Roots Archives Forum

Collectors,

A warning. I have noticed that "professional" auctioneers will use shill bidding - i.e. artificially raise the price of auctions - to get rare reggae records to stupid price heights. This trick enables the seller to either get a winning bid that is ridiculously high by a real buyer, or a fake buyer. If winner is not a real buyer, seller can then offer a second chance offer to a fool. Imagine: "Hey, the Lee Perry Super Ape winner 1108 USD didn't show up. You get the chance to buy to for 1098 USD-" What a deal....

How to spot these auctions:

> They generally end on Sunday evening, UK time.

> Prices are monstrously high. Big goes up and up and up.

> I noticed they tend to be organized from UK dealers (vs. say USA)

> They are sold by dealers who's expertise lie in reggae vinyl (vs someone selling all sorts of items amongst which a few records)

How to prevent from falling in the trap:

> Check popsike or Jah Chicken's great rootsvinylguide.com for reference price. Don't bid anything that is 10% higher than highest reference.

> Good old rule: BUYER BEWARE

Ah, yes, I love the "only 200 pressed" argument. Especially when the actual record keeps on showing up hundreds of time over a 5 year period.

Yes just like Vlad I buy allot of ebay for a long period. Many biddings are being faked.

Another tip to prevent. Sellers that state in their profile that they do everything to protect their actions from fakebidders (and offer the items to the second highest bidder) cannot be trusted. Unless they take measures and delete bids during the process of bidding.

Even the highest bid on popsike over the last 3 years is fake so be ware. Popsike cannot be trusted. I recall their was a period on ebay that there were also many fake actions. Around 2007/2008. Just like now.

i sold a few 7s recently. and 5 of my auctions were targeted by 2 fake bidders. this is a total pi** off as a seller. for instance, 1 record had 4 bidders. the winner was a fake with zero feedback, so i offered the record to the next highest bidder, as a second chance offer, at his highest bid price. (which is totally wrong, but ebay policy). he thought he should have it for a quid more than bidder 3, which i agree with . i then offered it to bidder 3 as a second chance offer. bidder 3 bought it. now, i have to pay ebay a percentage for the fake bidder, and the second chance offer. 2 payments, on 5 records. i left a warning feedback for other sellers, which ebay removed and then sent me a warning for doing so. ?????? f**ked up or wa?
also these bidders had automatic bids, that come in at the last second so nothing that can be done until auction is finished. also i had msgs from other sellers, asking what i had written on fake bidders feedback, as they had been targetted too. i dont usually sell records. i only had a few twice so i thought i'd sell them on. but i dont think i will be using ebay again in a hurry, as it is more hassle than its worth. but i dont believe for a second that all or most sellers are crooked.
ites.

agreed that ebay reggae auctions are plagued by fake bidding which is not done by the seller.

There's been items where I was the only real bidder, and ended up getting for the starting price.

A big hassle for the seller, he said the fake bids usually come in the last ten seconds before the auction ends.

But thanks for the warning still - always good to be aware.

vlad wrote:Collectors,

A warning. I have noticed that "professional" auctioneers will use shill bidding - i.e. artificially raise the price of auctions - to get rare reggae records to stupid price heights.

How to spot these auctions:

> They generally end on Sunday evening, UK time.

> Prices are monstrously high. Big goes up and up and up.

> I noticed they tend to be organized from UK dealers (vs. say USA)

> They are sold by dealers who's expertise lie in reggae vinyl (vs someone selling all sorts of items amongst which a few records)

How to prevent from falling in the trap:

> Check popsike or Jah Chicken's great rootsvinylguide.com for reference price. Don't bid anything that is 10% higher than highest reference.

> Good old rule: BUYER BEWARE

Not only big sellers.. also ´small´ people. However here is my opinion as a seller. People bought some stuff from me far above anything you see on popsike or rootsvinylguide..(don´t ask me why.) as they say here ´it´s worth what a madman is willing to pay for it´... if some rich Japanese buyer want´s to buy it for that price, so be it.
Also sometimes records get hyped. I´ve seen it a couple of times.. records first sell for 5 or 10 dollar (especially digital) a year later for 3/400..

your argument to not pay anything above 10 percent does not make any logical sense.

Here is one trick how you can see if they are jacked up though. If multiple items that have no connection with each other are won or bid on by the same buyer. Let´s say a seller offers digital pieces, 1990s UK steppers tunes and 1960s ska tunes. Bids done on all or more items by the same buyer...

you used to be able to pick up some bargains on ebay back a while but not any more. Sky-high prices, fixed "Buy-it-Now"prices, shops trading there. havent seen any reggae items worth parting with my money for.it always seems to be the same stuff too.
"Rare" the most overused word on ebay. duplicate items appear days after a "rare" item is sold, often at inflated prices.Unscrupulous vampires ripping us off.babylon always greedy
Sold some vinyl recently, two lps had ten "watchers" on them. after sale was over, only one bid wtf?can you have fake watchers too?
agree that hassle is too much bother and also you have to pay postage upfront if you sell.
Not for me any more, looking elsewhere R.I.P ebay

I still pick up bargains.. you are probably trying to fish out of the same small pool of ´big´ tunes..the same onces you see on youtube and want-lists all the time by everyone..

Sky high prices. well ebay is a big cash cow for ebay itself.. the fees (and also paypal charges you. so you are charged twice by the same company. paypal is owned by ebay) are very high (13%?).. much higher than for example discogs. you got to earn it back. And compared to northern soul and African pieces the prices are very very modest.. I can assure you that..

http://www.popsike.com/php/quicksearch. ... =&currsel=

´I can´t afford my hobby, so people who try to sell things are vampires´ And nobody is ripping you off because you are not obligated to buy anything from anyone.

im certainly not obliged to buy anything from anyone you're right, however when you say im looking in "the same small pool" I dont know what you mean there. Im not looking for "big" tunes either not my thing. maybe thats were the problem lies my tastes are two obscure.what i mean is if you look through the RA database for instance there are a wealth of albums which will probably never even come up for sale on ebay. What id like to know is when original JA lps were pressed what would be a standard number of copies pressed?im guessing it would be in the hundreds rather than thousands.Also im guessing they didnt export many outside of JAor am i wrong?

When buying anything on eBay, take a look at the item and decide the maximum price that you're prepared to pay for it, watch the item, then wait.

Then bid once, bid late (preferably in the last 10secs of the auction) and bid your maximum. If you don't win, just wait for the next one to come up. Never get involved in bidding wars or into the mindset of thinking of it like a game that you need to win.

That's my advice to you guys anyway - don't show your hand until as late as possible. If you bid in the last few seconds of the auction

a) the people you're bidding against don't get a chance to put in higher bids, even if they would have done so
b) an unscrupulous seller won't have time to use an alternate ID to shill the auction price upwards

There are automated tools that allow you to 'snipe' auctions even when you're not at your computer.