Best offer on ebay now useless ?

bronco2078

Can someone explain to me why ebay no longer allows you to filter best offer/buy now ?

They changed it to accepts offers , which now shows tons of auctions with a best offer.

So it is a new listing with a 199.00 opening bid and a best offer button. Who was asking for this? Does the best offer disappear if it gets a bid? If not will some idiot seller end his action early to take a best offer?

isaiah58

I just experimented searching Buy it Now versus Auction format, both that allow Make an Offer. On auctions, if a bid has been placed the Make an Offer option is no longer available.

So, you can filter by format to choose, Auction, Make an Offer or Buy it Now. Make an Offer shows any of the other two, BIN or auctions with no bids yet.

bronco2078

@isaiah58 said:
I just experimented searching Buy it Now versus Auction format, both that allow Make an Offer. On auctions, if a bid has been placed the Make an Offer option is no longer available.

So, you can filter by format to choose, Auction, Make an Offer or Buy it Now. Make an Offer shows any of the other two, BIN or auctions with no bids yet.

My complaint is if i select the best offer on a search I am not wanting to see any auctions ever because its stupid for them to be there in the first place

searching for a best offer on a buy now is me playing a hunch , bottom feeding whatever you call it, auctions are 7 days out totally different animal. I have no clue what the seller is expecting for an offer if he is doing an auction. The whole point of an auction is to let it run not end it early. Plus if I make an offer and the seller thinks on it a day then some other person bids I'm out? Waste of time.

Ebay idiots at work improving things

GRANDAM

Sometimes I am not sure why there is even a best offer when they want a $1 less than the BUY-IT-NOW price. And no,, I am not talking about making a real low ball offer with them countering at a $1 less.

Mesh

it's eBay, what did you expect ?

bronco2078

I'm not saying I dont bid on auctions mind you. Its a different process though.

If I'm bored I will do a newly posted buy now search and if nothing suits me I'll tick the best offer box and re run it.

Now that dumps thousands of auctions back into the search and removes the buy now option entirely.

Note to ebay , ticking another box is a way to narrow a search not widen it.

Search technology provided by programmers who have never searched for anything , you wanted signs of the apocalypse ? theres your sign

Cougar1978

The bin / make offer option for store listings has worked for me at times when lots of room. I am unaware they have discontinued that. Example - listing price $100, usually market retail (cost $60, CDN bid $75) offer floor $85 / weeds out low ballers.

For the feature where somebody making an offer in one of my auctions disliked that and if it’s gone - good.

Sometimes low ballers email me just tell them “unless buy it now make offer already at our best price.”

At a show one may have price sticker on coin $500 say CPG. Guy asks what is your best price. Seller says $460 (bid plus 20 pct). Buyer tries counter. Seller Play call choices: counter offer (no less than bid plus 10 pct), take offer, or “that’s the best I can do” (with cost in it) or “sorry that’s the lowest the consignor will go.” Even if your fuming just be professional and polite. For the guy that counters your asking price at x$ and says “please do not give counter offers” your choice is take his offer (if u want move it or pass). Or what the heck ignore his arrogant comment and do as you wish.

bronco2078

@Cougar1978 said:
The bin / make offer option for store listings has worked for me at times when lots of room. I am unaware they have discontinued that. Example - listing price $100, usually market retail (cost $60, CDN bid $75) offer floor $85 / weeds out low ballers.

For the feature where somebody making an offer in one of my auctions disliked that and if it’s gone - good.

Sometimes low ballers email me just tell them “unless buy it now make offer already at our best price.”

At a show one may have price sticker on coin $500 say CPG. Guy asks what is your best price. Seller says $460 (bid plus 20 pct). Buyer tries counter. Seller Play call choices: counter offer (no less than bid plus 10 pct), take offer, or “that’s the best I can do” (with cost in it) or “sorry that’s the lowest the consignor will go.” Even if your fuming just be professional and polite. For the guy that counters your asking price at x$ and says “please do not give counter offers” your choice is take his offer (if u want move it or pass). Or what the heck ignore his arrogant comment and do as you wish.

i like the best offer on buy nows as both a buyer and a seller. I don't comprehend it on auction listings. If I list a 7 day auction do I need multiple low ball make offers below the starting bid coming in? I swear I have seen make offer on auctions that start at a penny. Cue the offer of .005 cent

I dont like it when I'm searching as a buyer. I search auctions as ending soonest I search buy nows as newly listed. If I try to search best offer I get both .

I guess they don't want me to buy, I should know this because they keep dumping me out of ending soonest into best match for no reason if I reload. They have already ruined category navigation by making it one way down and if you go up somehow they uncheck all the options.

why is ebay so passive aggressive? If they don't want to be friends with me anymore they should just say so

I just went on there I feel like buying a lot of 5 morgan dollars maybe. Best offer gets me auctions , uncheck best offer , ebay resets me to best match I change to ending soonest , I see nothing I decide to go to peace dollars , I go up a level ebay resets me to best match and removes auctions and sets me to all listings .

Where is the option for listen ebay I never want to use %%$ing best match ok? If I do I will be sure and let you know.

mbogoman

"Where is the option for listen ebay I never want to use %%$ing best match ok? If I do I will be sure and let you know."

Couldn't have said it better!!!

doubledragon

A precious metals man, I never expected that. I like it!

I'll see you over in the sports forum buddy!

JBK

This new feature did work to my advantage recently,

Niche item (limited appeal) - no bidders - 1 day left in the auction.

I offered a couple bucks above the opening bid and he took it. I figured he saw that no one had bid all week and decided to jump at my offer. For my part, I avoided any last minute sniping that might have driven u the price, as I would have paid much more than my offer,

It is all a game. Ebay is very frustrating with their nonsensical changes, but if you learn to play the game you sometimes come out ahead.

bronco2078

I found a few auctions with opening bids too high, one had 8 minutes left with best offer. I offered 10% less . I'm curious if no one bids and it ends will he be able to accept the offer after the fact or if it just ends. Its doubtful he would respond before the bidding ended

LogPotato

@Mesh said:
it's eBay, what did you expect ?

A bit off topic, but you have good taste in avatars.

bronco2078

this forum isn't big enough for botha youse I reckon

bronco2078

I guess someone bid on the listing with a minute left which removed my best offer. So I didn't find out if it would persist beyond the end of an auction

USASoccer

Hi, it will not

dontippet

@GRANDAM said:
Sometimes I am not sure why there is even a best offer when they want a $1 less than the BUY-IT-NOW price. And no,, I am not talking about making a real low ball offer with them countering at a $1 less.

At least twice now, I have made a very good offer, and the seller came back and said they needed full price. I think some sellers don't know what best offer is or don't realize they selected best offer in their auction.

I'll take my story one step further. The other night I found an item for $100. To get my ebay 8% bucks offer, I didn't to make the purchase that night. I went ahead and offered $90, hoping the seller would respond later that night and I could get the item for $90 minus 8%. The seller did not respond, so I went ahead and purchased the item later that night for $100 so I could secure the 8% discount. Then, the next day, the seller responds to my offer by saying that he needs full price. I guess he didn't realize that I had already purchased the item.

Pedzola

The worst is when sellers ignore offers entirely, no response. For me this seems to be about 75% of the time. Why do they even accept offers? Frustrating waste of time.

Those who do respond to offers, their negotiation seem to be limited to ~1% less than asking price... again, why bother accepting offers if you're not even willing to knock $10 off a $1000 item?

I have never been successful with an ebay offer.

oih82w8

I tried making an offer on an item, and was automatically declined four times. My last offer was within 10% of the asking price, but still declined. It is not a pricey item, just under $100, but if you won't knock off 10%...why bother with "make an offer"?

ricko

I tried the 'make an offer' a couple of times...Never offered a low ball, just not my style...however, refused both times...So just moved on. In one case, got an item exactly like the one I wanted, for less than my offer on the original one, a week later.... Cheers, RickO

PerryHall

If you make a reasonable offer I would think a smart seller would at least make a counter offer.

rte592

@PerryHall said:
If you make a reasonable offer I would think a smart seller would at least make a counter offer.

That's what it's for, but I think ebay made it a must include feature on listings to keep the fees low.
Some sellers just include it and keep the regular price point without negotiating.
That I can see if your running a store with 7000 listings.
No seller wants to answer too many lower offers.
It just takes up time, like potential buyers offering half the asking price to start.

mbogoman

As a seller, I will sometimes let an offer "age" in an attempt to generate offers from other "watchers". Other potential buyers can see that an offer has been made (but not the amount) and are prodded into action. I'll hold off on countering until closer to the offer expiration in hopes of getting more offers. It has worked many times in the past.

Of course, if the initial offer is good enough, I accept right away. I use the above strategy on those offers that are a bit lower than what I am prepared to accept at the time...

JimW

@rte592 said:

@PerryHall said:
If you make a reasonable offer I would think a smart seller would at least make a counter offer.

It just takes up time, like potential buyers offering half the asking price to start.

But sometimes half of the asking price is, in reality, a reasonable offer!

3stars

Best offer is a game, I’ve gone as low as 40% off ask and gotten the item, but usually start at 33%. Most of the time I get it around the 20-25% off area

blitzdude

Best offer is pretty much the only way I shop these days. I've been shocked at some of the offers I have put out there that are immediately accepted. As mentioned above also cases where you get within 10% of the ask and they still reject so why even put best offer as an option?

rte592

@JimW said:

@rte592 said:

@PerryHall said:
If you make a reasonable offer I would think a smart seller would at least make a counter offer.

It just takes up time, like potential buyers offering half the asking price to start.

But sometimes half of the asking price is, in reality, a reasonable offer!

Some stuff I list I'm glad to get rid of.
I've had a few good stories and sold items much lower then I was asking.
Some stuff gets 30%/50% of ask and I just laugh.
On bullion if I can get within 80% of ask on Ebay, I'll try and steer them over to one of the coin/bullion fourms and save fees for both parties.

USASoccer

I love this thread. I sell quite a bit and deal with all kinds of offers (not bullion); my favorite is when they make an offer you accept then they start asking questions about the item.

JBK

It has been mentioned above already. but reiterate....

Ebat usually (akways?) defaults to include a best offer option. I think they even suggest that turning ther feature off will result in higher fees.

One way around this is to set auto-decline just below the asking price or starting bid.

Best offer can sometimes pay off. In a few cases I have made an offer on an auction that has gone 6 days with no.bids, and the seller accepted. I suspect that they figured no one would bid at that point.

JimW

@rte592 said:

@JimW said:

@rte592 said:

@PerryHall said:
If you make a reasonable offer I would think a smart seller would at least make a counter offer.

It just takes up time, like potential buyers offering half the asking price to start.

But sometimes half of the asking price is, in reality, a reasonable offer!

Some stuff I list I'm glad to get rid of.
I've had a few good stories and sold items much lower then I was asking.
Some stuff gets 30%/50% of ask and I just laugh.
On bullion if I can get within 80% of ask on Ebay, I'll try and steer them over to one of the coin/bullion fourms and save fees for both parties.

But you are probably pricing things reasonably to begin with; my point was that some stuff on ebay is incredibly overpriced based on price guides, recent auctions, etc. So an offer that is consistent with the approximate actual value may be 50% of the listed ebay price.

bestmr

I guess it depends what it is. I made a reasonable offer on a tungsten cube that got accepted this morning. I can’t wait to get it.

bronco2078

a couple years ago I made a best offer on a surplus soviet tank periscope for the secret camera obscura room I was building in my garage . We went back and forth and never got the deal done . The room never got built either

i totally forgot about that whole episode until just now

bronco2078

well i just did a search and found this and assumed based on the sellers moniker he had what I needed

https://www.ebay.com/itm/M20A3-Tank-Periscope-M20A2-M41-Walker-Bulldog-M48-Patton-Serial-1567/164178231674?hash=item2639c9017a:g:c0kAAOSwNYZeqIzP#viTabs_0

but the prism is cracked so he does not