Ebay sniping
 

Right. I know many of you will condone this sort of tactic, but I also bet some of you have used it. ;)

Does anyone have any experience they care to share. Use U2U if you prefer. My reason for asking is that I want to biy something from the US but don't fancy getting up at 4 in the morning, so simply looking for a tool that can do the bidding on my behalf. And yes I know I could put in a maximum bid in several hours before, but last time I got sniped by $0.50! Not doing that again!

Do you have a file sharing program?

If so just put ebay snipe in the search and you will get the tool you need.

I snipe all the time, learned it in Vietnam while poping off them damn VC on the wire. :lol::lol:

It's on it's way to you.!!;)

Just like Dom, auctionsniper's my weapon of choice for this.

Don't need to worry about having my PC online, the link being up etc, etc ,etc.

First bid in of that value wins.

Th chances of them being exactly the same time are miniscule.

Leave your PC on overnight and use Auction Sentry...

I use esnipe and have been very happy with the results. Stops me from going over the top and it's a doddle to use.

Ali

Cheers for all the replies. Now, presumably, you need to provide any of these snipers with your Ebay credentials. Any need to worry?

sorry to sound daft but how is this software different to just putting in the max price you would pay on ebay?

doesnt ebay bid for you up to your max bid? if you get outbid does it matter if its by 50p or £5000?

do a google dearch for - bidmate uk

No need to down load software, no need to have your PC turned on, no need to enter too many personal details and free to use 3 times per week. Costs apply if you want to use it more often.

Used it a few times with good results.

A

my thoughts , exactly , dont fall foul to ebay bid fever !!!!! stick to your max bid !:mad:

Interested to hear of peoples experiences with bid snipers.

I've been outdone myself a few times and usually for trivial amounts.

Wouldnt it be fun though if two automated snipe programs battled it out against each other....... and some one comitted to buy my trackbike for £10,000 :lol::lol:

Frank

You put your max bid onto eBay with 5 days to go, and the price gets pushed up incrementally, someone bids, your proxy bid bumps the price up a bit more, then the other person bids a bit more and so on.

With a snipe, you put your max bid in with 5 seconds to go, so no incremental updates and no opportunity for another user to quickly hit "bid now".

If there's a proxy bid in higher than your max snipe, you still lose.

But, you can keep the costs down and increase your chance of winning substantially.

It's been around for almost as long as eBay, and is essentially playing on the fact that a lot of bidders still sit there with 5 minutes to go "just in case".

Wilf, the main difference being that the snipe software doesn't act until the last second - usually 4-5 seconds depending on how you configure it. What this means is that the auction value will generally be lower than using the auto-bid feature. Why? The e-bay auto-bid feature will automatically increment your bids up to your max value when someone else decides to bid - so the price is always going up.

If you snipe, it doesn't increase the price during the auction by continually incrementing the price. It will come in at the last second and just bid what you need to beat the current price up to your maximum. It does it all for you so you don't have to worry about hitting the wrong key, typing the wrong thing etc etc. It's also near impossible to beat a snipe manually. Lots of people use them so if you're playing in the same ball park as a sniper they will generally win.

Felix, you do need to enter your e-bay credentials but I wouldn't worry about it.

Damn, beaten to it!

Spent too long typing ...

TP...You need "postsnipe" software.

Basically, with this system you enter all the replies you can think of about any subject under the sun, in advance, and as soon as the software detects that somebody has posted a topic that your answer is suitable for it posts your reply just 4-5 seconds later.

You need never be beaten by manually typing again

:lol:

do they do something similar for bikes regarding races start?

i could do with one of those.

thanks dudes,

I'm pretty sure i'll stay away from it, if i think i have an 'edge' on ebay i'll be broke in no time, i buy enough crap anyway.

I get carried away enough with the Corse parts list!

Race bike has just come apart to start getting it ready for next year (keen or what!) and i have already heard myself saying "while it's apart ...."

Damm you Ducati corse and your temptations...

Wilf...just show it as business expenditure and the VAT man will be no wiser............

R X

If i do that any more i'll have to put "HM CUSTOMS AND EXCISE" on the side of the fairing!!

thats why I never win anything!!:mad:

Its so funny
 

Thought I'd sign up with AuctionSniper and have a go after the recommendations here.

Up for grabs was a Marchi 5 spoke rear mag wheel that would need some work but I think could be made to match my Front Magnesium jobbie.

Start price was £75 - it was on a 7 day auction with no bids until this morning (the final day).

I figured going £20 higher might stand me in with a chance and set the 'sniper' running....it took a while to sign in set up so dont try and do it 5 mins before the end of an auction.

here is the bid history:

http://offer.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI...tem=8016262668

The first won - as he weirdly increased his own maximum bid 14 minutes after placing it - but it worked!!!

The other 3 bids all came withing the last few seconds of the auction (one of them EXACTLY so even more suspicious !!) and I would of been outbid anyway.

Interesting though - I wonder if all the snipe companies are owned by Ebay (or am I being cynical :lol: ).

Frank