206/246 listings on eBay: limited information on bidders

I think it is interesting how eBay has now limited the information available on auction bidders - I can understand the reasons why, but this also makes it harder to warn someone about potential issues, ESPECIALLY when bidding on 246GT items that are prone to misrepresentation. The only way to raise questions or warn someone now appears to be through F-Chat.

Mark

 

And since many of these items are of interest to the guys here, that information will not always be forthcoming or particularly accurate, I suspect.

If I'm bidding on something worth $4K, and I'm a known bidder for say, books or tools, it's to my advantage not to have my ID show. The less others know about who's bidding, the less chance there is for tag along bidders. Now, you need to ask more questions of the seller, get more pictures, or be within visiting range and take a look up close.

With that in mind, what advantage is there for me to fill the guys here in on the worth or authenticity of that item I'm bidding on. None!!! So, on most of these expensive items I would expect little help from your fellow fchatter. It's not in their best interest if bidding, to do so.

On the other hand, the seller may be very informative here, but who's to know if that information is accurate. Fortunately, there are several well known sellers here who don't misrepresent what they have, and have good reputations for what they sell.

I think the new system on ebay has made a difficult situation even more complicated. I don't particularly like it, but I guess that's the way it's gonna be.

DM

 

I'm not a big fan of the change. Previously if someone that I know was bidding for scarce parts or such, I would contact them and see how much they wanted that part. If they wanted it more, I would not bid on it and I always found the reverse was also true. If there was a part that I really wanted, those known people would not bid against me. Now, you might be bidding against someone unecessarily.

Alberto

 

the main reason i don't like the change, regardles of relating to dino stuff or not, is it open sthe door for all kinds of mischeif. remember when la scuderia rossa would suddenly have his no reserve auction won buy a newly registered bidder. no wconsider the fact that some sellers can register and bid up an item without anyone knowing.

the info next to the "bidder #" isn't accurate. it will say someone has a certain percentage feedback. when the same bidder has won, the percentage is different and so is some of the other info. to me, this is the equvilent of chandilier bidding. i think it is a big mistake for ebay.

 

Agreed on most of the points above.
A more serious issue with Ebay is that they allow each user to have 7 IDs and none are verified that the registered person is who they claim to be.

User IDs are nearly disposable and users may not feel a responsibility to be completely honest hones.
Yahoo auctions has a superior auction format with many features that Ebay has had to copy to resolve issues with Ebay trading (e.g blocked bidders, pre-approved bidders, listing reporting, etc) but they don'thave half the traffic that Ebay has.

YAHOO - SINGLE ID
Yahoo allows only one user ID per person and verifies it with a credit card

YAHOO - USE FEEDBACK TO RESOLVE ISSUES
Yahoo pos/neg feedback can be altered by either seller or bidder at any time with no limit to the number of feedback comments left (Ebay limits it to 3 comments and once you leave a pos or neg it can never be changed). I've used this before to leave a negative for a non-paying winner and when the non-paying buyuer realizes it affects his rating he then pays up and I'm allowed to change this to a positive.

 

Actually it's much worse than that.

Total search of Yahoo produced 745 hits for "Ferrari" and tons of those were for spoilers and fuel additives.

Total search of eBay produced 8,791 hits and a much smaller percentage (I only checked the first few pages) appear to be for stuff that simply has the word "Ferrari" in it to draw interest.

Ferrari Dino?? 2 hits on Yahoo, 488 on eBay.

Don't think Yahoo is there just yet.

DM