Somebody explain this

[Deleted]

OK. This is the third time this has happened to me in the past couple of months. I search eBay using the "Best Offer" option. I've had better luck trying to negotiate prices with a seller than I have with straight bidding.

So earlier today I found one of the type auctions that make me scratch my head. It's an auction, but has a "Best Offer" option. That in itself is a little strange to me. His starting bid price is $14.75 with $10.85 shipping. I try to buy kits for a price WITH SHIPPING that's under 20 bucks. Can't always get that done, but that's my goal.

On this particular kit I figured I'd really only be interested if I could get it for about $18 or less with the shipping. Knowing there would probably be some dickering back and forth with counter offers, I made an offer of $6.50. I know that's way too cheap, but I wanted to start a dialogue with the seller.

I got a "Decline" message. No counter offer, just a decline. It's hard to negotiate when one of the parties refuses to participate. So I sent a message to the seller and asked if he would make a counter offer for me to consider. His reply was basically the same as I had gotten from 2 other sellers. He told me he would only consider an offer quite a bit higher than the $14.75 opening bid price.

Huh? Say, WHAT? Why in He** would I make a "Best Offer" quite a bit higher than the opening bid price? Why wouldn't I just submit that amount as my maximum bid price?

This has happened 3 times now! Am I all screwed up, or isn't a "Best Offer" normally lower than the "Buy It Now" price and also lower than the opening bid price?

So, what is it guys? Am I looking at this all wrong? Or are the sellers all screwed up? What's a "Best Offer" supposed to be?

[68383]

That’s kind of like expecting people to pay more than list price on a house for sale.

I’m growing tired of BS on eBay.

I just had a bad experience with a guy about shipping. He wanted to charge $30+ to ship, so I asked if he could do better. I pointed out that someone else would ship the exact same item to me, from farther away, for $15.

So he showed me that shipping cost him something like $22. When I replied, saying that he basically is marking up $9 or $10, he got a little righteous, telling me how he never questions someone’s shipping (like a personal attack on me), has expenses - like fuel to drive to the post office (probably with multiple packages, right?). Then he cancelled my purchase because he didn’t want to deal with me because I’m “the type of guy who will leave negative feedback.”

I told him he should have just been clear up front that he marks up the shipping cost, and that I’ll steer clear from all his auctions in the future.

I’m tired of people’s antics. I think hiding behind screens to do business is eroding the way people behave and communicate.

[Deleted]

Jul 11, 2018 4:31:15 GMT -6 68383 said:

I think hiding behind screens to do business is eroding the way people behave and communicate.

BINGO! I think that has a whole lot to do with it. You never heard of any krapp like this before the popularity of personal computers in the home and the Internet. I could rant and rave about that for hours, but I won't. Can you even begin to imagine the owner of your local Mom & Pop hardware store telling you he wanted $2 more than the list price on an item in his store?

[41chevy]

The key board commandos get a serious case of computer balls because they're protected by anonymity. As for E Bay balls, I was half owner in Gold Coast Hobby's for 29 years and the E Bay, OnLine stores and Tower Hobby crowd would buy and item on line because it was 3 cents cheaper, find an issue with it and because I was an authorized dealer, expect ME to replace it or send it out for repair! I even had a few who bought an AMT or Revell kit and wanted ME to replace missing parts, return it or exchange it and get very indignant when I told them that I won't exchange or refund it if I didn't sell it, to call the E Bay seller. For Go-Peds, Tamiya R/C and Traxxas warranty work I had two rates posted...one for store purchase and double it for E Bay / internet purchases.

[Deleted]

Fortunately I've never had a business that sold stuff on eBay. I'd hate to have to deal with belligerent customers. I don't think I could ever have done it and I know I couldn't do it now.

As for the PC situation itself. I had started out on large, IBM mainframe computers. When the group I was with in the late 70s and early 80s got wind of IBM's plan to sell a Personal Computer at a price people could afford and then use it in their homes, we all saw the writing on the wall. Not one of us saw it as a good thing. To us, computers were business machines that needed the constant attention of trained specialists to operate smoothly. Then when we heard that the average personal computer was going to be capable of connecting to a WAN called the Internet we all were kind of in shock  . At that time only us Geeks were using Modems to connect to bulletin board systems (BBS) to upload/download software and data and to read news. The mere thought of thousands and thousands of inexperienced home users of PCs connecting together on the Internet sent chills up our spines. And to a large degree, what we feared would happen has happened. But enough of that.

That inexperienced home user that the Geeks feared now lists items for sell on eBay with a "Best Offer" option added to a regular bid type auction and expects buyers to offer "quite a bit more" than the starting bid. The way I see that ridiculous idea is equivalent to going to a public auction, seeing an item I'd like to own, then when the auctioneer asks for a $5 starting bid, shout out, "FIFTY DOLLARS!" Or like'68383' said, find a house that meets your needs, hear that the price is only $50,000, then offer $75,000 when no other offers have been made. Not sure about you guys, but I'm not really in the habit of intentionally throwing money away like that.