eBay

beautifulbeauty2012 · ‎07-31-2023

I marked as "watched" $30 item and received $40 "offer" from a seller. He changed the price to $45 and "offered" me $5 off from the new price. I knew I wasn`t losing my mind and went to the revision history-indeed price was revised.

Do you think it is ethical? Obviously, I declined that "offer" and blocked him. Does the seller think buyers are stupid? I can see increasing by a buck or two, but $15 on $30 is just rude.

chapeau-noir · ‎08-01-2023

I think the original point is being missed here - it's not raising and lowering the price, it's the way it was done, which supposed that the buyer/watcher wasn't actually paying attention to anything that went on.

It's as if a store had a sign that said proclaimed "Golden Widget $75!!", then the next day replaced the sign with "Golden Widget $105, 10% off!!!!" Sure, the store can do that, no one disputes it, but anyone who saw that sign yesterday would just be shaking their heads because basically, it's just such an obviously poor marketing strategy.

Saying "You should have bought it when it was $30", etc. etc. is totally missing the point.

“The illegal we do immediately, the unconstitutional takes a little longer.” - Henry Kissinger

"Do not obey in advance." Timothy Snyder "On Tyranny"

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titipeo · ‎07-31-2023

Nothing new, been going on for ages. Sellers can decide how to price item. Perhaps he did the typical thing that local stores do when they do a sale, raise the price of the item, and then marked it down. You as buyer can decide if it's worth it.

dirk12955 · ‎07-31-2023

Happens all the time.

Grocery stores do it. Furniture stores do it. Car dealers do it.

People won't buy those shoes for $50.00 Jack em up to $100.00 and mark them

50% off and they'll get sold.

wil_483592 · ‎07-31-2023

I look at sales of some of my competitors and it's insane what buyers will pay. I move my prices around a bit and many times I'll up a price by 30% and it'll sell within hours, and that item had been on ebay for a while.

dqdistribution · ‎07-31-2023

If you are just a watcher you are not entitled to the price staying the same.

This is the RISK of watching instead of buying. Prices can increase or decrease.

beautifulbeauty2012 · ‎07-31-2023

Not this item. $30 was already a bit high for it.

beautifulbeauty2012 · ‎07-31-2023

I am talking about increasing the price because someone is watching it and sending "discounted offer" with a higher than original price, not just increasing the price and selling it to random buyer.

fashunu4eeuh · ‎07-31-2023

Hmm, i am not sure. I don’t think this action was quite egregious enough to be called unethical. But certainly it was ill-advised. Like you, i also would not buy from him. Creating a fake sale in order to get full price is pretty distasteful. And short-sighted for the seller to not consider it would alienate his informed buyers.

chapeau-noir · ‎07-31-2023

Well, that's an old trick, but kinda dumb for that seller to be playing it so obviously. You're supposed to do all that price jigging BEFORE the prospective buyer sees the original price! 😂 Not unethical per se, but a little silly.

“The illegal we do immediately, the unconstitutional takes a little longer.” - Henry Kissinger

"Do not obey in advance." Timothy Snyder "On Tyranny"

inhawaii · ‎07-31-2023

@beautifulbeauty2012 wrote:
I am talking about increasing the price because someone is watching it and sending "discounted offer" with a higher than original price, not just increasing the price and selling it to random buyer.

The fact that you (or anyone else) is watching it makes no difference.

A seller can raise (or lower) the price at any timer.

Telephone Line - Electric Light Orchestra

itscalledapostingid · ‎07-31-2023

A lot of ecommerce can be automated. They might not even know they did that.

With "automatically send offers" enabled on an item where they also use an app to discount the price weekly down to as much as 1/3 off then back to the top - it could happen.

I'm not saying that's what happened here but it's possible.

I see a lot of items in my watchlist or cart where the price is discounted weekly then back to the top after a month or so. I've found sometimes it pays to watch an item before buying.

chapeau-noir · ‎07-31-2023

@inhawaii wrote:
@beautifulbeauty2012 wrote:
I am talking about increasing the price because someone is watching it and sending "discounted offer" with a higher than original price, not just increasing the price and selling it to random buyer.
The fact that you (or anyone else) is watching it makes no difference.
A seller can raise (or lower) the price at any timer.

They totally can, but it's the way they did it with the offer that makes it so danged funny! Like the OP wasn't going to notice...really? 🤣 Whomever did that does not get the brass ring on this ride.

“The illegal we do immediately, the unconstitutional takes a little longer.” - Henry Kissinger

"Do not obey in advance." Timothy Snyder "On Tyranny"

m60driver · ‎07-31-2023

@beautifulbeauty2012 wrote:
Do you think it is ethical? Obviously, I declined that "offer" and blocked him. Does the seller think buyers are stupid? I can see increasing by a buck or two, but $15 on $30 is just rude.

To paraphrase and with apologies to the late great Tina Turner:

Oh-oh-oh, what's ethics got to do, got to do with it?
What's ethics, but a second-hand emotion?

By the way, you are still under no obligation to purchase the widget.

sakic92710 · ‎07-31-2023

Is it much worse than the countless 50-40-30% offers many sellers get? A couple of months ago, a buyer offered me 40% of my asking price. I decided on giving up the item & move on with everything else I have. They already knew the S/H cost. Once I gave them the deal, they asked for cheaper postage. Not going to happen. They never paid.

onefootflipper · ‎07-31-2023

Nothing unethical there, it is just a sales strategy.

When I ran the ebay for the card store the boxes of cards for the Anime related games always got hundreds of watchers. Every friday before I went home I would raise the price $10 on those boxes and send out offers at the original price, and would usually sell 20 of them over the weekend. Then when I got back on monday I would put the price back and repeat the process the next friday.

At no point did anyone pay anything extra and it is absolutely no different than the fake sale that many ebayers are running continuously.