discuss Crap I just bid on a domain I did not want!!

[MapleDots]

HeHe

So it's late for me, have not eaten and have a bit of a sugar low. I see this domain for sale on GoDaddy and it's actually pretty sweet. Starting bid was quite reasonable and I figured it was way too low for a premium domain so I wanted the seller to think I was serious.

So guess what.... I bid twice the opening bid amount and felt pretty good that I had a chance the offer would get accepted.

Then..... a wave of something overcame me and I went to dictionary.com and sure enough I had a misspell on my hands, the domain had an extra letter that did not belong.

CRAP

So there I sit looking at the domain name trying to justify how I could possibly put it to use. No matter how I flipped it I figured I just wasted some good money. The owner of the domain would surely be accepting my offer.

Almost an hour to the T the seller came back with a counter for a couple hundred bucks more than my double sized offer.

HeHeHe.... I just chuckled to myself. The guy had a solid offer on a misspell and got greedy, he had to ask another couple hundred bucks. Well, that lets me of the hook, now I can go spend the money on something I actually want.

Lesson to seller: If you have a misspell that is close to the real word there is a chance the bidder did not realize it was a misspell. If you counter, you let him off the hook.

Think about accepting the bid on a misspell because you might not get a second bid when the guy on the other end realizes its a misspell.


So how was your day

 

[BarryDavis]

I'm glad you had a window to escape.

 

[ben pedri]

Show attachment 83683


HeHe

So it's late for me, have not eaten and have a bit of a sugar low. I see this domain for sale on GoDaddy and it's actually pretty sweet. Starting bid was quite reasonable and I figured it was way too low for a premium domain so I wanted the seller to think I was serious.

So guess what.... I bid twice the opening bid amount and felt pretty good that I had a chance the offer would get accepted.

Then..... a wave of something overcame me and I went to dictionary.com and sure enough I had a misspell on my hands, the domain had an extra letter that did not belong.

CRAP

So there I sit looking at the domain name trying to justify how I could possibly put it to use. No matter how I flipped it I figured I just wasted some good money. The owner of the domain would surely be accepting my offer.

Almost an hour to the T the seller came back with a counter for a couple hundred bucks more than my double sized offer.

HeHeHe.... I just chuckled to myself. The guy had a solid offer on a misspell and got greedy, he had to ask another couple hundred bucks. Well, that lets me of the hook, now I can go spend the money on something I actually want.

Lesson to seller: If you have a misspell that is close to the real word there is a chance the bidder did not realize it was a misspell. If you counter, you let him off the hook.

Think about accepting the bid on a misspell because you might not get a second bid when the guy on the other end realizes its a misspell.


So how was your day

You gotta stop drinking and bidding,but seems like everyones bailing you out ,next time just hope the sellers not drinking what your drinking lol

 

[Michie]

Don't let it be an English Class, the question was asked for help and advice.

Thanks

 

[Joe Styler]

What is the penalty for all these non-payers @Joe Styler.

It depends on the account. Normally we give people a $10 fine if it is their first offense and they did this on one domain. If it is more than one domain the fine rises. If it is the Second offense the fine is typically $50 on one domain. Again it would rise based on # of domains. There is no fine on a third offense, we ban you for good, cancel all your listings and you do not pass go. Now we give ourselves leeway in the penalties we hand out but that is the standard procedure. We want leeway because your first offense may be your last if we find that you have done it maliciously or if you are negatively impacting the auction and we do not think it was a mistake etc. So if you make an honest mistake we will usually let is slide with a small fine and an understanding that you know the rules and better understand them going forward. We are a pretty good sized selling / buying platform so being banned from using us normally keeps people on the right side of things and in my experience most people want to do the right thing anyway.

 

[alcy]

Interesting, personally I wouldn't have thought twice about this.
By countering, the seller is essentially saying, thanks but no thanks your offer is too low, so the original offer should no longer be binding.
I think that when the potential buyer receives a counteroffer he should also get an option to terminate negotiations along with it because otherwise the whole thing can turn into a farce. You simply can't assume that the buyer has the time, desire or money for that matter to haggle, you can counter of course but it should be at your own risk, that means you counter only when you're ready to forfeit the original offer.

not if he originally agreed his offer would be binding for 7 days

 

[Ategy]

I'm having a good laugh at all the debating here on the way people think it "should" be .. lol

Fact of the matter is .. either way is fine AS LONG AS everything is clear to everyone involved.

Let me preface this by saying that while I've found a ton of bugs at GoDaddy .. and can be quite critical of them at times .. overall they are a really big machine that mostly gets thing right enough for thing to work for 99% of people in 99% of cases. Plus they've got a huge selection of expiring domains that you can usually get at better prices than if they were elsewhere. So kudos to them on all that ...

... HOWEVER ... lol ...

The one area they really fail at .. is clarity .. particularly for (but certainly not limited to) automated communications/emails. There are times I feel like I would get a clearer answer from a steel plated brick wall! lol

lol

I understand how it happens ... platform upgrade creep .. little changes and improvements that aren't documented well .. things that don't make it into instructions / communications / FAQs / terms. Not so bad when something is new .. but can get particularly bad when a features/options change.

I want to be fair in saying that it certainly is not in any way unique to GoDaddy .. it happens at virtually all large organisations .. usually the bigger the organisation the worse it gets (Government agencies for example). with GoDaddy being by far the biggest in the industry .. compounded by the fact they have multiple overlapping departments .. the end result is an almost impossibly unmanageable communications mess.

What differs GoDaddy from government agencies however .. is that GoDaddy is making tons of money hand over fist .. so the solution is likely a few thousand person-hours of work .. admittedly certainly no small task .. particularly if they want to do it right .. it's often easier to fix code than it is to fix communications issues because wrong code gives you an error, while wrong/ambiguous information is just wrong information and just sits there until someone actually notices it AND also decides to be pro-active about it (which rarely happens) .. so it's a big task .. but definitely something possible.

 

[Premiums]

OP could you please sharethe name?

thank you

 

[Ategy]

OP could you please sharethe name?
thank you

lol .. The only reason I didn't ask is because given the final answer that his offer *IS* binding for 7 days .. I don't think it would be a good idea for him to share the name until 8 days have passed!

 

[xynames]

Show attachment 83683


HeHe

So it's late for me, have not eaten and have a bit of a sugar low. I see this domain for sale on GoDaddy and it's actually pretty sweet. Starting bid was quite reasonable and I figured it was way too low for a premium domain so I wanted the seller to think I was serious.

So guess what.... I bid twice the opening bid amount and felt pretty good that I had a chance the offer would get accepted.

Then..... a wave of something overcame me and I went to dictionary.com and sure enough I had a misspell on my hands, the domain had an extra letter that did not belong.

CRAP

So there I sit looking at the domain name trying to justify how I could possibly put it to use. No matter how I flipped it I figured I just wasted some good money. The owner of the domain would surely be accepting my offer.

Almost an hour to the T the seller came back with a counter for a couple hundred bucks more than my double sized offer.

HeHeHe.... I just chuckled to myself. The guy had a solid offer on a misspell and got greedy, he had to ask another couple hundred bucks. Well, that lets me of the hook, now I can go spend the money on something I actually want.

Lesson to seller: If you have a misspell that is close to the real word there is a chance the bidder did not realize it was a misspell. If you counter, you let him off the hook.

Think about accepting the bid on a misspell because you might not get a second bid when the guy on the other end realizes its a misspell.


So how was your day

It sounds like such a thing as you describe could never happen, but similarly more than a few times I have entered very large stock trades at the wrong price, and been filled and suddenly in some massive position I didn't want to be in. Also had situations where I thought it was a pre-market order only that would expire at the bell, only to get filled on something I didn't even think was open and suddenly be down several thousand dollars after market opening.

You'd think, no way you'd ever make such a mistake and get filled at market on what was supposed to be a limit order, or have the wrong limit order entered or end up short when you meant to go long, but it has happened to me more than a few times, too tired in the early hours of the morn.

On the other hand, I have also had situations where the brokerage itself screwed up, and after repeated complaints to Compliance had them reverse the trade or compensate my account for any loss. So who knows maybe sometimes GoDaddy is the one making the mistake!

 

[Name Trader]

It depends on the account. Normally we give people a $10 fine if it is their first offense and they did this on one domain. If it is more than one domain the fine rises. If it is the Second offense the fine is typically $50 on one domain. Again it would rise based on # of domains. There is no fine on a third offense, we ban you for good, cancel all your listings and you do not pass go. Now we give ourselves leeway in the penalties we hand out but that is the standard procedure. We want leeway because your first offense may be your last if we find that you have done it maliciously or if you are negatively impacting the auction and we do not think it was a mistake etc. So if you make an honest mistake we will usually let is slide with a small fine and an understanding that you know the rules and better understand them going forward. We are a pretty good sized selling / buying platform so being banned from using us normally keeps people on the right side of things and in my experience most people want to do the right thing anyway.

Thanks for the response. It's the clearest explanation I've ever heard about these penalties. I think it would be useful for any customer to know where they stand on this ladder. Like 0 strikes, 1st strike, 2nd strike, banned. So they can prepare beforehand for the shock of being banned. I think there should be some method also to wipe the slate clean after say 2 years of no problems. Somebody who has been a customer for 20 years and somebody who has been a customer for less than 1 year, should be treated differently IMHO. But we should all know at which rung we are on.

 

[Ategy]

.. I think it would be useful for any customer to know where they stand on this ladder. Like 0 strikes, 1st strike, 2nd strike, banned. So they can prepare beforehand for being banned. I think there should be some method also to wipe the slate clean after say 2 years of no problems. Somebody who has been a customer for 20 years and somebody who has been a customer for less than 1 year, should be treated differently IMHO. But we should all know at which rung we are on.

I think letting people prepare kinda defeats the point .. that would mean they are also preparing to abuse the system .. lol.

Again .. you might see me complain about bugs and communication issues at GoDaddy a lot .. but at the same time I'll be the first to say GoDaddy isn't evil .. they aren't out there deliberately planning to make things unclear in hopes of tricking people into doing something. Also, unless it's something out of their scope (which does happen), for the most part their staff do make efforts to be fair more often than not. Are they 100% consistent? .. definitely not .. Do they always make the right decision? .. definitely not .. But are they deliberately trying to scam us out of our hard earned money? No ...

I've encountered bugs on the auction platform where I ended up bidding on different domains than intended .. also where bids submitted we not what I actually typed in .. I had different decisions result each time as sometimes they made me keep/pay for the domain .. but other times they've gone out of their way to cancel my bid. And that despite the fact I'm 99% sure they didn't even understand/investigate the bug itself .. and were more just going on good faith. Speed of how you report an issue is a factor as well .. I've made the mistake in the past of taking time to detail and report everything by email ... only to have them tell me it's too late and that I should have called them the instant it happened.

All that to say I think it's better that their infraction system isn't written in stone and treated on more of a case by case basis as @Joe Styler described above. That way they have the right to immediately ban someone for something flagrant .. but also have the flexibility to just administer a $0 (zero) warning if it's an established client where there seems to be a genuine mistake/misunderstanding. Also, in this particular case discussed in this thread where it's not an expiring auction (100% of profits going to GoDaddy), GD needs to find a fair balance between buyers and sellers.


Ideally they would fix all the bugs and clarify all instructions/info/communications .. but somehow I doubt that's going to change any time soon! lol

 

[Name Trader]

I think letting people prepare kinda defeats the point .. that would mean they are also preparing to abuse the system .. lol.

That's not the intention at all. If GoDaddy takes actions on my account, which are no fault of my own, on a very long established account. Don't you think I should be able to check my status at GoDaddy, before they ban me, again? For the next time when they close my account thru no fault of my own? Paranoid? You betcha!

I admire all your efforts trying to fix the problems with GoDaddy's services. Keep at it. I probably stopped doing this myself about 6 or 7 years ago. You should keep up the good work for all of us.

 

[poweredbyme]

If a bid (offer) binds bidder (offerer) for x days, it should mean the offer binds for x days unless seller clearly declines the offer. Counter offer of seller or buyer shouldn't make any bids void. Because counter offer is not a clear decline of previous offers. Counter offer is option given by seller or buyer. Bid is a binding contract, counter offer is another binding contract, counter offer should not invalidate the previous offer(s) of seller and buyer. This is my personal opinion about an ideal marketplace. I am not a lawyer.

Personally I hate to make offers when buying domain or website unless it's auction. A serious seller lists his/her domains with a BIN price. "Make offer" type listings makes seller greedy. It's difficult to buy a domain by making offer.

 

[Name Trader]

If a bid (offer) binds bidder (offerer) for x days, it should mean the offer binds for x days unless seller clearly declines the offer. Counter offer of seller or buyer shouldn't make any bids void. Because counter offer is not a clear decline of previous offers. Counter offer is option given by seller or buyer. Bid is a binding contract, counter offer is another binding contract, counter offer should not invalidate the previous offer(s) of seller and buyer. This is my personal opinion about an ideal marketplace. I am not a lawyer.

You and GoDaddy are exactly in opposite step as to how most of the rest of the world thinks about makeoffer/counteroffer negotiations. But that OK to have differing views. It's fine, IMHO, to use both methods provided it is made abundantly clear to both parties which method is being used. Which GoDaddy are in the process of updating.

 

[poweredbyme]

You and GoDaddy are exactly in opposite step as to how most of the rest of the world thinks about makeoffer/counteroffer negotiations. But that OK to have differing views. It's fine, IMHO, to use both methods provided it is made abundantly clear to both parties which method is being used. Which GoDaddy are in the process of updating.

In my understanding counter offer does not invalidate previous offers unless it's clearly written in TOS like the sedo's FAQ page which was posted here by previous posters.

When I make counter offer(s) to you, my counter offer(s) shouldn't make you free from your obligations related to your previous offers unless I accepted this rule before making counter offer(s) to you, unless I clearly decline your previous offers, unless your previous offers expire.. I am not defending GD or anyone else. Ironically I don't like GD as a registrar, hosting provider and domain marketplace. My favorite is namesilo. But I think GD understands the nature of "counter offers" correctly. "Rest of the world" or majority may understand things incorrectly. However you may set incorrect rules to a game. If all players agree, it's okay. That's why all rules of a game should be clearly written somewhere and should be accepted all players. This does not make rules correct. This makes the rules valid. "Valid" should not necessarily be "correct". Majority confuses on this, think if something is valid, it's correct.

 

[Galaxy Traveller]

"But I think GD understands the nature of "counter offers" correctly. "Rest of the world" or majority may understand things incorrectly."
Yes

 

[poweredbyme]

I am not lawyer. I know some basics in law as a semi-retired finance expert. If you work in finance with some academic background you have to understand the nature of law well, more than the majority. It doesn't make me lawyer, it helps me to understand law better than majority. A dentist can't cure cancer but understands how cancer works better than majority.

 

[Galaxy Traveller]

"I know some basics in law" (it matters). There are lawyers but I dont think even a lawyer fit for all the countries but understands law better than majority.

 

[Galaxy Traveller]

I like to see update from Maple. What is going to happen? Anyone can predict?

 

[lock]

I'm glad you had a window to escape.

I am quite displeased since i have owned taken care of every mistake I have made and had plenty of non paying winners.

 

[anantj]

I have it officially.....

Thank you to all members who responded.

GoDaddy differs from services like Sedo.

When you make a bid on GoDaddy and the seller counters it does NOT cancel the original bid. If you make a bid it is binding for 7 days. So if you offer 1k and the seller comes back at 1.5k it does not void your original bid. If you do not answer the seller he can decide at any time in those 7 days to accept your offer.

I must say that I find that whole process a bit strange but I guess it is what it is.

Kinda like I go to the butcher and offer 60 bucks for the steaks and he says 80. You say no thank you and the butcher says... too bad I'll hold you to the 60.

In this case I prefer the sedo way where the latest bid or counter bid becomes the binding one.

To refresh your memory here are the sedo terms...

All that said, I can live with the way GoDaddy does it and won't complain about it but their documentation leaves a lot to be desired. Not one member of their support team was able to show me anywhere in their terms where it is as clear as with the sedo terms.

There you have it... thank you so much to everyone who chimed in previously.

Keep in mind my opening post is not correct for godaddy, it is correct for sedo only so the advice still applies, just not for godaddy. If on sedo you get a bid and you are thinking about taking it be careful if you make a counter offer because it will annul the previous bid and the buyer walks away. This is probably the most important on misspells because sometimes the bidder does not see the misspell until further in the transaction and if you counter offer the original bidder walks away.

Late question as I've been out of town for a few days. What happens if you counter the seller's counter with an offer lower than your original offer? I know it is likely too late for you to try out but perhaps that might be an escape route... But that said, does THIS null and void the original offer?

 

[anantj]

Im not saying you don't have a point.. all Im saying is who is to say what is the proper way to do things.. and is the proper way to do things the way that most do it? to me the two, in life, were never really automatically true.

in all honesty, if I was born in the amazon and came to this world today knowing nothing about offers or godaddy.. and went to make offer on godaddy today, the offer would say it is bidning for 7 days... (which it does clearly say at offer time)... the first thing to come to my mind then wouldn't be that if seller counters my offer then what I am offering now will no longer stand.

what do you think would be your first thought? if you came out of the jungle for first time? (no offence to jungle people btw).

Even Sedo says the same -

And then, if the seller counters, the original bid becomes invalid. So, for the same "clause", two marketplaces have two different behaviors on counters

 

[usernamex]

Fascinating and informative thread

@MapleDots - are your 7 days up by now? Would love an update : smile :

 

[MapleDots]

Even Sedo says the same -

Show attachment 84231

And then, if the seller counters, the original bid becomes invalid. So, for the same "clause", two marketplaces have two different behaviors on counters

Wow, it gets even more confusing, clarity is indicated.

 

[MapleDots]

Fascinating and informative thread

@MapleDots - are your 7 days up by now? Would love an update : smile :

Gotta love the baby, even if it's unexpected