Auction Sniping - Objections To Bid Sniping

Objections To Bid Sniping

Non-sniping bidders object to sniping, claiming that it is unfair to place bids at a point when it is impossible or unfeasible for other bidders to evaluate and possibly counter the bid, causing them to lose auctions even though they would have been willing to meet the winning bid amount. Bidders sometimes object to sniping when multiple, identical items are listed as separate lot, as they must wait until the last minute to find whether their maximum bid on one lot has been exceeded before being in a position to bid on another.

However, online auction sites, unlike live auctions, usually have an automatic bidding system which allows a bidder to enter the maximum acceptable bid. This is a hidden or proxy bid, known to the system, but not any other bidders; during the auction the actual bid is incremented only enough to beat the existing highest bid. For example, if an item's current maximum high bid is 57 and someone is prepared to pay 100 and bids accordingly, the displayed bid will be 58, with the hidden maximum of 100. Proxy bidding also discourages 'bidding wars', and can encourage 'opportunistic' bidding on low-priced items.

The failure of a maximum acceptable bid beaten by a sniper prepared to pay more is not due to the act of sniping, unless the original bidder would have bid higher when they saw the price rise. For this reason, opposition to sniping can be analyzed as more of a subjective reaction to simply losing an auction for the usual reason (not bidding high enough), than a reaction to a "dirty trick". In other words, you would have still beaten the sniper if you'd placed your maximum bid higher than the sniper is willing to pay.

However, if the minimum bid increment is very low, the Sorites paradox can come into play, and make it difficult for a person to establish a single maximum bid. For example, if the minimum bid increment on an auction is 10 cents, it can be difficult or impossible for a person to identify a price which they would be willing to pay to win the item, but they would not pay 10 cents more. The fear that 10 cents may make the difference between getting the item and losing it to a sniper can trigger unusual behaviour, such as deliberately bidding strange amounts (such as $274.81) to make it hard for snipers to guess the minimum required to outbid the current winner.