Suspicious ebay activity on heat-treat furnace combo thingy...

[Daniel Koster]

Somebody here brought up this auction a little while ago:

New Heat Treat Furnace Oven & Nitrogen Cold Treating


..and now I can't find the original thread (of course) so forgive me for starting a new one.




A few days ago, this was at around $800....and suddenly it shoots up to $5900?!?

And the high bidders all have 3 or less feedback?
Bidder's List


I'm confused....is it really worth this much? Were we just dreamin' we had a chance at getting it?





http://offer.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewBids&item=7577107393

 

[krept]

the guy that won received his only feedback from the seller of the item. Similarly, the guy that put in the second highest bidS received half of his feedback from the seller of the item. All over a year ago too, so we can't see the auction... pretty convenient, hmm?

I'd bet decent money that the seller of the item created what is known as "shill accounts." I've caught a couple sellers on e-bay doing this before on items I bid on and in both instances, they were put on probation but eventually hung themselves later and their accounts were revoked. They basically create separate accounts from their main one, get a couple minor feedbacks then use them to bid up their auctions.

The smart ones (that are a lot harder to prove) usually buy small BS items for $.99 or whatever and get a couple feedbacks from DIFFERENT, well established sellers before shill bidding on their own stuff. Unfortunately for this guy, he used his regular account to leave feedback for himself. Should be pretty easy for e-bay to wake him up. If I were bidding on the item, I'd report it to e-bay as a guy using shill accounts.

In addition to those two that bid on this auction, I'd have them look into the user "amymel92" as well.

cheers

 

[Daniel Koster]

thanks for the reply to confirm my suspicions...I think I'll drop a line to ebay.

 

[mete]

The auction business has always had their frauds , it's nothing new !! In fact fairly recently the two biggest art auction houses were found to have fixed prices. The use of shills was common long before e-bay. Just have a few people in the room to bid up the price. This is why you should know the object and it's value and not get caught up in the emotion of bidding.

 

[Daniel Koster]

Yes - I agree.


Have any idea what a fair price for this item would be?

 

[Daniel Koster]

check it out....eBay gave 'em the boot. :thumbup: