Jeremy, At my age I have learned a couple of things. Read the responses a couple of times. 1. DO N.O.T. take the advice of people who do not do eBay. They may have good intentions but have zero idea of how this can impact your problems if this goes south on you. 2. Don't open up a can of worms for a few dollars. Sometimes we have to swallow our sense of right and wrong when we look to the bigger picture. Don't over think this. It's not the end of the world for the buyer but it is the end of your world with this seller-anyway you look at it. 3. Send the buyer a gift and thank him and invite this person to keep you in mind when they sell.
I would notify the buyer that a bid was manipulated. Inform the buyer that the price is reduced by XXXX (all the shill bids). ALL of them.
Inform the consignor that the final price was reduced by his bids, violating the contract plus your commission.
For example, final price $985. 7 shill bids, starting at $525. The bid span covered was $82. New final price is $903.
Buyer will be happy. You will not have to worry about the consignor anymore.
Even if the shills did not "affect" the final price, they influenced it. I would back out all of those amounts also, and let those buyers know that a bid was manipulated, and the buyer will be a refund.
Change your contract to 1) be more explicit, 2) state that ANY bid influencing any item will cause the item to be sold at the highest bid BELOW the first shill. The next person may have a "friend" bid so the account may not be quite as clear.
I have been selling on ebay for 14 years with a 2800 feedback.
<< <i>Continue selling his coins for him but block him from bidding on them. >>
As silly as it may sound, this is probably a very good action for Jeremy to take for any future consignments provided he put it into his "Terms of Consignment".
If the consignor has an ebay account then block them until the item(s) sell, then unblock them. >>
This logic fails if the seller has another account, as many of us do.
I understand the reasons against shill bidding... but it seems more of a gentleman's agreement and an act of integrity than anything. You can't enforce it, and you probably never know it's happening. It might happen to you every auction on eBay. The last 5 bidders could all be from the same account. You don't know and you don't care, as long as you get the item for the price you bid.
If you want to avoid further issues with both your consignor and with the buyer of this item, you should probably just complete the transaction as is, pay your consignor and then do no further business with that consignor if you didn't like what he did.
Anything other than that creates too many potential problems from both your consignor and this buyer.
<< <i>Jeremy, At my age I have learned a couple of things. Read the responses a couple of times. 1. DO N.O.T. take the advice of people who do not do eBay. They may have good intentions but have zero idea of how this can impact your problems if this goes south on you. 2. Don't open up a can of worms for a few dollars. Sometimes we have to swallow our sense of right and wrong when we look to the bigger picture. Don't over think this. It's not the end of the world for the buyer but it is the end of your world with this seller-anyway you look at it. 3. Send the buyer a gift and thank him and invite this person to keep you in mind when they sell.
Best of luck. >>
Doing the right thing is easy and uncomplicated in the abstract. But this is practical.
First, for those with shakey morals, SHILL BIDDING is not legal anywhere in this country. It is covered by either a specific shill statute, or the fraud statutes of that state.
Second, the property owner may bid on their property in ONLY a reserved auction where it is announced that the auction is reserved, or in a forced sale if the auction is not reserved.
Shill bidding is therefore defined as bidding in an unreserved action on your own property.
Auction sales are covered in the Uniform Commercial Code whose language has been adopted, and codified in 49 of the states (not codified in Louisiana, but their courts accept it in practice).
Ebay has rules, not laws. Their only remedy for violating their rules that do not comport with law (and many don't) is to kick you off their site.
I would approach future consignors with this clause:
_____________ (initials) YOUR PROPERTY WILL BE OFFERED FOR SALE WITHOUT RESERVE.
As such, you acknowledge, and agree that neither you nor anyone acting on your behalf or at your direction, whether as your agent or otherwise, may bid on the Property at the Sale. Your Property is being sold pursuant to, and subject to, UCC 2-328. The remedy for violating this clause, at our sole discretion, may include any or all of the following.
1. You forfeit the amounts in excess of the prior real money bid to us as liquidated damages for our time and trouble, and for any possible actions taken against us. 2. We may, at our sole discretion, award the Property to the last real money bidder at their prior bid. 3. You agree to the liability of treble damages plus all costs in addition to our sales commission on the closing hammer price should Ebay or any damaged party decide to take any action against us in the course of a shill bid.
^ This clause may create pause.
The concepts behind the remedy are that the consignor would not benefit from an increased hammer price, or should they win, they would not get their property returned, and should you decide to report them to feepay your account could be put into jeopardy by the blazing morons in their customer service, and as such, gives you a specific course of action against the shill.
The seller should have asked what the minimum price was and set a reserve for his client. On that note, I'd just not deal with someone who's intent is to not only hurt my reputation as a fair dealer, but cause injury to himself and the seller by interfering with the auction, if that's what was found out along the path of commerce.
<< <i>I've been in this situation where i consigned a coin, and was watching with horror as the coin was about to sell for half of what I bought it for, from the same seller nonetheless.
I easily could've bid it up, to either buy it back myself, or artificially raise the price.
However, my moral compass lit up, and told me that this was tantamount to shill bidding, and I declined to bid, losing my shirt (and pants) in the process. >>
Heck fire, if I would have known about "bidding on your own auctions" I would have done it to keep from loosing my shirt. But from what I understand, it is not permitted...there seems to be ways around it though.
Oh well...live and learn to deal with it if you put something up for auction...let the public decide what it is worth.
oih82w8 = Oh I Hate To Wait _defectus patientia_aka...Dr. Defecto - Curator of RMO's
Your consignor placed a protective bid, which constitutes shilling. This inflates the buyer's price beyond what the market determines to be fair value.
Your consignor should examine this situation more ethically . . . How would he / she feel if a buyer with 2 accounts immediately drove up the price with extremely high bids, discouraging all other participation, and then withdrew the second highest very near auction's end, allowing the high bid to drop way down to one increment above the start and win the coin at next to nothing?
The consignor has also put your reputation at risk.
You should create a consignment policy dis-incentivizing shill bidding. Then you should inform your future consignors that, while you cannot prevent them from shill bidding, by doing so they will incur those disincentives.
Due to your breach of our consignment contract and to protect myself from litigation and/or criminal proceedings arising out of your actions, I have issued the buyer a refund in the amount of $(your shill bid - underbider) which will be deducted from your payment.
I am returning all other consigned coins and can no longer do business with you.
The consignor may have loopholed eBay's shilling rule but violated terms of your consignment.
What you do next is up to you. I suspect that you will disclose that the consignor was the underbidder. If winner keeps, then you either should discontinue business with the consignor or simply reinforce consignment policy with warning that any future bidding on consigned coins will end the relationship.
<< <i>If you want to avoid further issues with both your consignor and with the buyer of this item, you should probably just complete the transaction as is, pay your consignor and then do no further business with that consignor if you didn't like what he did.
Anything other than that creates too many potential problems from both your consignor and this buyer. >>
If the buyer gets upset, Jeremy will take the neg hit for his consigner's actions. One of the many reasons I won't handle consignments. Too much hassle and risk for too little reward.
I would just complete the current transaction(s) and refuse to business with that consigner again, after blocking him.
I would also add a penalty clause to the consignment contract to the effect that if it is discovered that consignor has bid on any of his own items, the commission triples for ALL consigned items... or something to that effect. Legit consignors won't be bothered by it.
Due to your breach of our consignment contract and to protect myself from litigation and/or criminal proceedings arising out of your actions, I have issued the buyer a refund in the amount of $(your shill bid - underbider) which will be deducted from your payment.
I am returning all other consigned coins and can no longer do business with you.
Regards, Airplanenut >>
He has no legal authority to what you suggest in the first paragraph, and it would open himself up to problems. He took in $X amount of money on the consignor's behalf and owes him a fiduciary duty to turn over those funds unless the sale is cancelled. I see two options:
1) I would fuss with the consignor, never do business with him again, and leave the auction alone. 2) Explain the situation to the buyer and allow him or her to decide whether or not to cancel the transaction and provide a refund.
In either scenario, eBay should be made aware of his activity to decide whether it was consistent with its policy and whether all of the shiller's eBay accounts should be suspended. The OP did nothing wrong and shouldn't lose sleep over the actions of a third party that were initially done without his knowledge and that were clearly done against his wishes.
As a buyer on eBay, I fully expect the auctions to be shilled. This does not bother me as I only bid what I am willing to pay for the item and I am not looking for a rip. Yes, by the rules the seller should open the bidding for an amount he/she is willing to accept (or accept the final bid) but that is not reality in many auctions. I am not saying that it is right, just the way it is.
I would not contact the buyer (I would not want to be contacted if I was the buyer). My point is if there was a Buy-It-Now price for my max bid or less, I would buy it for that price, so a shilled bid that allows me to win for my max (sniped) bid or less does not bother me.
<< You point out ebay's policy on shill bidding, but his statement that he would have purchased the coin back at his bid does not fit the definition of shill bidding "to artificially increase its price or desirability". If this is the only bidding prohibition ebay has for someone with a financial relationship to the item, then he did not break ebay's rules. As such, it seems that your contract language is at least partially built upon a faulty reading of ebay policies. >>
Sorry, but wrong. It's his item and he's bidding on it to run the price up... Hello! That's the textbook definition of shilling! If he wanted $x for it then he should have asked Jeremy to put a reserve of $x. Period. He wasn't bidding on his own item because he wanted to own it back; he merely stated he was willing to purchase it at his bid if he got stuck with it. My response-So what? He would have had to do that anyway or be in (further) violation of eBay rules.
<< <i>As a buyer on eBay, I fully expect the auctions to be shilled. This does not bother me as I only bid what I am willing to pay for the item and I am not looking for a rip. Yes, by the rules the seller should open the bidding for an amount he/she is willing to accept (or accept the final bid) but that is not reality in many auctions. >>
Yes you paid less than you were WILLING to pay, but more than you should have paid. He stole from you and you are happy???
-----Burton ANA 50 year/Life Member (now "Emeritus")
<< <i>As a buyer on eBay, I fully expect the auctions to be shilled. This does not bother me as I only bid what I am willing to pay for the item and I am not looking for a rip. Yes, by the rules the seller should open the bidding for an amount he/she is willing to accept (or accept the final bid) but that is not reality in many auctions. >>
Yes you paid less than you were WILLING to pay, but more than you should have paid. He stole from you and you are happy??? >>
I don't see it that way. I don't think I paid more than I should have because the seller wasn't willing to sell it for less than his shill bid.
Comments
At my age I have learned a couple of things. Read the responses a couple of times.
1. DO N.O.T. take the advice of people who do not do eBay. They may have good intentions but have zero idea of how this can impact your problems if this goes south on you.
2. Don't open up a can of worms for a few dollars. Sometimes we have to swallow our sense of right and wrong when we look to the bigger picture. Don't over think this. It's not the end of the world for the buyer but it is the end of your world with this seller-anyway you look at it.
3. Send the buyer a gift and thank him and invite this person to keep you in mind when they sell.
Best of luck.
If eBay gets a whiff of this you stand a good chance of loosing your seller privlidges. And they might lay a 42 gallon barrel of whooparse on you.
Inform the consignor that the final price was reduced by his bids, violating the contract plus your commission.
For example, final price $985. 7 shill bids, starting at $525. The bid span covered was $82. New final price is $903.
Buyer will be happy. You will not have to worry about the consignor anymore.
Even if the shills did not "affect" the final price, they influenced it. I would back out all of those amounts also, and let those buyers know that a bid was manipulated, and the buyer will be a refund.
Change your contract to 1) be more explicit, 2) state that ANY bid influencing any item will cause the item to be sold at the highest bid BELOW the first shill. The next person may have a "friend" bid so the account may not be quite as clear.
I have been selling on ebay for 14 years with a 2800 feedback.
<< <i>
<< <i>Continue selling his coins for him but block him from bidding on them.
As silly as it may sound, this is probably a very good action for Jeremy to take for any future consignments provided he put it into his "Terms of Consignment".
If the consignor has an ebay account then block them until the item(s) sell, then unblock them. >>
This logic fails if the seller has another account, as many of us do.
I understand the reasons against shill bidding... but it seems more of a gentleman's agreement and an act of integrity than anything. You can't enforce it, and you probably never know it's happening. It might happen to you every auction on eBay. The last 5 bidders could all be from the same account. You don't know and you don't care, as long as you get the item for the price you bid.
Check out my iPhone app SlabReader!
Anything other than that creates too many potential problems from both your consignor and this buyer.
Michael Kittle Rare Coins --- 1908-S Indian Head Cent Grading Set --- No. 1 1909 Mint Set --- Kittlecoins on Facebook --- Long Beach Table 448
<< <i>Jeremy,
At my age I have learned a couple of things. Read the responses a couple of times.
1. DO N.O.T. take the advice of people who do not do eBay. They may have good intentions but have zero idea of how this can impact your problems if this goes south on you.
2. Don't open up a can of worms for a few dollars. Sometimes we have to swallow our sense of right and wrong when we look to the bigger picture. Don't over think this. It's not the end of the world for the buyer but it is the end of your world with this seller-anyway you look at it.
3. Send the buyer a gift and thank him and invite this person to keep you in mind when they sell.
Best of luck. >>
Doing the right thing is easy and uncomplicated in the abstract. But this is practical.
Second, the property owner may bid on their property in ONLY a reserved auction where it is announced that the auction is reserved, or in a forced sale if the auction is not reserved.
Shill bidding is therefore defined as bidding in an unreserved action on your own property.
Auction sales are covered in the Uniform Commercial Code whose language has been adopted, and codified in 49 of the states (not codified in Louisiana, but their courts accept it in practice).
Ebay has rules, not laws. Their only remedy for violating their rules that do not comport with law (and many don't) is to kick you off their site.
I would approach future consignors with this clause:
_____________ (initials) YOUR PROPERTY WILL BE OFFERED FOR SALE WITHOUT RESERVE.
As such, you acknowledge, and agree that neither you nor anyone acting on your behalf or at your direction, whether as your agent or otherwise, may bid on the Property at the Sale. Your Property is being sold pursuant to, and subject to, UCC 2-328.
The remedy for violating this clause, at our sole discretion, may include any or all of the following.
1. You forfeit the amounts in excess of the prior real money bid to us as liquidated damages for our time and trouble, and for any possible actions taken against us.
2. We may, at our sole discretion, award the Property to the last real money bidder at their prior bid.
3. You agree to the liability of treble damages plus all costs in addition to our sales commission on the closing hammer price should Ebay or any damaged party decide to take any action against us in the course of a shill bid.
^ This clause may create pause.
The concepts behind the remedy are that the consignor would not benefit from an increased hammer price, or should they win, they would not get their property returned, and should you decide to report them to feepay your account could be put into jeopardy by the blazing morons in their customer service, and as such, gives you a specific course of action against the shill.
``https://ebay.us/m/KxolR5
<< <i>I've been in this situation where i consigned a coin, and was watching with horror as the coin was about to sell for half of what I bought it for, from the same seller nonetheless.
I easily could've bid it up, to either buy it back myself, or artificially raise the price.
However, my moral compass lit up, and told me that this was tantamount to shill bidding, and I declined to bid, losing my shirt (and pants) in the process. >>
Heck fire, if I would have known about "bidding on your own auctions" I would have done it to keep from loosing my shirt. But from what I understand, it is not permitted...there seems to be ways around it though.
Oh well...live and learn to deal with it if you put something up for auction...let the public decide what it is worth.
BST transactions: dbldie55, jayPem, 78saen, UltraHighRelief, nibanny, liefgold, FallGuy, lkeigwin, mbogoman, Sandman70gt, keets, joeykoins, ianrussell (@GC), EagleEye, ThePennyLady, GRANDAM, Ilikecolor, Gluggo, okiedude, Voyageur, LJenkins11, fastfreddie, ms70, pursuitofliberty, ZoidMeister,Coin Finder, GotTheBug, edwardjulio, Coinnmore, Nickpatton, Namvet69,...
Your consignor should examine this situation more ethically . . . How would he / she feel if a buyer with 2 accounts immediately drove up the price with extremely high bids, discouraging all other participation, and then withdrew the second highest very near auction's end, allowing the high bid to drop way down to one increment above the start and win the coin at next to nothing?
The consignor has also put your reputation at risk.
You should create a consignment policy dis-incentivizing shill bidding. Then you should inform your future consignors that, while you cannot prevent them from shill bidding, by doing so they will incur those disincentives.
Due to your breach of our consignment contract and to protect myself from litigation and/or criminal proceedings arising out of your actions, I have issued the buyer a refund in the amount of $(your shill bid - underbider) which will be deducted from your payment.
I am returning all other consigned coins and can no longer do business with you.
Regards,
Airplanenut
What you do next is up to you. I suspect that you will disclose that the consignor was the underbidder. If winner keeps, then you either should discontinue business with the consignor or simply reinforce consignment policy with warning that any future bidding on consigned coins will end the relationship.
<< <i>If you want to avoid further issues with both your consignor and with the buyer of this item, you should probably just complete the transaction as is, pay your consignor and then do no further business with that consignor if you didn't like what he did.
Anything other than that creates too many potential problems from both your consignor and this buyer. >>
If the buyer gets upset, Jeremy will take the neg hit for his consigner's actions. One of the many reasons I won't handle consignments. Too much hassle and risk for too little reward.
I would just complete the current transaction(s) and refuse to business with that consigner again, after blocking him.
I would also add a penalty clause to the consignment contract to the effect that if it is discovered that consignor has bid on any of his own items, the commission triples for ALL consigned items... or something to that effect. Legit consignors won't be bothered by it.
1/2 Cents
U.S. Revenue Stamps
<< <i>Continue selling his coins for him but block him from bidding on them.
LOL! Probably best answer yet!
GrandAm
<< <i>Dear Shiller,
Due to your breach of our consignment contract and to protect myself from litigation and/or criminal proceedings arising out of your actions, I have issued the buyer a refund in the amount of $(your shill bid - underbider) which will be deducted from your payment.
I am returning all other consigned coins and can no longer do business with you.
Regards,
Airplanenut >>
He has no legal authority to what you suggest in the first paragraph, and it would open himself up to problems. He took in $X amount of money on the consignor's behalf and owes him a fiduciary duty to turn over those funds unless the sale is cancelled. I see two options:
1) I would fuss with the consignor, never do business with him again, and leave the auction alone.
2) Explain the situation to the buyer and allow him or her to decide whether or not to cancel the transaction and provide a refund.
In either scenario, eBay should be made aware of his activity to decide whether it was consistent with its policy and whether all of the shiller's eBay accounts should be suspended. The OP did nothing wrong and shouldn't lose sleep over the actions of a third party that were initially done without his knowledge and that were clearly done against his wishes.
I would not contact the buyer (I would not want to be contacted if I was the buyer). My point is if there was a Buy-It-Now price for my max bid or less, I would buy it for that price, so a shilled bid that allows me to win for my max (sniped) bid or less does not bother me.
Joe.
Sorry, but wrong. It's his item and he's bidding on it to run the price up... Hello! That's the textbook definition of shilling! If he wanted $x for it then he should have asked Jeremy to put a reserve of $x. Period.
He wasn't bidding on his own item because he wanted to own it back; he merely stated he was willing to purchase it at his bid if he got stuck with it. My response-So what? He would have had to do that anyway or be in (further) violation of eBay rules.
RIP Mom- 1932-2012
<< <i>As a buyer on eBay, I fully expect the auctions to be shilled. This does not bother me as I only bid what I am willing to pay for the item and I am not looking for a rip. Yes, by the rules the seller should open the bidding for an amount he/she is willing to accept (or accept the final bid) but that is not reality in many auctions. >>
Yes you paid less than you were WILLING to pay, but more than you should have paid. He stole from you and you are happy???
ANA 50 year/Life Member (now "Emeritus")
<< <i>
<< <i>As a buyer on eBay, I fully expect the auctions to be shilled. This does not bother me as I only bid what I am willing to pay for the item and I am not looking for a rip. Yes, by the rules the seller should open the bidding for an amount he/she is willing to accept (or accept the final bid) but that is not reality in many auctions. >>
Yes you paid less than you were WILLING to pay, but more than you should have paid. He stole from you and you are happy??? >>
I don't see it that way. I don't think I paid more than I should have because the seller wasn't willing to sell it for less than his shill bid.
Joe.