Osmio on EBay

I’ve been buying off Ebay for years and have never heard of this Sniping. I wait until the dying minutes of an auction, look at where it is at and if I still want it and I think it is worth paying more for what the current bid is, I wait and push the button in the final ten seconds. If I win great, if I don’t then, ce la vie.

I know that means I’ve got to be around when it comes to an end but 9 times out of ten I am and I’ll be honest, there is a little bit of excitement in doing it that way…yes I know, I live a very boring life. One thing I always do though is whatever my maximum, I always make it pounds and pennies with the thought if my max in pounds is the same as someone elses, the pennies might win it.

The one thing you can almost gurantee about Ebay, is that if you do miss out on a certain item, another will be along at some time. On the few auctions I have lost, another of the same item has come up later and I’ve even won those at a cheaper price than the original one I bid and lost on, so as Del would say…'Everyone’s a winner!'

Got to admit though, I am sometimes gobsmacked how some people get into a bidding frenzy and pay well over the odds for something pre-owned that they could have bought for new, cheaper elsewhere.

I always search the net first and Ebay is certainly not always the cheapest option.

It’s a difficult one, it’s easy to say £50 is my limit and that’s the most I’ll bid, but when the item goes for £51 then it’s frustrating as you’d (probably) have happily paid a tiny bit more. But in that situation you don’t know what the winning bidder was willing to bid up to, they might have had a max bid of £70.

By leaving it until the last minute there’s probably a higher chance of paying less than your max price

DavecUK I reckon that Osmio might go very cheap, unless of course someone mentions it on a coffee forum

Will need to fit a new set of Filters though and give it a descale and sanitises depending on wether or not you have the kit £57 - £80 to add to the price. I wouldn’t use it straight out of the box

Gagaryn because no body else outbid you”. This is the bit you are struggling to understand the importance of.

Really - I’m not…………

1 - If you bid manually and nobody (sniping or otherwise) outbids you by more than a bid increment - you win!
PLUS - You get it at the cheapest possible price - as little as 1p above your rival (he always has to did/pay a full bid increment more to outbid you)

2 - If you snipe you have to outbid your rival by MORE than a full bid increment
and as you have already said - you inflate your max bid in an attempt to achieve it. You are only countering his odd pence strategy….. the difference being his odd pence strategy is a winning strategy (he gets the win for the lowest possible price whereas you get to pay a full bid increment more)

You (by sniping) MIGHT “win” more auctions.
But in contested auctions - you pay a premium
In uncontested auctions……. the method doesn’t matter.

The thing you (IMHO) are failing to understand is that “winning” the auction (at "any’ cost) isn’t actually a measure of success - “winning” the auction at the lowest possible price is more relevant.

If you bid “silly money” (sniping or otherwise) on every auction you had an interest you would “win” every auction……
but it would cost you a lot.

So if you are happy “winning” by paying a premium…. knock yourself out.

Pompeyexile I wait until the dying minutes of an auction, look at where it is at and if I still want it and I think it is worth paying more for what the current bid is, I wait and push the button in the final ten seconds. If I win great, if I don’t then, ce la vie.

You are sniping manually - but the key difference is that you are getting that “little bit of excitement” out of it :-)

If you over bid by a few pence/quid or lose out - you aren’t bothered… AND you had a bit of fun….

Dusk t’s a difficult one, it’s easy to say £50 is my limit and that’s the most I’ll bid, but when the item goes for £51 then it’s frustrating as you’d (probably) have happily paid a tiny bit more. But in that situation you don’t know what the winning bidder was willing to bid up to, they might have had a max bid of £70.

By leaving it until the last minute there’s probably a higher chance of paying less than your max price

I know the feeling of “missing out” (by a couple of quid) - but that is only a factor in determining your max bid.

If you think - That’d be a steal at £40-45 but I’d pay £50……. No actually I’d hate to lose out by the quid…
So I’ll actually bid £56……. then your “in”…..

By bidding late - you might beat the early £51 tactical bid… but it costs you the £5 bid increment on top.

It is only your last sentence I disagree with…… by sniping/late bidding there is statistically/mathematically a higher chance of paying more (in a contested auction) - and b*gger all difference in an uncontested one ;-)

Drewster I think you are misunderstanding how sniping works - you say “ If you snipe you have to outbid your rival by MORE than a full bid increment”. This is perhaps the root of the confusion. Sniping only increases the price by one bid increment at a time. If the auction is sitting at £15 but the current winning bidder has actually bid £20 my £50 snipe will mean I win at £20.50.

My argument is if I had bid £20.50 early in the auction, or even my full limit of £50 and some pennies - the opportunity is there for the other party to bid again, increasing the final sale price. I think this is pretty obvious. Your logic seems to rely on assuming every bidder only bids once at their max price, not the incremental bidding war which is the norm. Sniping negates the war.

Yes - EBay “proxy bidding” only ups the bidding by “one bidding increment” at a time.

This is true with “advance” bidding & sniping…

If a bid is entered at say £50 but the first acceptable bid is £5 the current bid shows as £5

Which is what you are bidding against. (lets assume the bidding increment is £1)

Any (higher) bid will increase the current bid (in £1 increments)
So if “player 2” bids £8 the bidding will go:

Initial bid player 1: £5 (£50)
Player 2: £6 (£8)
P1 (auto/proxy): £7
P2 (A/P): £8
P1 (A/P) £9 (£50). - The intermediate bids do logically exist)

In order for P2 to “win” they need to bid £51+
and it doesn’t really matter if they manually do it in any number of increments/amounts
Only £51+ will allow them to win

P1 can win at any increment - above where the later bidder stops.
Including a “few pence” above the later bid
(The full amount of the initial bid was accepted as an acceptable bid when posted)
Any later bid has to beat the earlier bid by more than an increment.

My argument is:
If you bid your MAXIMUM bid early you will “win” - In that you will pay the minimum price possible for the item (below your maximum)
If someone else bids more (than you max) they will win

- BUT their MINIMUM winning price WILL BE HIGHER than your MINIMUM winning price!

Proxy bidding just means that the price only increases to a single bid increment above a rival (very similar to a “real” auction Commission bid)

As previously stated any user has every opportunity to bid at any point - irrespective of other peoples actions.
(I accept that an early bid does indicate/tell other people that “someone” is interested - but they have no idea if the initial bid is actually higher).

I am in full agreement about the futility of incremental bidding……..

Drewster I think we are getting worryingly close to agreeing. So to make sure that doesn’t happen, I’m going to point out that most eBay users do incrementally bid. :)

You favour bidding high early on, in the hope that potential rivals get scared off because every time they submit an incrementally higher bid your earlier bid counters and trumps them. You will only lose if others trump your bid, either incrementally during the course of the auction or by bidding higher in one go at any point.

I favour keeping my cards close to my chest hoping that I can sneak in at the end with a bid higher than others without giving them the ability to respond. If my highest bid is higher than theirs - I win. If it is less - I lose.

In a nutshell, my strategy is favourable if others bid incrementally and believe that nobody is bidding against them - this works for me as I am often looking for stuff with little interest.

For stuff where their is more interest, many bidders and a consensus on value, bidding early will be just as successful, even more so if you have no desire to go a few pennies over the notionally agreed value just to win the auction.

Still doesn’t solve the problem of seeing 3 of the same item and similar price and being able to set up a snipe on all 3….but as soon as you win one…the software (or mine did this) ceased to bid on the remaining items.

You simply can’t do that on proxy bidding, or add a bid in if another similar/same item comes up a few days after you placed your proxy bid.

Drewster I agree this is a weakness (or a drawback) of the EBay system.

Which for me, that reason alone was enough to stop me proxy bidding.

:-) - I don’t buy that much on EBay……..

But I (or at least MrsD) sell a fair bit.

Most of our stuff is BIN because we know a realistic market price. But when we don’t know or when we expect a proper bidding war (on popular/known rare type stuff) we use auction.
It can be interesting analysing bidding patterns - Including the double bidders….

Who bid an amount and then come back (some times multiple times) and bid higher amounts even though they haven’t been out bid……. no doubt they “think” they have a good reason! ;-)