Buying bikes on eBay

[R8Steve]

Am i just extremely unlucky or am i wasting my time?

I’ve now won three auctions for bikes in the last few weeks and haven’t managed to get one of them.

Bike 1 – no answer to any of my messages after winning it.

Bike 2 – The guy insisted in delivering it to me, no big problem there, saves me the hassle. He doesn’t turn up and then claims by message he crashed on the way to my house and i wouldn’t want the bike now!

Bike 3 – Won last night, got a message straight away, excellent, must be to arrange payment/collection. No, it says ‘Hi there, sorry the bike sold this afternoon but i couldn't stop the auction. Thanks for your interest.’ He then called me a knob for leaving him negative feedback asking ‘was i even a biker as bikers respect one another’ along with some other pointless rants.

I despair!

[R8Steve]

Isn't that kind of the point of an auction though?

As i said to the last guy, if you don't want to sell it for that price, put a reserve on it.

[R8Steve]

cat with a hat said:

Might sound like an arse for saying this, but I waste a lot of time watching bikes only to see the sellers are playing silly buggers just as much as some of the scummier buyers.

Not at all, that's exactly my point, i'm looking for a cheap winter bike and am now three weeks on and no further forward with all the messing about. I put an R6 on ebay, it went for a lot lower than i thought it would but that's the gamble you take. The fact he felt insulted that i left him negative feedback kind of tells me the mentality of some people on there.

He said 'I have bought and sold here on eBay for years, I must bring to your attention that not every transaction receives feedback, I have sold brand new stuff, 2nd hand stuff and according to my account profile bought over 70k worth of gear on eBay, a few purchase's have pissed me off but I always try to resolve before leaving neg feedback'.

Well yeah, you could resolve it by selling me the bike i won.

Anyway, looks like i'll need to brave the scumtree, unless anyone on here is selling a sub 2k winter bike 600cc upwards.

[R8Steve]

Farlig said:

boyse7en said:

Blackpuddin said:

Seller No 3 was telling the truth as you can't stop an ebay auction less than 12 hours before the end if the item's had a winning bid.

Yes, that's true. But if he had it up for auction he shouldn't have sold it beforehand IMO. Should have told however he sold it to to put a bid on it.

Did he not have a wee disclaimer somewhere saying "bike also advertised elsewhere, I reserve the right to waffle waffle...?"

No, the advert didn't have that, nor can i find the bike for sale on any other site.

Think it's just a case of he thought it would go for more and didn't want to pay the paltry sum to put a reserve on it. Pretty naive for an ebayer with 1000+ feedbacks.

[R8Steve]

CarsOrBikes said:

Ebay need to add a function that extends the auction for half an hour if a bid is placed in the last ten minutes. It will kill the snipers stone dead. Any live auction holds out for bids, as they are obliged to see what they can achieve, the ebay flaw allows it to be regarded as a disposal site. I won't deny a sale, but will pull the ad in the last hour due to snipers waiting to see if they can get something for nothing. If you want it bid earlier, and bid higher, then you'll never experience being let down in this way.

Sorry, but that is the daftest idea i've heard. If you want a certain price for it put a reserve price on it, it's not that difficult.

If the snipers win then you've actually made a bit more than what the rest of the market valued the item for. If you can't bid in the last ten minutes what's the point in having an auction?

You say bid earlier and higher and i'll never experience being let down this way? That's not the way ebay works though so that's pointless. If a no reserve auction starts at .99p and i bid 10k on it and no-one else bids on it i get it for .99p, not 10k. The reason? No-one else wants it so at that time in that market that's all it's worth.

Cappo - feel free to PM me if you have something

[R8Steve]

robbocop33 said:

R8Steve said:

Sorry, but that is the daftest idea i've heard. If you want a certain price for it put a reserve price on it, it's not that difficult.

Two problems with that,a reserve on something puts people off bidding and secondly you're already paying fees,classified price,whatever,but some people don't want to pay a billionaire non tax paying company to put a reserve on something!Reserve 'should' be free.
Nobody should be charged for setting a limit on a price 'they' want for 'their' item.

Firstly, it only puts people off if you've set it too high.

Secondly, if you don't like the fees this 'billionaire non tax paying company' charge you don't have to use it. There is other markets you can use to sell your item.

You weren't selling a VFR 800 the other day were you?

[R8Steve]

catso said:

Surely the start price should be the reserve - none of this 99p starting price with a £3k reserve bks?

That way all confusion is avoided, or am I missing something...

Yep, these are usually found with headings like '*******LOOK CBR600 BEST IN WORLD 99p STARTING PRICE LOW RESERVE NOT R6 ZZR ZXR GSXR YZF' then it turns out the reserve is about double what the bike is worth so will probably never be reached.

I'll stick to buy it now, make best offer or classifieds from now on i think.