eBay turns offers to unsuccessful bidders into new public offers that anyone can see and buy.
Summary: rostweg reports a problem on eBay in which offers were mistakenly published to losing bidders as public Buy It Now listings. He explains that this happened without any action on his part and that it violates eBay's own policies. petersmodellbahnstuebchen and elke@ebay try to help based on the information, while hasjana asks for details about the purchase. rostweg explains that the original buyer did not pay and that eBay acknowledged the problem, which was caused by a technical error. He emphasizes that eBay will take care of the resolution.
Prologue:
Germany, the world champion of bureaucracy, strikes again and closes its eyes to any logic ;-)
Since the moderators explained to me that you may only point out a problem if you do it through the affected eBay account, if you have several, then that’s just how it has to be done.
The problem is that otherwise nobody is allowed to reply to a problem because it affects a different account.
I’ve now specifically signed up to the community again with my second eBay account in order to comply with this wonderful restriction of this community guideline, if such a pointless rule even exists. So now I have two logins in the community, because that’s apparently how it has to be.
On the subject:
I don’t get it. You sell something, but the buyer doesn’t pay. So, for example, you make an offer to two losing bidders. It’s also displayed that way. That’s what this function is for, and it’s described exactly like that.
But that only applies as long as you’re on the eBay account that was used for it. So the eBay account where the item was actually sold, but the highest bidder doesn’t pay and where now the purchase is only supposed to be offered to those two losing bidders.
If you use any other eBay account, it gets completely crazy. So if you don’t use the account where the item was sold, but a completely different eBay account.
Because then you realize that the offer - only to the two selected losing bidders - was automatically relisted as a Buy It Now offer without any action on my part. Not for the selected losing bidders, but as a completely normal listing that anyone can see and buy. Not just once, but for every losing bidder you selected, eBay relists an extra Buy It Now offer that anyone can see and anyone can buy.
Without me having any control over it, eBay simply automatically creates several new listings for just one item that I only wanted to offer to the two losing bidders.
And that is a problem.
I don’t want to create a normal listing visible to everyone, but only make an offer to two specific losing bidders. I don’t want to create a publicly visible listing at all. And certainly not multiple ones.
According to eBay’s rules, it’s not even allowed to list an item, even if you only have one of it, in multiple auctions or offers at the same time. But apparently that doesn’t apply to eBay itself when arbitrary and automated new public listings accessible to everyone are artificially created from offers only to losing bidders, without me wanting that?
What’s that about? Does anyone have any idea why such nonsense by eBay - even against their own guidelines - was automated?
These two listings were not created by me, but by eBay:
https://www.ebay.de/itm/198542438169
https://www.ebay.de/itm/198542438182
And here is the sold listing:
https://www.ebay.de/itm/198523663474
I only sent an offer to two selected losing bidders, just as specified by eBay on the corresponding sub-page. The eBay website created the new public listings without my knowledge.
I actually only use my shovelfxb account for buying and the rostweg account is my selling account. That came about because I originally had one business account and one private account. And eBay explicitly allows having multiple accounts, even as a private person. I specifically asked about that back then, and that still applies today.
With my shovelfxb account I saw that these incorrectly created by eBay listings are publicly active, which I had sent ONLY to two losing bidders via my rostweg account.
elke@ebay
·6 days agoHello @rostweg , thanks very much for your post. The original listing "198523663474" has already been canceled, or a purchase cancellation was successfully carried out by you. In this case, it is not possible to send an offer to losing bidders. That is only the case if you successfully sold the item through an auction and the highest bidder withdraws from the purchase. In the event of a purchase cancellation, the buyer automatically receives a full refund of the purchase amount and you can list the item again. The two other listings were manually relisted from the original item "198493765615", using the same eBay account with which you sold the original item (which has now been canceled). Please therefore check your listings carefully in your eBay seller account and, if necessary, end the additional listings.
@petersmodellbahnstuebchen thanks for the tag.
Kind regards
Elke
rostweg
OP6 days ago · EditedHello Elke,
thanks for your effort, but that’s not correct. It would be helpful if mistakes were taken seriously and not just claimed to be untrue. And especially when someone reports that the website automatically posted offers online, then saying that those offers were manually reposted by oneself is already very close to calling someone a liar.
Such incidents are not explained because someone wants to annoy, mislead, or do anything like that, but because something happened that should not have happened. Simply declaring that impossible from the outset is neither helpful nor a solution.
This current bug is now known at eBay and there are quite a few other cases about it, as I was told. So I am not the only person affected. I spoke to eBay for a very, very long time and it is being handled by the technical team.
Just so everything can be understood in full:
The original foreign buyer neither replied nor paid, so I canceled the purchase and blocked the buyer for the future. Offering it to the losing bidders was completely independent of that and no matter in what order I had done it, it would have led to the same error, which has now turned into a total disaster. At least that’s eBay’s assumption on the phone
I made the offers to the losing bidders BEFORE canceling the purchase. That was possible without restriction too, but when I did it is ultimately irrelevant.
I did not manually create the two other offers for one and the same camera. I had absolutely nothing to do with it.
The two other offers, which were addressed only to the losing bidders, were automatically and without my knowledge or consent converted by the eBay website into public new Buy It Now offers as well, so that anyone can see and buy them. At the same time they were apparently also sent to the losing bidders.
The two offers that were NOT created by me are listed in my active offers list and I can open them, but it is neither possible to delete nor edit them. Any editing is excluded. That is why I cannot delete them either.
The total disaster has occurred. Through the automated publication of the two offers for one and the same camera, which was caused solely by eBay, the original buyer accessed and bought them with another eBay account. But buying an invalid offer is not legally possible, since I did not offer it publicly myself, but eBay did so without my consent. eBay will take care of it themselves, I am not supposed to do anything.
Of course the "buyer" picked the cheaper offer, bought it and this time also paid. The only thing is that this offer was never created by me and is therefore invalid. eBay will take care of it themselves, I am not supposed to do anything.
Even though this "buyer" with his second account has now bought this invalid public offer, the offer is still active for the losing bidder, which also should not be the case. At least that is clearly shown in my list of active offers. I cannot edit or delete it, since no editing is allowed. Only eBay itself can take care of that and is working on it too.
At the moment, one of the offers automatically published by eBay is still active and visible and usable for everyone. So there is a risk that a second total disaster could still occur within the next about 4 hours. If, hopefully, at least that works, then the offer period will have expired and the offer should end by itself. Nobody knows yet whether that will work; we have to wait and see. I myself cannot edit or delete it, since no editing is allowed. Only eBay itself can take care of that and is working on it too.
It is a bit complicated, but this is a real website bug that has now been confirmed by eBay. I have nothing to do with it at all.
Best regards
Dan
petersmodellbahnstuebchen
·6 days ago@elke@ebay
Hi Elke, can you untangle this riddle? Thanks a lot. ❤️
Best regards from the Baltic Sea
Peter
hasjana
·6 days ago@rostweg
was the listing https://www.ebay.de/itm/198542438182 ended by you ?
... what I don't understand: the original listing https://www.ebay.de/itm/198523663474 was only sold on 01/08 - if someone doesn't pay, the purchase is cancelled for non-payment at the earliest after 4 days, why have you already sent offers to losing bidders now ?
rostweg
OP6 days ago · EditedHello Hasjana,
no, this “ended” listing was actually only directed at an unsuccessful bidder. Ebay automated it itself and wrongly turned it into a publicly listed offer. And I didn’t end it either; the same foreign buyer used another eBay account and then bought the camera with that. But the listing is only “half” ended, because it still seems to be shown as active to the unsuccessful bidder. So at least my list of active listings still shows it. I can’t do anything about it either, because editing isn’t possible at all. Neither edit, nor delete, absolutely nothing. Totally crazy ;-)
Hopefully this will be “sorted out” in just under 4 hours, because then the offer period to the unsuccessful bidders expires. Whether that will then have any effect on the publicly listed offers automatically converted by eBay itself... we’ll see.
The buyer who placed the bid just seconds before the auction ended, in the original auction, was therefore active right up until the auction ended.
I wrote to him straight away, because I would have liked to ship immediately too (Packstation “just around the corner”). No response. That was already unusual, because winners who actively took part right at the end of the auction have always replied so far.
So there was neither a response nor payment. Of course I sent eBay’s own payment information. No response to that either.
Then I wrote again the next day and said that if no communication took place and he didn’t pay, I would cancel the purchase, having assumed his consent — if he didn’t respond. But again no response.
It is more than unusual when a buyer, even though you write to them repeatedly (even in their own native language), doesn’t respond at all and also doesn’t pay.
I’ve come across this behavior too often. From “fun bidders” who simply didn’t pay after an auction ended. The pattern is almost always the same. You write, but no response. Then you write again and eBay cancels the purchase, but still no response.
I had that happen several times before, and it always took ages until eBay resolved it. In the meantime you have to wait for days and can’t relist the item.
20 years ago you could still set it so that auctions had to be paid immediately too, if I remember correctly, but that option was probably rationalized away? Of course that significantly reduces complaints about non-payment if buyers can take days to pay. So I understand the reason why the immediate payment requirement for auctions was removed for buyers.
That’s why I now always message all buyers who don’t pay immediately and don’t wait long. And in the meantime I then send offers to unsuccessful bidders if necessary, because as long as it hasn’t been paid, they can snap it up.
All of this is within the framework of eBay rules, which I read through very carefully and intensively for this exact reason. I only use the given, available and permitted options if it becomes apparent that a buyer could be unreliable.
Best regards
Dan
petersmodellbahnstuebchen
·6 days agoHi @rostweg
the whole thing is very odd. An eBay employee has to check this tomorrow. No one else is online about it today.
Best regards from the Baltic Sea
Peter
rostweg
OP6 days agoHi Peter,
thanks, I see it that way too, if no one else here has an idea.
Best wishes to the old homeland
Dan
rostweg
OP6 days agoPS: What also seems interesting is the fact that both offers in my list of active offers are explicitly marked as "Offer to losing bidders · 198542438182" and " Offer to losing bidders · 198542438169".
I can edit all the other seven active offers. But not these two offers. The menu, or the button, "Edit" is not available for these two offers.
If I open the two offers via my rostweg account, it says "You have sent an offer to losing bidders for this item to (eBay name)"
For all other active offers, the options Edit offer, Sell similar item, Change price suggestion settings, Create shipping discounts are shown as function buttons, as usual.
And the offer information too, such as for another of my offers the starting price: EUR 149.99, views: 61, duration: 10 days and start time: Jul 29, 2026 07:27:36 PM CEST
For the two offers to losing bidders, none of that is shown.
If I look at the offers with my shovelfxb account, I could buy the offers immediately, because they are public and visible to everyone. That shouldn't be the case, because they are not public offers, but only offers to two selected losing bidders. And I only have this one camera, with this serial number, which is also listed.