What Happen To Ebay ?

Dutch - much of what you say is true.
As for auction houses owning what they sell - that varies a lot from house to house.
And I don't think shill bidding is quite as pronounced as you appear to think it is.

Maybe the so called "cartel"....
but show a US big seller (any) that uses shill bidders.

BS!

There is no problem attracting bottom-feeders, as they will simply be outbid.

The problem is attracting any bidders, period, when there are tens of millions of listings.




I recently came into an item postmarked Ninilchik AK. If I could list it somewhere for free, indefinitely, I could wait for the guy who is dying to complete his Postmarks of Alaska collection.

But there are always overhead costs to be met - even on your own site - never mind that you might be doing all this work in the hopes of generating a salary.

Even with deep pockets, there are limits to the "set high BIN and wait" strategy; what we do not know is how many people are trying this strategy, and how many of them will be giving-up as time goes by.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

As a buyer, I see less offered than 10 years ago. I still find one or two items per week but I have to do a lot of sifting. I find the searching to be part of the fun of collecting so I don't mind at all. I confess to being part bottom feeder and part specialist who will pay good prices for what I want. The bottom feeder part has become harder and harder. Both professional and clueless ebay sellers still turn up specialist material I can use - but I collect a lot of different stuff.

Kevin

Large seller has item I am interested in that is fairly low priced so far. I set a snipe for a considerably higher price.

Low an behold, I get outbid.

Item is relisted at a much higher fixed price.
I had bought from this seller many times in the past and was suprised at this so sent an email to the seller.

He told me that the high bid backed out and asked if I wanted to take it at a 2nd chance offer at my max.

The 3rd highest bid was way below mine. I would of won it at a price slightly above the 3rd bidder and way below my max.

I respectfully declined and told the seller I do not appreciate games like this. I told him I would never buy from him again.

This is the garbage that is going on with ebay sellers

So, dutchman, what's the seller's ebay ID? If what you have related is fact, there is no issue legally, with privacy, or with ebay's rules in disclosing the seller's ID, and it's helpful to the community to do so.

DUTCHMAN ----There is a lot of garbage flying both ways on ebay. It flies between buyer to sellers and sellers to buyers .

cjpalermo1964

Seller ID is pavstamps

floortrader

I am well aware it goes both ways as I buy and sell.

It is getting worse and worse and as a buyer getting garbage, I just buy next to nothing on ebay anymore.

As a seller, I go with the flow until I get fed up and not sell anymore either. I am setting up my 2 websites again because all the crap with ebay changing rules and punishments will eventually catch up to a lot of sellers, me included. I already have 2 cancellation defects due to ebay relisting sold items but denying it or any knowlwdge of the glich.

That is of course total garbage as the issue has been on the boards off and on for some time.

Life goes on.

Maybe it's just luck on my part, but I do probably 90% of my buying on ebay - probably 2-3 purchases a week on average - and have had almost zero bad experiences.

https://www.justice.gov/atr/case-do...greement-107


Earl P.L. Apfelbaum, Inc. and John Apfelbaum will waive indictment pursuant to Rule 7(b) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and will plead guilty to a two-count Information, in the form attached, charging them with violations of Section One of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1, in connection with conspiracies to rig bids for the purchase of stamps at auctions in the United States and elsewhere.

Q/ Anything since 2002?

area - this had nothing to do with ebay auctions, the bid rigging you refer to was at big public auction houses, and it was not shilling (which a seller uses to drive up prices), but rather a non-compete scheme used buy some major buyers to reduce prices they paid

thank you!

I should clarify that I have actually had negative experiences on ebay, but all of them have been as a seller. As a buyer I have no complaints. I have gotten mis-identified stamps a couple times as a buyer, but I got a profuse apology and an immediate refund both times.