Ever think you were high bidder in an online auction, only to realize you weren't, and lost item?
PocketArt
Posts: 1,335 ✭✭✭✭✭
I participated in an online coin auction yesterday morning through Stacks & Bowers. Regrettably, I lost item thinking I was high bidder. It was the first "live" auction I participated in with this particular service. I have done only internet before with them, yet, very few. Heritage, and Great Collections I primarily have participated in- no problems.
Stacks & Bowers need to add a few more bell's and whistles for stupid people like me because they are missing a demographic, and losing revenue.
I've never been so upset about losing a coin through auction....
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I have not lost an item, but I did have the auction house come after me for more money hours after the hammer fell. I was none too pleased with that and told them so. They claimed that they had missed a "snail mail" bid. Well that's too bad. You should eat it in that case.
Years ago I sent in a "snail mail" bid that was higher than price realized. When I called the auction house about it, they apologized for missing the bid and not executing it. That didn't do me any good. I still lost the item and the consigner got less money.
Sometimes when bid is at my max bid from a pre-bid, only to realize the bid for that amount is from the floor. I have gotten to the point now, where I set my max bid and do not fret if it is beat or tied and awarded to someone else. There are just too many coins out there to get upset.
I think a lot of this relates to a comment on another thread where someone talked about "owning" an increment. Of course, If you land on the increment prior to your ceiling then someone else might get that increment.
I lost once at Stacks because I thought I had 12hrs left to bid. They had a clock ticking down on the item I wanted and it turned out that this feature was used for something else. Pretty disheartening, because what else would a person think a clock counting down meant!?
So I log on to find that my item sold for pennies on the dollar, about 10 percent of what I would have bid.
That was a difficult one to shake.
Dead Cat Waltz Exonumia
"Coin collecting for outcasts..."
Didn't see the other thread.
I was bidding live on the item, somehow missed I was outbid through what auctioneer was saying, and what online platform indicated. Guess I wasn't looking hard enough....split my focus, and unfamiliar with their online format. Would be nice if there had been a flashing "outbid," or, something...I just missed it.
Sorry for my typos, since corrected.
It can be hard enough to keep track of the high bidder when you are in the room, much less from a distance.
Once in an auction I was pretty sure my absentee bid won, but I still felt a need to call to confirm. So I've (almost) been there.
I had the reverse happen in a Bowers and Merena auction. I had the high bid on a coin and then my bid was topped. So I proceeded to "spend" all my initial bid on winning other coins only to be told after the auction that I also had won the initial coin. I presume that the person who beat my bid on the initial coin had somehow backed out from his bid. Needless to say, given I had spent twice my budget on the auction, 1) it was a financially tight few months, and 2) I never told my wife about this...though she must have wondered why I was so tight-fisted for several months.