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I'm looking at an item on ebay, private sale, and after reading a recent thread here I had a look at the bid history.
There is a series of automated bids from a user with no feedback or history, is it likely to be shenanigans to boost the price?
I know I could just bid my max then ignore but to be honest if they are scoundrels i'd rather just walk away,
Thanks
probably nothing to do with the seller. Just pay through paypal and if you dont get the goods then you can get your money back.
Could just be a new user that also wants to buy it. The eBay bidding system can show a lot more bids than the user actually placed - as it goes up to their max in increments if they get outbid.
So long as you don't have reason to believe the item itself is dodgy (using a shill sort of casts doubt broadly on the honesty of the seller) then make a bid, but bid a bit less than you would if the seller wasn't playing silly buggers.
A lot depends on who else is interested in the item - a shill bid is only effective if theres one serious bidder. As soon as there are two people who are genuinely keen then the shill is moot really.
There is a series of automated bids
How do you know they're automated? If someone had bid a high price then others had come in below their max, ebay would keep bumping them to the top. That's the only automation I could tell of in bid history.
Just snipe the auction with your max and leave it.