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Pensacola Discussion Forum » General Discussion » A really goofy eBay mystery. Can anyone here solve it because I can't.

A really goofy eBay mystery. Can anyone here solve it because I can't.

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TEOTWAWKI
Hospital Bob
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Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

The following link is a listing of completed ebay auctions.
You will see records being offered for 1 penny with free shipping.

There are two mysteries about this which stump me.

One, is why would anyone sell a record for one penny with free shipping? Even if the seller doesn't want to get anything for the record (which is goofy in itself), the seller cannot ship anything for one penny. So he's guaranteed to lose on every sale.

Two, when only one penny is paid for an item, how in the name of sense do eBay and Paypal get their fees out of one penny? Do they expect the seller to cut the penny into pieces and mail them a piece of it?

http://www.ebay.com/sch/Records-/176985/i.html?_sop=15&LH_Complete=1&rt=nc

TEOTWAWKI

TEOTWAWKI

You must not shop much on ebay. The seller has a minimum set and doesn't have to sell until that its reached. the 1 cent is just an auction base. These records will probably not be released till they reach many dollars apiece.

TEOTWAWKI

TEOTWAWKI

Here's one that has been in play for a while....it started at $1.99..remember even though this record is up to $40 the seller does NOT have to sell until it reaches his minimum which is hidden and may be as much as $100 or more...

Bidder Click here to know more about anonymous user IDs Bid Amount Bid Time
Member Id: r***e ( 163Feedback score is 100 to 499)   US $40.00
Feb-09-14 12:16:13 PST

Member Id: 0***r ( 43Feedback score is 10 to 49)   US $40.00
Feb-10-14 07:18:39 PST

Member Id: 0***r ( 43Feedback score is 10 to 49)   US $35.00
Feb-10-14 07:13:56 PST

Member Id: 0***r ( 43Feedback score is 10 to 49)   US $30.00
Feb-10-14 07:13:34 PST

Member Id: 0***r ( 43Feedback score is 10 to 49)   US $25.00
Feb-10-14 07:13:18 PST

Member Id: 0***r ( 43Feedback score is 10 to 49)   US $20.00
Feb-10-14 07:12:56 PST

Member Id: 7***o ( 295Feedback score is 100 to 499)   US $2.66
Feb-09-14 22:27:00 PST

Starting Price   US $1.99
Feb-09-14 10:53:54 PST

Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

TEOTWAWKI wrote:You must not shop much on ebay. The seller has a minimum set and doesn't have to sell until that its reached. the 1 cent is just an auction base. These records will probably not be released till they reach many dollars apiece.

No the list I linked you to are all completed auctions,  teo.  Each auction has ended.  And when you see the price in green,  that's an auction which received a buyer who is paying that price for the item (one cent).

TEOTWAWKI

TEOTWAWKI

I would say that the selling price defaulted back to a penny and the actual selling price was not revealed.

Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

TEOTWAWKI wrote:I would say that the selling price defaulted back to a penny and the actual selling price was not revealed.

When an auction ends, the auction selling price is always revealed. The price is then shown in either red or green. When it's the red color, that indicates that the auction ended without a sale (the highest bid didn't meet the seller's minimum or reserve price). Whenever the auction price is in green, that tells us the auction did result in a sale and the green price is always the amount the item sold for.
These auctions did end in a sale and the amount of the sale was one penny.

Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

I've been buying and selling on eBay since 1997, teo. And I've never seen anything as goofy as this.

TEOTWAWKI

TEOTWAWKI

Great golly wompers Bob I'd say you have the mystery of the ages then..good luck.

boards of FL

boards of FL

That is really weird. They are even receiving positive feedback from closed transactions where the end price was $0.16, and the buyer is stating that they received their item - so we know that records are actually being sold.

Another weird thing I noticed: there was one auction that had an ending price of $0.01, but it also had two bids. How does that work? Ebay won't let you match someone else's bid. You either outbid them or you do not bid.


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boards of FL

boards of FL

Bob, you should just buy one. You could solve the mystery for $0.01. Bid on a record, pay the $0.01, and then see what happens.


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Sal

Sal

I heard some people bitching that ebay penny auctions were a way to cheat the feedback system.

Not sure how that works, and not interested enough to research it.

Try googling "ebay penny auctions cheat feedback system", and see what you find.

Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

Sal wrote:I heard some people bitching that ebay penny auctions were a way to cheat the feedback system.


That would be a plausible explanation.  You run fake penny auctions and have cohorts be the buyers.  There is no intention of actually completing a transaction,  it's just to use each official transaction to give the seller positive feedback.
And the penny amount would be used because that would not incur eBay or Paypal fees for the seller.

I'm gonna do what boards suggested.  I'm gonna run a penny record auction and get a friend to be the buyer.   Not to get feedback (I could care less about that),  but to see how eBay/Paypal computes the fees on a penny sale.  That's the part that is intriguing.

Sal

Sal

Bob wrote:

That would be a plausible explanation.  You run fake penny auctions and have cohorts be the buyers.  There is no intention of actually completing a transaction,  it's just to use each official transaction to give the seller positive feedback.
And the penny amount would be used because that would not incur eBay or Paypal fees for the seller.

I'm gonna do what boards suggested.  I'm gonna run a penny record auction and get a friend to be the buyer.   Not to get feedback (I could care less about that),  but to see how eBay/Paypal computes the fees on penny sale.  That's the part that is intriguing.

From what I understand, you can be suspended or banned for engaging in this practice if they catch you, Bob.

Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

boards of FL wrote:That is really weird.  They are even receiving positive feedback from closed transactions where the end price was $0.16, and the buyer is stating that they received their item - so we know that records are actually being sold.

Another weird thing I noticed: there was one auction that had an ending price of $0.01, but it also had two bids.  How does that work?  Ebay won't let you match someone else's bid.  You either outbid them or you do not bid.

That one I can explain.  That's the same bidder plugging in two bids.
Remember,  an eBay buyer never plugs in an actual bid.  He is always plugging in a "maximum" bid.  The actual high bid amount is determined by what others have bid.
One buyer will plug in two different maximum bids because he gets cold feet after he enters the first maximum bid and worries that he hasn't bid high enough.  And so he then decides to enter a second maximum bid to help ensure he wins the auction.
When one bidder has plugged in two maximum bids (and there are no other bidders yet),  then the high bid amount will remain the auction's opening bid amount (which in this case is 1 cent).



Last edited by Bob on 2/10/2014, 3:17 pm; edited 1 time in total

2seaoat



From what I understand, you can be suspended or banned for engaging in this practice if they catch you, Bob.

Only if he is caught with popcorn and milk duds in his pants, and only if he made payment with a steel penny.

Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

Sal wrote:
From what I understand, you can be suspended or banned for engaging in this practice if they catch you, Bob.

I would imagine you're correct. But what puzzles me is this seller has run dozens of these auctions and the eBay software apparently hasn't caught it yet and neither has anybody ratted him out to eBay (which usually happens whenever the rules are broken).

Floridatexan

Floridatexan


What if you had really bad ratings and you wanted to pump them up so you wouldn't lose your ebay privileges? Is it only one seller that does this?

TEOTWAWKI

TEOTWAWKI

Are you sure since records are such a small market they don't advertise on ebay connect and transact with buyers through a different medium and close the auction so they don't have to pay ebay ?

Floridatexan

Floridatexan


Hey, Bob, check this out...I found it on...ebay. What do you know about setting up an ebay store?

Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

TEOTWAWKI wrote:Are you sure since records are such a small market they don't advertise on ebay connect and transact with  buyers through a different medium and close the  auction so they don't have to pay ebay ?

That was done in the past.  But eBay was losing money so they changed the system.  There is no longer any way for eBay users to share emails.  eBay users are now limited to using the eBay messaging system and the software is so sophisticated that it senses any attempt to type an email address and any words that could be used to suggest an outside of eBay transaction and won't let those messages be sent.

And by the way, records are not a "small market" on eBay. There are four million eBay auctions at any given time selling records.

Hospital Bob

Hospital Bob

Floridatexan wrote:
Hey, Bob, check this out...I found it on...ebay.  What do you know about setting up an ebay store?  

Sorry,  tex,  I don't see a link in your post.  But I'm familiar with eBay "stores".  What is it you're wondering about?

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