I don't know if it has any bearing, in regards to shill bidding, but last time I looked the leader was "private" so we could not see an ID.

Although not in my area, there are some high price, nothing like this I don't think, pieces I would truly love to have, but have no expectation of ever getting. I can, and am happy to put a nice reproduction in just to complete a display. At present I only have one such patch, an Australian nurses sleeve patch. I am quite happy with it, and even more so as it was a gift from a fellow member. If someday and by miracle I ever got a real one I would probably still keep it in the display because of it being a gift.

Terry

If, there is something unsual that I am bidding on, not necessarily on anything in this league, I will leave an early bid, as it makes it more difficult for the seller to accept a private offer from another buyer before the auction has run its course.

Several items that I have been bidding on have 'disappeared' over the years and it is annoying, not to mention ungentlemanly.

Leaving an early bid has no impact at all on the ability of the seller to end his auction early, for whatever reason. Human nature being what it is, there will always be incentives to end auctions early. I know of sellers who endorse their listings "So as to be fair to all, please note we never end our auctions early". They have done, and will probably do so again if they get an offer they can't refuse. It has nothing to do will gentlemanly behaviour. Its about making money.

Dave.

It is to do with making money, but if the seller accepts an offer, he never knows what he could have got for his item.

With the current Commando title he might have been delighted and possibly accepted a £3,000 offer within the first 24 hours. If, I had been in his position, the first question that I would have asked myself would be, "What is so special about this cloth title that someone is offering me £3,000 for it?"

I would be tempted to take the offer as it is a large amount of money, and if I didn't, I would run the risk of having to sell it to the highest bidder at the end of the auction for £9.99, if that was the highest bid.

If the offer, had been £50, I would almost certainly have let the auction run its course.

Not particularly gentlemanly, I will admit.

Simon.

Your third paragraph highlights the flaw in the first.

Last week I ‘best offer’-ed someone £9 plus P&P for a 1916 Devonshire. They rejected it outright, the auction ran and it sold for a maiden £7.50 to someone else. So that seller knows he could’ve got £9 but ended up with £7.50.

That’s why auctions are a gamble. Things can sell for more than they’re worth or less, no guarantees.

The whole idea of an auction is not particularly gentlemanly if you think about it, person with more money always wins.

I do not believe this is the case; there is nothing in the bidding history from the current high bidder and underbidder that I would consider suspect. Both bid multiple times on different items from different sellers and from different categories; one bidder in particular on ebay Germany and France.

Both do seem to withdraw bids quite often though, that is something I consider ungentlemanly but within the rules.

Not exactly true. I had some items I bought at auction for a particular piece, and having bought them found the gents name and number etc. So spent time researching them, and keeping the item I wanted listed the others on ebay (as I had them already, in better condition). Cut a long story short, the family had asked the auction house to clear the house, not checking the loft, and didnt even know these bits were being sold, until they had been. They wanted them back, and I agreed, for my money back, and had cleaned them and tidied them up. Eight Lots, three had bids. Ebay charged me a quarter of the start price for removing the three that had bids, precisely to deter from removing listings. So doing a good deed when the family couldn't be bothered to check the house cost me!

After receiving two eMails from a very experienced and knowledgeable collector concerning this “bidding war” I am leaning toward the idea that something is definitely not “Kosher” here. Watch for a couple of others to suddenly materialize in a month or two! D.J.

Something odd, indeed. Third highest bidder, e***7, dropped out at £185. Two bidders, 3***0 (private) and c***a (1282), took it from there. Fishy??? . . .

Are you suggesting this patch is a fake?

Definitely not Luke. I was referring to the Bidding. Then as an afterthought, it struck me that the “Fake-Makers” seeing the money involved, may see an opportunity to suddenly find one and offer it for sale through a third party.

Bids have now been retracted and its down to £190!

Definitely something very strange going on. I would be gutted if it was me selling it and the bid had dropped by £7,000.

Yeah of course it has. It’s the oldest trick in the eBay book. The bidder has various names and puts a bid on this cockmando badge for some huge amount and then with another name takes it right up to the limit. Then you give it four or five days so every anorak who is interested in it, will have seen it. Then the 1st bid is withdrawn and it then goes down to a sensible amount. (190 in this case)
Now everyone knows that they now need to bid nearly 8k to win this badge, so no point at all bidding. Now the clever guy gets it for a couple of hundred quid and there isn’t much at all anyone can do , unless one of you lot dare bid it up and also get it for a complete bargain but that only works if you call the high bidders bluff and the high bidding conman then withdraws his high bid. Of course there is limited time to retract, so it’s a great game of Russian Roulette.

Am I hallucinating or is the bidding now at £190 .?

P