebay about 20 years occasionally buying and selling items (2000+ feedback) and I don't remember every being charged for a cancelled auction, let alone almost $300. 

I sent an email to support, but I don't have high hopes. Anyone shed some clarity on this?

Thanks in advance!

[coffeebean832]

If he bid the highest price he was comfortable with upfront then he wouldn't have to be around when the auction ended.

[eunster1313]

(I had an auction up for a laptop with a starting bid of $1000 and had "allow offers" turned on. A few days into the auction, the laptop was around $2300 and I received a message from someone making a really good offer. However, the auction wasn't allowing him to actually make the offer. I looked on my side and didn't seem to have an option to send him an offer, so I figured the best way to do it was cancel the auction, relist it fixed price with a BIN of the amount, and have him hit the button.)

Buyers are not allowed to interfere with anyone's auction and sellers are not allowed to accommodate them.

Once the best offer option is off the table when someone else places a bid any side deals through the message system is a violation of eBay's policy.

Interfering with transactions policy

https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/rules-policies-buyers/interfering-transactions-policy?id=4226 

[serriyl31]

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@jinsaku_edo wrote:

> Why didn't you just have them bid their offer?

Understandable. I originally suggested that but he asked because he was going on vacation for a few weeks, the laptop I was selling isn't available in that specification anywhere else, and the auction was ending after he left.

This was me trying to be nice to someone who sounded like he really would enjoy the laptop.

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🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩 So many red flags!

[7606dennis]

You do realize that if an auction listing with the BO option attached, that option is removed once a bid has been placed and all pending offers become void, right?  This is designed to keep a seller like yourself from running into legal  issues in states where regulations require auctions to be conducted in an ethical manner and to accept an offer outside the bidding process would violate that principle.  Depending upon your state's laws governing auctions there could be issues that the state and all the bidders could seek legal redress.  I would urge you to check with your state's auction regulating authority to make sure how those laws apply to you in the future.

[jinsaku_edo]

> You do realize that if an auction listing with the BO option attached, that option is removed once a bid has been placed and all pending offers become void, right? 

Nope, that is what I didn't realize. That makes sense why he couldn't make an offer and why I couldn't send him an offer. 

Again, I almost never do Auction-style and pretty much always do Fixed Price, so I wasn't aware of this even after having used eBay for so long.

[jinsaku_edo]

>  So many red flags!

I mean, not really. We still went through the eBay process, just in a different listing. In that regard, no rules were broken, it wasn't a "side-deal" or anything outside of the eBay process.

[silverstatetreasureboxes]

@jinsaku_edo 

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@jinsaku_edo wrote:

>  So many red flags!

I mean, not really. We still went through the eBay process, just in a different listing. In that regard, no rules were broken, it wasn't a "side-deal" or anything outside of the eBay process.

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Hun, oh boy, what you did was a no-no. You had this laptop in auction and bids were on it. You broke eBay's rule and they are making you pay for it. And on top of it all this " nice vacation bound buyer" held a fat juicy carrot in his mouth and you took the bite. This transaction isn't over yet, don't be surprised if buyer pulls something. But I would keep all corresponding messages between both of you as I believe (maybe someone can verify this) this buyer may have lost his MBG privileges.