Posted on 02/18/2011 7:38:24 AM PST by econjack
I recently saw an online ad that touted a guy who bought a brand new Apple iPad for just under $21. Since they retail for around $500, I thought I'd check it out. The company is QuiBids (quibids.com) and it's legit.
The way it works is that you buy the number of "bids" you want. For example, you can buy 45 bids for $27, which works out to 60 cents per bid. At any given moment, there are dozens of items being auctioned, from iPads, TV's, gift certificates, golf clubs, you name it. You find an item you're interested in and right below its description if a Bid button. If you want to try and win that item, just click the Bid button and you become the high bidder. Less obvious is that you just spent $.60 on that button click. Most items automatically increase in price by one penny with each new bid. If you're the last bidder, you get the item.
I won a dozen name-brand golf balls for one penny (I was the only bidder). I thought this was great until they tacked on $9.99 in "shipping and handling". I also won a $40 electronic baking scale for $.03, which had a $6.97 shipping and handling charge. All this got me wondering.
Suppose the iPad sold for $21.01. If you're the last bidder, you got a great deal. However, since bids go up by one penny per bid, that means that there are 2000 bids "spent" unsuccessfully on the item. At $.60 per bid, those bidders shelled out $1200 for a $500 item. QuiBid makes $700 profit...and that's assuming they pay full retail. Just today, a $25 gift car sold for $4.33. A great deal for the winner...not so much for the 432 unsucessful bidders who shelled out $259.20 for a $25 gift certificate.
If this company goes public, sign me up. It's as good as having one of Obama's printing presses.
Really? The Quibids 101 page said you have 2 hours after the auction closes to exercise the Buy It Now option, and doesn't say only one person gets to use it.
The problem I see is having to check every two hours for maybe days on end just to exercise the option. If you miss it in the middle of the night, you're
The commercial with the Hemi Charger that “sold” for only $597 told me all I needed to know...
Actually, it was a Challenger, one of which I have for sale now. It’s going to cost someone a lot more than $587, though. (Shameless advertisement-listed on www.autotrader.com.)
Online penny auction + young person with credit card surely equals a maxed out credit card.
A guy at work was bidding (he happens to be an elitist liberal as well). I had to explain to him how easily he was being scammed...seems like every time he put in a bid, somebody else almost instantly bid against him...and there were dozens of ‘auctions’ going on at once, on this obscure website. Maybe, just maybe, he was the only human involved in the bidding...you think?
I have heard of online gambling sites that will put two or more ‘autobot’ players at a table. They play in unison to fleece the real players.
Doing anything online, there is never anyway to know what’s real and what is a setup.
“... bottom line is a scam”.
From the info that I read, it was compared to gambling. You dump money into a machine, lottery ticket, whatever with the hopes of a big return but the house always wins type deal. I have also read that if you are the type of person with a gambling type personality, they WANT you.
Obviously not for me, then.
A friend of mine and her son do quibids. Her son told me that if two people are doing the "automatic bidding" option, that nobody wins. The bidding will exhaust your entire supply of pre purchased "bid bundles".
They've picked up some stuff really cheap about 3 and 4am. Vacations, gift cards, not electronics.
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