OT: A strange ebay bid experience on lens

[washy21]

Hi

I know it's off topic, but it relates to my M8 so here goes.

Last night I was on ebay when I saw for sale a Canon TV 50mm f0.95 which was converted to Leica 'M' Mount by Ken Ruth.

I really fancied this lens (even more than my wife at that point in time) and got myself into the position of highest bidder meeting the reserve price and was prepared to go a bit more to get it.

About 10 minutes before the end of listing the item went back to '0 bidders' and I got a message saying that my bid was cancelled. The bid history showed that everyone elses bids were cancelled as well.

The next thing is I get an email message which looked a bit dodgy offering me the lens for a fixed price. It did look as though it came from the seller, but on closer inspection it was probably not.

I re entered my bid and contacted the seller through ebay who said he had know idea why all the bids had been retracted and when asked why he had offered me the lens for a fixed price he said that it wasn't him.

In the confusion and panic I lost the lens to another bidder. I really fancied trying that 0.95.

Has anyone else experienced this or similar. Oh, and where can I get a Canon 0.95 50mm converted for Leica because I want to play with that ridiculous bokeh.

John

 

[Mr_Flibble]

I was offered a fix price for Kodak 35 PH-324 by someone 3 days before the end of an auction. The weirdest thing was that it was sent to my Gmail account. That's not the address I use on Ebay. The bids did not get cancelled though.

I contacted the real seller about it and we both agreed it was best to relate the story to Ebays Fraud and Spoof department.

Didn't win the PH-324 either 🙁

 

[Didier]

I wouldn't believe the seller that it was not him retracting the bids. Some do that trick to avoid ebay fees. And if it was really not him, then i would anyway not bid. Canon 0.95 come up quite often. You may contact seller "linaanna123" who lists modified 0.95 lenses all few weeks, like #220142058937 recently.

I was offered a fix price for Kodak 35 PH-324 by someone 3 days before the end of an auction. The weirdest thing was that it was sent to my Gmail account. That's not the address I use on Ebay.

Fraudulent members often try the trick to sell you something similar like you're bidding on - but that with the gmail is really weird... Maybe just a strange coincidence?

 

[Mr_Flibble]

I think he/she/it took just my Ebay-username and simply tried it with @gmail.com.
That was my first clue. And mailing me so early before the closing of the auction was really a dead giveaway.

Hopefully Ebay was able to do something with this guy his email-address that he used to contact me with.

The life is hard enough without people trying to rip you off.

 

[Didier]

I think he/she/it took just my Ebay-username and simply tried it with @gmail.com. That was my first clue.

That's one of the reason why I use different and regularly changing mailadresses for ebay, paypal and forums/lists (the advantage of running my own mailserver). This has also the nice side effect of getting less spam.

Sometimes I believe people only contact you at ebay to get your mailadress and feed their spam databases. Once I was selling and bidding on luxury watch auctions, got several questions which I answererd, and afterwards got a flood of spam offering me replicas of exact the watches I had been bidding on, on my ebay mailadress. No coincidence, for shure.

Didier

 

[zeitz]

The 0.95 lens converted to M Mount seems to be rare, although I think the real camera repairmen can convert them. Unfortunately repairmen with machining skills and tools are a vanishing bread. Be sure a converted TV lens has a focusing cam.

Kevin Lee (kevincameras.com) in Los Angeles has two converted RF lenses for sale. Kevin's prices set the high end of the market, but he has equipment you'll never see for sale again or you'ld take years to find.

 

[speedyturtle]

Ebay

Ebay

Yes ebay lets sellers cancel all bids if it's more than 12 hrs left in the auction.

I bought one of these lenses very cheap on ebay and it's mounted on my Robot Star. The lens is bigger than the camera, and heavier. You should see it.

I think you'll find a couple of these lenses on ebay from time to time.

 

[colyn]

I wouldn't believe the seller that it was not him retracting the bids. Some do that trick to avoid ebay fees. And if it was really not him, then i would anyway not bid. Canon 0.95 come up quite often. You may contact seller "linaanna123" who lists modified 0.95 lenses all few weeks, like #220142058937 recently.

For the record I am the seller of the lens in question and I did not contact the seller. He had bid the $1000 reserve and then got an email from someone else offering to sell for $650.

Fraudulent members often try the trick to sell you something similar like you're bidding on - but that with the gmail is really weird... Maybe just a strange coincidence?

I contacted eBay to find out why all of the bids had been cancelled at the same time and was told they had done it because a scammer had made several offers to the bidders. One of them was stupid enough to take the bait and sent a Western Union money Order. The OP again bid on the lens but was outbid in the final seconds.

There was no fraud on my part whatsoever..

 

[washy21]

Hi Colyn

YES, I MUST STATE THAT AT NO TIME DID I SUSPECT COLYN OF ANYTHING UNTOWARD _ HE IN FACT REACTED VERY QUICKLY TO MY CONCERNS AND I BID AGAIN WITH CONFIDENCE.

Yeah that was a real annoying situation last night. As I said, that message looked very dodgy and it threw me just before I was getting ready to bid because I needed that lens sooooo bad.

I'd already looked at your feedback which of course was great and so I just ploughed on. Anyway, it really threw me and I lost the bid because of it.

Still that's life and thanks for getting back to me as well last night.

DDIDIER: Thanks for the HU

 

[colyn]

Hi
The next thing is I get an email message which looked a bit dodgy offering me the lens for a fixed price. It did look as though it came from the seller, but on closer inspection it was probably not.

One bidder fell for the scam and sent a WU money order to the scammer (gmail email address) then contacted me to verify that I got it. I only contact bidders through eBays email system.

Someone has posted their copied auction of this lens at least once that I know of but it was removed by eBay. If you see this lens up again please notify eBay.

I re entered my bid and contacted the seller through ebay who said he had know idea why all the bids had been retracted and when asked why he had offered me the lens for a fixed price he said that it wasn't him.

I contacted eBay about it and was told they had cancelled the bids because a scammer was contacting bidders with offers like the one you received.

In the confusion and panic I lost the lens to another bidder. I really fancied trying that 0.95.

Has anyone else experienced this or similar. Oh, and where can I get a Canon 0.95 50mm converted for Leica because I want to play with that ridiculous bokeh.

John

I hope you find another one. It is a fine lens.

This is the first time someone has done something like this with one of my auctions. I will be including a statement in my future auctions warning bidders not to answer email offers but to report it to eBay..

 

[colyn]

Hi Colyn

YES, I MUST STATE THAT AT NO TIME DID I SUSPECT COLYN OF ANYTHING UNTOWARD _ HE IN FACT REACTED VERY QUICKLY TO MY CONCERNS AND I BID AGAIN WITH CONFIDENCE.

Yeah that was a real annoying situation last night. As I said, that message looked very dodgy and it threw me just before I was getting ready to bid because I needed that lens sooooo bad.

I'd already looked at your feedback which of course was great and so I just ploughed on. Anyway, it really threw me and I lost the bid because of it.

Still that's life and thanks for getting back to me as well last night.

DDIDIER: Thanks for the HU

Thanks

I was expecting to have to relist because of the mess the scammer had made. I believe there were 25 bids at the time which went back to 0 for a time.

I can understand eBays concern but to cancell all bids was in my opinion going a bit too far. They could have frozen the auction till they got it sorted out.

Sorry you lost. It was obvious you were interested..

 

[jl-lb.ms]

The next thing is I get an email message which looked a bit dodgy offering me the lens for a fixed price. It did look as though it came from the seller, but on closer inspection it was probably not.

I also got the same email. "Be sure to email my work address, etc."

 

[Didier]

For the record I am the seller of the lens in question and I did not contact the seller. He had bid the $1000 reserve and then got an email from someone else offering to sell for $650.
I contacted eBay to find out why all of the bids had been cancelled at the same time and was told they had done it because a scammer had made several offers to the bidders. One of them was stupid enough to take the bait and sent a Western Union money Order. The OP again bid on the lens but was outbid in the final seconds.
There was no fraud on my part whatsoever..

Colyn

You likely mean "...and I did not contact the bidder...". I didn't know ebay would cancel auctions in such situations, and I sincerely apologize for my wrong estimation. Sorry.
Didier

 

[colyn]

Colyn

You likely mean "...and I did not contact the bidder...". I didn't know ebay would cancel auctions in such situations, and I sincerely apologize for my wrong estimation. Sorry.
Didier

I never contact bidders with a cash out price especially when it is less than the current bid.

I didn't know they would do it either. It caused a lot of problems and I am still getting emails from bidders. It seems as though there are now 2 people who fell for the scam.

Thanks no harm done.

 

[sienarot]

Selling the 0.95 already, colyn? I thought you just got it?

Something similar happened to me once. I was bidding on a Hasselblad 150mm f/4 CF lens and while I did not win the auction, I was immediately contacted via email by the seller saying he was giving me the second chance offer on the lens saying the winner could not pay for the lens because his daughter was sick and needed to pay for medical bills. I thought it was odd because I was the second highest bidder and the winner actually placed his or her bid minutes before it ended. Why would a person bid so soon to the end of the auction if they could not afford it? Also eBay's second chance offer would have showed up in the "My eBay" page, which this did not. So I said I'd take him up on the offer if it was a legitimate offer and I would contact him via eBay's messaging system to verify it was really him. The _real_ seller replied back saying he sent me no such offer. And for the record, my eBay account is also the same as my Hotmail.

 

[colyn]

Selling the 0.95 already, colyn? I thought you just got it?

Actually my original intent was to sell when I first bought the lens. I sometimes buy to resell so I can get other items I need and this was a chance to make a good profit. I didn't realize it was going to be such a hassle.

Something similar happened to me once. I was bidding on a Hasselblad 150mm f/4 CF lens and while I did not win the auction, I was immediately contacted via email by the seller saying he was giving me the second chance offer on the lens saying the winner could not pay for the lens because his daughter was sick and needed to pay for medical bills. I thought it was odd because I was the second highest bidder and the winner actually placed his or her bid minutes before it ended. Why would a person bid so soon to the end of the auction if they could not afford it? Also eBay's second chance offer would have showed up in the "My eBay" page, which this did not. So I said I'd take him up on the offer if it was a legitimate offer and I would contact him via eBay's messaging system to verify it was really him. The _real_ seller replied back saying he sent me no such offer. And for the record, my eBay account is also the same as my Hotmail.

I've been contacted on several auctions supposedly by the seller making an offer. I always report it to eBay since the offer includes some off the wall reason why the high bidder can't pay..

 

[washy21]

Colyn

If you get another of these lenses - save it for me ;-)

 

[sienarot]

Actually my original intent was to sell when I first bought the lens. I sometimes buy to resell so I can get other items I need and this was a chance to make a good profit. I didn't realize it was going to be such a hassle.

Oh, that's right, you got the lens at a ridiculously great deal! So low that you should be reported to the police because you practically stole it! 😛 Fortunately "grand theft lens" is not a felony!

 

[colyn]

Colyn

If you get another of these lenses - save it for me ;-)

I'll keep you in mind..

 

[colyn]

Oh, that's right, you got the lens at a ridiculously great deal! So low that you should be reported to the police because you practically stole it! 😛 Fortunately "grand theft lens" is not a felony!

That's a good one... 😀 😀 I'll have to remember it..😛 😛 😛