[CMOTD]

'people on ebay' that are getting mates to push the price up and when you stop bidding you get a 'bid retraction' message saying you're now the high bidder.

Land based auctions are bid dependent - person with fattest wallet wins. Ebay auctions are time dependent - person who puts in last highest bid before time expires wins and this needs a totally different approach to a land based auction. There is no point bidding on any eBay auction prior to the last five seconds as you are just giving others the opportunity to raise the stakes.

I always use a snipe tool. I decide the maximum I am prepared to bid for any item, load that into the sniper and forget about it. I then get an email when the auction ends, win or lose. If I lose I don't care because it has gone over my maximum and there will be another one along soon. A win is often at well below my maximum bid because I haven't given anybody the chance to drive the price up by constantly bidding in small increments.