e-bay

[Samw]

Originally Posted by whaase

But, he could not have done that earlier in the auction. I had the highest bid up until the last 10-20 minuts or so... I guess my question is still, how can you have a penny bid when the increments are $10? Does ebay allow you to do this aslong as you bid the minimum $10? Not that it really matters, I'm just curious now.. maybe I could win using this!

Walter

Increments are used when maximum bids have not been reached yet. Let's say bidding starts at $250. At $250, the increments are $5. Let's say your max bid was $400. Well, the current bid would then be $250 (your bid is the first bid).

Now, let's say John also wants the camera. His minimum bid would have to be $255 (EBAY will not let him bid a lessor amount such as $250.11 because the increment is $5). So let's say John places his maximum bid at $255 (which happens to be the minimum that EBAY allows). But you already have a bid of $255 so the highest bid now is $255 for you.

Now Jane comes along and also wants that camera and she puts in a maximum bid of $401.16. Well, $401.16 beats your 400 so she gets it for $401.16.

Its a little confusing but the increments are used only when the maximum bids of a bidder has not been reached yet. Once the maximum bid has been reached, you can beat the bid by 1 penny and win.

So hopefully, this example shows when the increment is used and when it is not used. You can read more in the link below:

http://pages.ebay.ca/help/buy/bid-increments.html

In your auction, had your maximum bid have been $450.11, you would have won by a penny even though the increment was $5 (according to Ebay's chart).