eBay

anniebun · ‎14-02-2024

I want to let folks know about a scam that is circulating regarding items with a Make-an-offer button (which is eBays default setting). The scammer Bids on the item - this cancels all active Offers on the item, and auto-declines any further Offers without the seller seeing any of them. They then immediately Retract the bid - this does NOT auto-reinstate any offers. They then immediately make an Offer on the item, which the Seller then thinks is the 1st offer they get (because they don't see any others after the Bid, and because pre-existing offers are not reinstated when the Bid is cancelled). So the seller accepts the offer (assuming it's above some minimum amound in the seller's mind) and the trade is done. This means, the seller might have gotten more from another offer had such been visible to the seller or had it not been voided by the scammer's Bid. I hear you say "well the seller sold because the offer was above his minimum acceptable price", but this is not the issue. Placing a Bid to kill the existing Offers and reject further Offers, ELIMINATES the fair online market characteristic that eBay is supposed to be. There's no competition between Offers (because other Offers aren't visibly received), and the scammer's offer is typically significantly LOWER than other offers might have been, because the know that other offers aren't visible. So the seller doesn't even know this is occurring, and typically ends up selling at a lower price than they might have. I and others have reported this to eBay over the last 6 months, and nothing has been done by eBay about it. They say they can't discuss matters with other eBayers but they have DONE NOTHING as it's still occurring (to me and others - we are in contact regarding it).

anniebun · ‎14-02-2024

Furthermore, I am now reporting this to the department of fair trading, and to the ombudsman, and writing to my local MP about it. To fix this, they need to have it so that retracting a bid auto-reinstates all previous outstanding offers that were cancelled when the corresponding bid was placed. eBay SAY they're reporting and doing things to fix issues on the platform, but they DON'T. They continue to squeeze as much money out of the platorm and us sellers, as possible, without doing anything to maintain the platform. Instead they streamline, streamline, simply to make it more convenient and profitable for them and their AI. But on this occasion, they have contravened the law, by failing to ensure a fair online marketplace, which in this instance (and others) has lead to a loss to the seller. This can be verified but I'm not going to say here because eBay will just make changes to prevent us seeing it (somehow they have resources for this type of code change, but not for others that actually improve eBay....).

tressygirl · ‎14-02-2024

If you wish, as we are mere members here just like yourself, with no input or power to make any changes on the eBay platform, join in the weekly chat with the eBay team managers today.

This happens here betwen 2 p.m. and 3 p.m.

Add your thoughts to the team, and if anything can, or should be done here.

*vyolla* · ‎14-02-2024

Can I ask how often this is happening and how many different eBay IDs are doing this?

Why don't you just set your offer feature to accept offers above the amount you'd be happy to accept and to decline those below an acceptable price?

That way, their MO of bidding and then retracting to remove existing offers wouldn't be effective.

*vyolla* · ‎14-02-2024

@anniebun wrote:

Furthermore, I am now reporting this to the department of fair trading, and to the ombudsman, and writing to my local MP about it.

Please don't do this, there is so much serious stuff going on in the UK at the moment that MPs and ombudsman are overloaded dealing with more serious issues.

The Office of Fair Trading wouldn't be the correct reporting route for this anyway, even if it still existed.