Winsor Crosby wrote:
> A couple of thoughts:
>
> I would be willing to bet that each person who bid receives the same
letter
> from the dealer. They are probably all told that they are the high bidder
> and if someone beats you to it by the time you reply they will send you a
> "sorry" letter saying that they held it for for 2 days or 2 hours and
when
> you did not reply they offered it to the next one.
Well it's definately a form letter, I enjoyed the one I got offering me a
leather case for a Voigtlander Prominent for their reserve of $40,
especially the part about next highest bidder - there were no other
bidders. Either I've remembered wrong or most of the "discussers" here
don't seem to realize that ebays fee schedule includes adjustments for
starting price, final selling price and reserve price. So PCE (aka
Bernie's) pays to have those high reserves. In fact my experience with
them is that while guilty of "sharp practice" they do nothing overtly
wrong. For instance if something isn't mint they just don't say anything
about it (except every item has a photograph and a small print disclaimer
to call if you have questions about condition). So while the lens I did
buy from them had filter ring damage, and it wasn't mentioned in the
description, it was visible in the photograph -though it would have helped
if you knew to look for it. An example of this very same thing is their
current auction for a Zuiko 50/1.4:
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=28295172. And I
could have paid for the long distance call to have someone describe the
lens to me beforehand. Note that if it is mint they usually say so.
Example the Zuiko 600mm/6.5:
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=28450095. And the
psychology was interesting, I was pissed at them, but not quite enough to
demand to return the item (surely, they must have a restocking fee?),
though I wish I could filter out all their auctions. So I wouldn't
recommend them, but there's nothing particularly actionable about what
they're doing.
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