It would appear that Mark is indeed correct - but only until 12 hours before the auction. Then according to the ebay help rules the auction can't be cancelled (or at least so they say). Frankly, unless an error has been made, I find in unpleasant that folks can "angle" with a seller to coax them into stopping an ebay auction early on. The whole idea of the auction is to let the highest bidder win and avoid other forms of haggling and interaction. Fortunately, most folks seem to put an item on ebay and leave it there. And why? Because in most cases, it is in the sellers best interest to let the auction play out - since making an early deal usually limits the upper bound of the sale price.
Now of course, the relationships developed by buying and selling in a non-auction environment are often wonderful, and that is why for most non-unique items where fair price is well understood, a friendly CR list transaction is often best.
Mike Kone in Boulder CO
> I don't know about the circumstances of the auction you are talking
\r?\n> about, but I broke no rules. I can end the auction any time I want and
\r?\n> sell to the highest bidder. eBay get's (and got) their fees. I can also
\r?\n> cancel the highest bid if the guy sounds like a nutjob, or has bad
\r?\n> feedback, or, as in my case, I just feel like it, and sell to the
\r?\n> highest bidder.
\r?\n>
\r?\n> http://ebay.com/
\r?\n>
\r?\n> I've also withdrawn auctions when someone asks me a question about
\r?\n> condition and when I go and look, the item isn't what I remember it
\r?\n> being. I find it hard to comprehend how a seller could be 'forced' to
\r?\n> end an item early and get 'shafted.' The market is the market - it sets
\r?\n> the price to some extent. If you item doesn't get bids, then it must not
\r?\n> be worth anything. THat happens to me all the time, too. Some of the
\r?\n> movies I try and sell are just plain crap and, as it turns out, I am the
\r?\n> only sucker dumb enough to want to buy it.
\r?\n>
\r?\n> Mark
\r?\n>
\r?\n> --
\r?\n> mark assaf
\r?\n> burlingame ca 94010
\r?\n> http://www.sciencemonster.net
\r?\n> ebay:sciencemonster
\r?\n>
\r?\n>
\r?\n> Date: Mon, 10 Sep 2007 11:25:00 +0200
\r?\n> From: "kim klakow"
\r?\n> To: mark assaf ,
\r?\n> classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
\r?\n> Subject: Re: [CR]Re: Singer tandem disappears from ebay
\r?\n>
\r?\n>
\r?\n> Yes, many people do that. But a lot of times it is to shaft an unknowing
\r?\n> seller; probably what happened to the owner of the Cinelli tandem Steven
\r?\n> outed the other day.
\r?\n> The other part is, eBay does not permit this. Easy rule. Having had this
\r?\n> happen to me several times on choice items, you could incurr my wrath,
\r?\n> for how am I to know that YOU didn't snatch them away from me?
\r?\n> This survival-of-the-fittest thing is poo-poo'd on in this list, unless
\r?\n> I am wrong and the general tenor has changed since this was an item (it
\r?\n> has been several times before).
\r?\n>
\r?\n> best,
\r?\n> kim