$2.50

[Steve Marcus]

I am an extremely infrequent user of eBay. So my question may be old hat to eBay veterans.

I bid a couple of times today on an item. Each time after I confirmed my bid, a screen appeared immediately indicating that I had been outbid by $2.50.

It's obvious that this is an automatic function implemented either by the bidder, eBay, or both.

I assume that this is some kind of bot. How does one get around it?

[shovelingtom]

The auction was set to accept minimum bid increases of $2.50.

For example, If I was selling my car on eBay and I set the auction to start at $2,500.00, and Alan bid $5,000.00, the auction price listed would be $2,500.00 (this benefits the consumer). If no one else bid, he would win the auction at $2,500.00, much less than his actual bid.

But imagine that Bob comes along and bids $4,000.00. That's less than Alan's $5,000.00, so with my minimum bid increase of $2.50, the price now stands at $4,002.50. Alan is still in the lead.

Bob comes back and bids $5,000.00 now. Since Alan bid $5,000.00 first, Alan is still in the lead. Bob might now choose to bid again, or give up.

It happens to me all the time, and is the normal way that eBay works. It is a bot of a sort, it automatically raises the price for you winning you the auction at the lowest price possible up until it hits your maximum.

Hope that helps,
Tom

[DonShirer]

This is what ebay calls an automatic bid. Someone else has previously bid a higher value than you just did, so eBay increments their bid just over yours. There is nothing you can do about it but bid more than they did.

Example: An item is listed for $10. Bidder A thinks it is worth $15 so he bids $15. Since this is the first bid, ebay says the current bid is $10 but remembers the $15 limit. Later Bidder B bids $12 on that item. Since A's bid is bigger, eBay says someone else has bid more, and lists the current bid as $13 ($1 over B's bid*). If no one else bids, A gets it for $13. Someone will have to bid more than $15 to preempt A's automatic bid. (I'm no expert on eBay, so please correct me if my explanation is in error.)

* The increment over the previous bid seems to depend on the price. I don't know if it is set by eBay or by the seller. For low priced items, it can be $1 or less, but is usually more for higher prices. I would guess you were bidding on a higher priced item. I also would guess that this is to prevent people from bidding in increments of a couple of pennies.

[rhgargoyle]

Steve,

It is actually me. I watch until you bid, then I run up the price by $2.50. It is all because you were not at my recital Sunday night.

....and you know who I am!

[Dan Schultz]

Yeah, Steve. As others have mentioned already... someone has entered a proxy bid and Ebay will automatically elevate the bid incrementally until it's at the bidder's max.

That being said... it IS possible to win an auction by $.01. If I entered a proxy bid that was several increments above the current price plus one cent... Ebay would take the bid.

[Steve Marcus]

Steve,

It is all because you were not at my recital Sunday night.

....and you know who I am!

Believe me, I would rather have been at your ensemble's recital than where I was.