Help! I messed up my very first eBay auction!

I’m selling a motorcycle on ebay and when I was filling out all the info one of the boxes asked how many miles the bike had on it. Well, I put 22k, but when the auction was listed the K was missing and it just said 22. Now people are bidding on it but it says the bike only has 22 miles on it. Is there anything I can do short of emailing every single bidder to fix this?

By the way, anyone with common sense will realize that this 1980 motorcycle has more than 22 miles on it (considering I didn’t make a big deal out of this fact) but I want to be safe just in case the winner turns out to be a jerk.

I think ebay allows you to add a note even after a bid is placed. If so add a note and email the highers bidder explaning it, give him the option to walk away if he wins with his current bid. If he withdraws the bid then you have to email the 2nd highest bidder.

Also you can end the auction early so if after contacting the winning bidder - if he is willing end it early and relist it. You might use a ebay sock puppet to place a phony bid so you can end it early your self.

If you can’t you can let the auction go to completion then let the winning bidder walk if he wants to or go through w/ it.

Yes, you should e-mail all the bidders and then you should close the auction before more people bid on it.

I would close the auction early & post a note on why I did that. I heard that may turn
some buyers off though.

Also try asking in the ebay marketing newsgroup if you want.

I mean I would cancel the auction early not close it since that implies it would go to the highest bidder.

What is an Ebay Sock Puppet?

A new account created by the seller just to out-bid everyone else to safely close the auction. Be careful, though, if doing this. I am sure it is against ebay rules. If you did this a lot, then you could inflate your accounts history with positive comments. This is done a lot by people who heavily use ebay.

You should be able to add something to the auction listing after the auction is placed. It won’t let you change what’s on there already, but it will say at the bottom “seller added at such-and-such date and time” and there will be a line with whatever you added. Just explain what happened, add it to the auction, then e-mail your high bidder and give him the option of retracting his bid.

Here…

http://pages.ebay.com/help/basics/e_sell5.html

scroll down to “if your item has already received a bid:” and select “add to the item description.”

If you listed on eBay Motors, go here

http://pages.ebay.com/ebaymotors/help/overview.html

then go to the bottom, under selling, and choose “Add to my item description.”

Just revise your auction, then contact your bidders. Then you won’t have to end it early and be out your listing fees.

As jinwicked showed, you can update. I tried to in an auction, but it wouldn’t let me do so in the last 12 hours of the auction. So get it done now!