Ebay Best Offers Time Wasters

[tulagirl]

I have been getting irritated with some sellers that put in the Best Offer Option with only a high priced bin.  The thing is some of these sellers seem to either decline every offer, or worse just ignore their offers and let them expire.  You can see this history on the auctions for their items.  I don't understand the point of having a Best Offer on an auction if a seller has no intention of taking any offer lower than their BIN.  What is the logic in this?  If they intend on ignoring all their offers and letting them expire then why do they bother with this option on their auctions?  I am also not talking about store owners either.  These are just regular sellers but they don't have a minimum bid, just high Bins.  Sure its fine if they want a certain price for an item, I get that.  Something really is only worth what someone is willing to pay.  So if they want the highest amount possible for their item...then why waste a bidder's time with a Make an Offer when they have a proven history of declining every offer and many offers at that?
To me it just seems like a waste of time really.  Does anyone else notice this sometimes?  Not only does it seem the prices are totally unrealistic, but the auctions are just going to run and run with no purchase and you will probably see that same auction over and over and over. I don't get it.

[Tulips]

Oh, even more irritating for me is when they give you a counter offer of exactly the BIN price, and when you try to haggle they return with another counter offer of $1 less than the BIN... what is the point?!
I recently did a Best Offer but was ignored just like the 20 other people who had tried. In fact, all offers on the item had been ignored and expired, except for one which was declined. A little common sense and communication goes a long way.

[Twilight Pink]

I consider Best Offers on BINs "silent auctions".
But this never happened to my boyfriend, because he got me Caribbean Delight and Beach Belle for $95 best offer and their BIN price was $109 (to me that was practically a bargain considering the amounts they were going for back then O.o)

[kitkatvintage]

It could be that buyers are putting in ridiculously low offers. I can't tell you how many times I've had offers of $5-10 on items listed at $30-50. I'm sorry, but that's not a price drop I'm wiling to give. I typically make a counter offer in those cases, but if the buyer offers again at only $1 more I will decline right away. Since the offer amounts are only visible to the seller & potential buyer, it's a bit hard to judge which party is being unreasonable.

[tulagirl]

It could be that buyers are putting in ridiculously low offers. I can't tell you how many times I've had offers of $5-10 on items listed at $30-50. I'm sorry, but that's not a price drop I'm wiling to give. I typically make a counter offer in those cases, but if the buyer offers again at only $1 more I will decline right away. Since the offer amounts are only visible to the seller & potential buyer, it's a bit hard to judge which party is being unreasonable.

True, but I know what my offers are and they are not low like that.   I may not know what other people are offering, but I do know what I am offering and that is where the frustration for me is.  What I have seen over and over is say 10 people have offered.  All 10 have been rejected or expired. I come in a offer 3.00 less than the bin and get a rejection of my offer, to me this is a total waste of my time.  3.00 is not a lot of money so it just seems as though this type of seller has no desire to sell below their bin even with a reasonable offer.  I guess that is what my point is. I don't really need to know all the bad offers they have had.  If their bin is say 60.00 and I offer 57.00 and it is rejected then its pretty clear they only want the bin price. So, why have an offer then?  Just stick with the Bin and don't waste the buyers time with offers.  Its just irritating.  I have also noticed that out of the 10 people there are not more than one offer per person and I have not received any counter offers.  I am totally okay with the idea that they sell for what they want to get.  Its just kind of silly to have an offer when you have no plans to accept any offer.

[hathorcat]

I agree with KitKat that you would be amazed at the cheeky offers some people send for items. Just because it says Best Offer doesnt mean a seller is willing to take a bargain price. But I appreciate that has not been the case for you - it may explain the number of expired/refused offers however.

While, I am not defending people who refuse Best Offers, as a seller I will admit that sometimes I would prefer to hold out for a BIN. Often people use it tactically and yes some people use it on order to put a premium BIN price on their item.

If I have a £2500 item listed on ebay and its on a 30 day listing and I get offers of £2200 and £2300 in the first week, then I would perhaps be want to reject them. Because I know that their is interest in the item and because my listing is for 30 days and I may also have lots of people viewing/watching the item. So I would personally hold out to closer to the end of the listing and then make a judgement on whether I want to relist the item or take the next best offer which comes along.

I think a lot of factors can come to bear unfortunately.

[phoenixsoul85]

I have had the same problem.  They just deny and never offer  counter offer.

[zora]

i accept any serious offer on my BIN or OBO auctions. even if someone makes a ridiculously low offer i send them a counter offer and do not simply decline it

but i wont drop under the price i paid for the items. i also find it funny when i get an offer of 30 on a 120 pony and i send back 100 and get 35 back

[HorsingAround]

i accept any serious offer on my BIN or OBO auctions. even if someone makes a ridiculously low offer i send them a counter offer and do not simply decline it

but i wont drop under the price i paid for the items. i also find it funny when i get an offer of 30 on a 120 pony and i send back 100 and get 35 back

I do what Zora said!

I very rarely make offers and when I do, I offer only a bit lower than the BIN price.  For example, there was a pony listed with a BIN price of $22.00 and I offered $20.00 and they did accept. 

But I can see as a buyer, how it would be frustrating if you were putting in a very fair offer and it was either rejected with no counter offer or completely ignored. 

As a seller, almost all of my ebay sales are BIN with OBO.  I have automatic decline set for completely unreasonable offers (which people do make - i.e. they will offer $1.00 on an item I'm selling for $25.00).  I guess it is possible that sellers have their automatic decline thingies set very close to their BIN price? 

If it is not completely and totally unreasonable I will always counter offer.  I was selling a G1 for $10 and was offered $3.  I made them a counter offer of $7 which technically is a 30% discount from my BIN price, they declined. I was selling a MOC G2 (well actually the card was far from mint) so I was selling her as a BIN for $6.99.  I would have accepted $6 as a BO but probably not much lower as I originally purchased her for $11 plus shipping (I was selling because I upgraded to one with more pristine packaging).  Luckily someone bought her for the BIN price.  

I never hold out for the BIN price if a buyer puts in a solid BO. 

[little.fox]

I agree with Tula, it's completely ridiculous to even have a BIN option if you're not actually open to offers or will take like $1 off the price. Why waste everyones time?

[tulagirl]

Yes Horsing this is exactly my point.  You can set it to ignore the time waster buyers but to ignore an offer that is only 3.00 below a bin is just ridiculous to me.  Sure its okay to do, but my whole point in this post is that its a waste of time. Just have your bin and don't do the whole make an offer thing when you have no intentions of using it.  I could see waiting out for 200.00 or something, but this is not my experience.  This is for auction that are not holding out for 200.00 they won't take even 3.00 less than a very high bin.  I do see the point that it could be used as a selling tactic but that doesn't fit with what I am actually frustrated with. I am not talking about those types of sales where that much money is involved.  Why would a person need to hold out for 1.00, 2.00, or even three dollars?  Just do a bin and leave it at that. 

I very rarely make offers and when I do, I offer only a bit lower than the BIN price.  For example, there was a pony listed with a BIN price of $22.00 and I offered $20.00 and they did accept.

This is exactly what I am talking about.  In addition what I am seeing though is when the offers are rejected the item is re-listed over and over and over and over and never sold.  There is no logic in this.

[hathorcat]

I completely understand your frustration tulagirl - as mentioned I have been there as a buyer trying to make a judgement call and been there as a seller in making best offers and either having them declined or simply ignored. I was simply pointing out that sometimes people use it as a tactic even for that $1 or $2. To be honest if I come across sellers like that, I know that they are never worth the bother of running back to.
 

[MaronaPossessed]

Most of my BIN offers are usually, the lowest, are half the price. I can understand when it is something used, something I won't be able to sell easily, something that isn't in demand, or something I know that may not work.

*gets eyed at*...what? Garage sale of stuff online. In times like these, I'd take anything that's reasonable

[babylicketysplit]

It could be that buyers are putting in ridiculously low offers. I can't tell you how many times I've had offers of $5-10 on items listed at $30-50. I'm sorry, but that's not a price drop I'm wiling to give. I typically make a counter offer in those cases, but if the buyer offers again at only $1 more I will decline right away. Since the offer amounts are only visible to the seller & potential buyer, it's a bit hard to judge which party is being unreasonable.

THIS...  drives me nuts.  last time i got an offer of 5$ on a 400$ item.. i mean at that point its trolling.

[Ringlets]

I'm one of those people who has set up an auto decline now because of the ridiculous low offers I kept getting ( last one was £50 for a £200 item which was already listed for sale at a lot lower price than the exact same item other ebayers were selling - what a cheek! not as bad an offer as the one you got though BLS! ). I guess with that particular item if you'd checked how many offers were declined then it would have looked pretty bad! but I only actually declined a few offers personally (the rest were auto declined) , and I was willing to take up to £50 lower than the BIN if anyone had made me a decent offer. I relisted the item a couple of times with the same result and decided in the end to keep it a while longer.  Thats just my own latest experience although I'm thinking that this happens to quite a lot of people . But I've also been the buyer trying to make an offer and kept having it refused or ignored altough it was only a few $ lower than the asking price - which is crazy -  so I can see both sides.