EBay charges a premium for reserve auctions, so you would be doing them out of fees.
Take a look at eBay’s message boards - lots of amateur detectives there who make it their life’s work to track down and report shill bidding … “for the good of the community”!
Julie
Yeah, but under the reserve system, the price wouldn’t have been at $5 with minutes to go to begin with - the guy would have set the reserve at $30. You only thought you would get it for less, but in actuality you would not have.
True, but thats only if the seller actually had a reserve on it. If the seller forgot to, tough noogies.
Your first mistake was putting a “reserve” on it. I have posted & read the eBay boards, and although a few sellers like reserves- no buyer does. If you have a bottom-line price, then list that as your starting bid. Don’t play games with your buyers by making them guess what the bottom line may be- they don’t like it, and resent it as a cheap selling trick. Besides a reserve costs you more- a “lose-lose” if I ever saw one. My eBay “buyers” rating is something like 300- all POS- and now I 9 times out of 10 just skip over “reserve auctions” as I don’t want to waste my time (I place a bid- which takes some thought and a little effort- just to see “reserve not met”. Phui.) Some sellers also use a very high reserve just to get a mostly free appraisal of an item they have no real intention of selling.
Izzy- as to them finding shill bidders- eBay has scads of dudes (non-employees, like Julie said) who have lots of time on their hands. They will track down sellers with odd patterns of bids on their items, and see that the same bidder often bids on one sellers stuff- and no one else. Besides- when your “shill” “wins” you have to pay fees based upon your shills high bid- even though you really sold it to yourself. But you are right about high reserves discouraging bidders.
If I see a reserve auction I email them what the reserve is. So its rather pointless to have a reserve, when you could have just started the auction at the reserve price.
If you’re asking for an opinion, mine is that the credit card company should bear the loss.
And this is just my 2 cents on reserve auctions - it’s been my personal experience that I am more successful when I use a reserve. There is a certain amount of “momentum” that occurs when bids are placed. Once the ball gets rolling, and people see that others have bid on an item, they assume it’s a worthwhile thing to bid on. I have tried starting out with the price I want to get for the item, and often have received no bids. But if I start at a lower price, and people start bidding, then the “feeding frenzy” mentality starts, and more and more people tend to bid on it. Some people like to start at a lower price and have no reserve, which is probably the best way to generate interest in the item, but then you’re taking a chance that the bidding won’t go high enough, and you’ll be stuck selling the item for less than you wanted. So for me, a reserve works best.
I’ve seen some people list no-reserve auctions, and then cancel them on the last day if the bidding doesn’t go as high as they want. This pisses me off. I think it’s a sneaky and underhanded way to do business. It shouldn’t be allowed, but unfortunately it appears to be.
What if you transfer the paypal money to your bank account, withdraw it and then spend it? does your bank account just go in the negative?
Well I am back to update to let you know how it turned out. But first I wanted to thank everyone for not making me feel so stupid about asking what I felt were dumb questions. This thread has been very, very, helpful as I didn’t know about several things that have been brought up.
Well the bidding started about 5 hours before it ended and it was like as blowero states a “feeding frenzy”. Just like piranahs on a slab of meat. Clearly had I agreed to end the auction and take what this person offered I would have shorted myself $30. I wanted $70 out of the item and it brought $100. I think they knew what the item was worth and thought I didn’t and being new to this sort of thing wanted to see if they could pull a fast one over on me. But I stood my ground and didn’t end the auction and it still sold. 
I can’t answer your question chaoticdonkey. I am still new to this sort of thing. I am a little worried about some concerns that were brought up about pay pal and bank accounts. Such as, I am thinking that instead of using my primary checking account like I have done. I should have got a totally different account set up just for this. Am I being paranoid?
No, your not being paranoid, your right on the money. Your money. A seperate account is the best way to go. I would even recommend a seperate savings account to transfer money back and forth, keeping only a minimal amount in the account tied in with Paypal. Of course, we may both be paranoid.
Just my two cents about reserve auctions. I often sell animation cels on ebay when I’m in need of funds. And usually, I’m short on money in the first place, so I can’t afford the fees involved with a high starting bid. Which is why I always put a reserve on it. Especially with a collectible where you want to make back at least what you paid (unless the value has dramatically dropped, which is often the case with cels). My trick is to ALWAYS list in the auction description what the reserve price is. That way people know what I’m asking for ahead of time. It’s better than not putting a reserve and risking losing alot of money.
Yuki- I am sorry, but I have my doubts, having sold a couple of small items on eBay, and studied their fee structure. The difference is extremely small.
Most dudes say the “real” reason is to suck naifs into looking at the auction with a low starting bid, hoping they can “steal it”.
However, if you could/would link to an auction (not nessesairly yours- but the same $ range) of an item, then show us what the fees would be both ways ('cause they charge more for a reserve auction, too)- then we can see the difference. I’ll go on record here by predicting is is very small.
Don’t have anything to link to but I can give you a common scenario with me when I need money.
Ok, I have 4 cels I want to buy. I refuse to get less than $85 for any of them.
First the fees as they would be for having a high starting bid but no reserve.
Insertion fee for bids starting $50.00 - $199.99 = 2.20
2.20 x 4 = 8.80
Now fees for having a low starting bid but a reserve.
Insertion fee for bids starting $0.01 - $9.99 = 0.30
Reserve Price fee $25.00 - $99.99 = 1.00
(.30 + 1.00) x 4 = 5.20
Total savings for doing it with a low starting bid and a reserve = $3.60
And the more auctions you have, the bigger the savings. So there’s my reason why I do what I do 
Geez, went to all that work and made a typo… 
“…want to buy” should be “…want to sell”
Although most people on e-bay are reliable this doesn’t sound right, so you can.
But you will be paying for the listing and you do not have a firm commitment so do not remove it.
Things you may not have thought of:
Reserves are a cowardly way to cheat the system. If you don’t want to sell an item for less than X, list X as its starting price. That’s all you have to do. If that’s too honest for you, at least list the reserve price on your item description, so people can see if they’re wasting their time.
Well if you’d read my earlier post, you would have seen that I DO list the reserve price in my auctions. And how is it cheating the system? It’s an obvious way of spending less, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who does it. If it were ‘cheating’ the system, we all know eBay would have cracked down on this by now.
Well, now Yuki- you’re not “cheating the system”. However, if you read the community 's over at eBay, and even this thread here, you’ll see a LOT of buyers hate reserve prices- thus they won’t bid on your auctions. Why “cheat” yourself out of all those buyers?
According to th emost experience sellers- the following choice see in this order (best sales 1st)
Beleive it or nuts- # 1 is far & away the best- although many inexperienced selelrs think it is “too risky”.
“Total savings for doing it with a low starting bid and a reserve = $3.60”
Sure you might save a dollar or so but you make up for that in having to answer people’s emails on 'what is your reserve?"
Maybe in some circles, reserves are frowned upon. But when it comes to animation cels, they’re not unusual and often expected. Everyone I know of and have dealt with who deal in animation cels on ebay understand that reserves are a common occurance and hold no ‘grudge’ against the seller.
Again, I always state the reserve in my auctions in large bold letters ;p
Just to add my 2 cents, I agree that low starting price and no reserve is the best way to go.
The goal is to attract buyers and the best way to do it is to show them you’re taking a risk.
For what it’s worth, I once bought an item on e-bay then resold because it wasn’t what I wanted. I started with a much lower price than the original seller and ended up making more!!