status-resolved Making honest bid errors on NamePros

[alcy]

made an honest error this morning by placing a bid on an auction which I misread to be .net vs ".net.in" that it was in reality... it's a first for me.. I guess I am only human after all.. when tried to cancel bid with moderator, I was denied. my correction and cancellation request was made and spotted about ~40 mins following my bid. so not 1 hour.. not 4 hours.. not 2 days after.

do you think it is fair that namepros forces people to buy and complete auctions on whcih they have made an HONEST error and misunderstanding... or do you think that this could be a rule we could try and get mods to modify? again, provided the error is quickly cought, and is clearly an honest one... based on buyers reputation/feedback/explanation/frequency of happening...etc.

thank you for yoru inputs.

 

[DNGear]

They kept a time frame of 5 mins, We can modify it within 5 mins.

If they extend it to 30 mins, it would be great.

 

[Eric Lyon]

Please keep in mind that all bids are binding purchase agreements and may not be retracted as outlined in the rules:

6.2.6. All valid bids are binding and cannot be retracted.

It is a buyers/bidders responsibility to read a sellers listing, conduct research, and ask questions prior to placing a binding bid agreement.

Technically, there is no specified time frame that a binding bid agreement can be retracted, however, if an error request comes in, a moderator may investigate further to ensure that the listing was not misleading and then take appropriate actions from there.

It's advised that members take some time to do research, read a sales listing completely, and ask questions prior to engaging in any sales agreements. This will help avoid situations like this one in the future.

Sorry for the inconvenience and thanks for understanding,

 

[Brian Baird]

@alcy - I believe I made the exact same mistake on the same auction, I was happy to see that someone else outbid me.

 

[alcy]

thanks Eric.. I definitely believe a distinction should be made between those who may want to get out of a bid for dishonest reasons... which I presume accounts for most situations. versus those who make a genuine error. upon some investigating on your end, based on criteria listed above plus maybe some others, it should be relatively easy for you to determine and decide whether the request is a genuine one or not.

and if it is genuine, the person making it should not be imo penalized by being forced into a purchase of a domain he never wanted to bid on to begin with.

I am sorry but I just cannot see why namepros would support literally forcing someone into buying a domain which isn't even the one they thought they were bidding on.

do we all regret it when such honest mistake happens to us... for sure... but is there a single person among us who wants to be forced into this situation by np... well.. I highly doubt that.

 

[alcy]

@alcy - I believe I made the exact same mistake on the same auction, I was happy to see that someone else outbid me.

I am glad to see it is not just me... these types of listings are extremely easy to make error on.
before coffee, in morning, upon waking up.. especially so... but this is not about who or what to blame for the wrong bid.. it's about you or me thinking your placing a bid on domain1, when it is in fact domain2. and then being forced to buy domain2 by np.

I came close several times before! specifically for those domain.net.in or similar double dot listing types.. but this time I just went overboard.

not spending my mins on this to save $10 on this listing.. cause we all know $10 don't make noneone richer or poorer, but imagine this being $100 or $1000.. it sure can happen to anyone.
so imagine being forced by np to buy for $1000 domain you never wanted to have and never even wanted to bid on to begin with! that's some pretty serious stuff right here!

so let's tell Eric to change the rules. all together now..

 

[N-A]

If I were at an auto auction and hastily raised my paddle to bid on a car that I heard was a Lexus, when in fact it was a Toyota, it being an honest mistake doesn't lessen the liability I now face if nobody else outbids me. If it were a genuine mistake, the auctioneer would still expect either a payment in full or a down-payment before I walked out... there's no difference here.

If the name was clearly written and the seller did not try to obscure it, it's in my opinion that you should honor your end of the deal if you won.

 

[alcy]

If I were at an auto auction and hastily raised my paddle to bid on a car that I heard was a Lexus, when in fact it was a Toyota, it being an honest mistake doesn't lessen the liability I now face if nobody else outbids me. If it were a genuine mistake, the auctioneer would still expect either a payment in full or a down-payment before I walked out... there's no difference here.

If the name was clearly written and the seller did not try to obscure it, it's in my opinion that you should honor your end of the deal if you won.

yes. I do see your point for sure. I know a thing or two about honor and principle.

but still.. can any of us truly deny the devastation it would cause to you to be that person driving away in that car you never wanted to own or even to bid on.

 

[Eric Lyon]

I have used all of the major auction platforms over the years, and I don't know of any of them that allow a bid to be removed after it has been placed. That's not to say that we have to follow what everyone else does, but it does set an industry standard and expectations. It's rare for someone to bid on an auction by mistake, but it does happen. When it happens, it forces us to learn from that mistake and read every future auction a second and third time before bidding, to make sure the mistake doesn't happen again (it makes us more careful since we've learned from our past mistake).

If we allow bids to be removed for any reason, then major issues arise:

1. Accountability: If there are less consequences for making the mistake, then the mistake will happen more often, which disrupts the auction platform.
2. Abuse: The privilege and system would be abused and argued at every turn, even by those being dishonest, causing more disruption. "Why could they retract their bid and I can't?" "It was a mistake, I promise, I didn't realize I was running low on money to invest." Etc.
3. Time: It would cause an infeasible amount of work with all of the issues that would arise from #1 and #2 above.

It's just not practical, unfortunately. We must require that bids be upheld and not encourage mistakes in bidding, no matter how infrequent they are.

Please do report any listings that are confusing and caused you to place a bid as a result of that confusion. We will certainly remove those bids and fix the confusing listing. (As long as we find that it is confusing/misleading.)

 

[alcy]

thanks for your great help Eric as always!
the subject may become borderline philosophical at this point so we might as well end it here.

I sure hope neither I nor anyone else experiences placing a bid on a domain they initially thought was something else (I find the double dots particularly nasty in that regard.. and frankly, already caught myself on few occasions at very last moment with those types!! ... but.. I do agree its rather hard to do with just about every other type of domain), when this involves greater amounts of money than my own experience of today. thank you, good day.

 

[alcy]

due to a new development in this auction, I have brought again to @Eric Lyon attention the problem with auctions that involve double dot domains. such as the one I bid on... which was .net.in

so for the one auction about which I wrote in this thread, I placed an honest mistake bid. then @Brian Baird who replied on thread above saying the same, and then a 3rd person who placed one this morning again. that is 3 total people for one auction... who expressed publically to having made honest error, which means there could be others who make honest error and do not express it publically. I assume this happens regularly with double dot auctions. and asked Eric to consider implementing some visibility factor (red title or marker or such) or any other thing he can think of, to denote specificially double extension sales.

I am no longer obligated to buy this domain at this point, but wanted to ensure something hopefulyl is done in future.. for all members.

thank you for considering.

 

[Eric Lyon]

We see that it's affecting multiple people, but there's not much we can do in this particular situation because the thread is clear (there are no ambiguities). If the thread was "honest net in" then that would be cause for confusion/misinterpretation, and we'd be able to assist.

However, we would be happy to implement a solution to help avoid this issue from occurring in the first place (a proactive approach). Since we can't help much after it happens, the best solution would be to try to prevent it from happening at all.

I suspect this issue is happening because some bidders are rushed (reading through hundreds or thousands of domains) and not paying enough attention to the small details (like two dots appearing in the domain). If we can come up with a solution that will work to help avoid this issue, we will certainly look into implementing it.

Thanks for bringing this to our attention,

 

[equity78]

We see that it's affecting multiple people, but there's not much we can do in this particular situation because the thread is clear (there are no ambiguities). If the thread was "honest net in" then that would be cause for confusion/misinterpretation, and we'd be able to assist.

However, we would be happy to implement a solution to help avoid this issue from occurring in the first place (a proactive approach). Since we can't help much after it happens, the best solution would be to try to prevent it from happening at all.

I suspect this issue is happening because some bidders are rushed (reading through hundreds or thousands of domains) and not paying enough attention to the small details (like two dots appearing in the domain). If we can come up with a solution that will work to help avoid this issue, we will certainly look into implementing it.

Thanks for bringing this to our attention,

I would say when listing country codes that encompass more than one dot, the requirement is to spell out "This is a country code, not com or net, you are bidding on the Indian country code NET.IN" or when selling a country code domain that comprises of the top level extensions, com, net or org make it clear in your listing these are country codes and that someone is not bidding on a TLD.

 

[RapidNames.com]

@alcy, Learn from your mistake, so you will double check the extension in future.

You learnt it just for $10 and saved $1000's of your money...

 

[alcy]

I would say when listing country codes that encompass more than one dot, the requirement is to spell out "This is a country code, not com or net, you are bidding on the Indian country code NET.IN" or when selling a country code domain that comprises of the top level extensions, com, net or org make it clear in your listing these are country codes and that someone is not bidding on a TLD.

thanks for input.
I think its easy to see there is relatively few listings like these. but they are coming from a fairly stable circle of posters. therefore informing them on such a requirement may actually work.

otherwise you may end up with a handful of such sellers, affecting a much greater number of potential viewers of their listings, creating unwanted bids, and as I said to Eric, some like me may mention it, some may not bother to mention it and not mention the error publically, and then the 3rd category may altogether not even catch on the error until the domain is paid for and they see it in their account after transfer.

thank you.

 

[alcy]

@alcy, Learn from your mistake, so you will double check the extension in future.

You learnt it just for $10 and saved $1000's of your money...

like I said, its not really just about me. thanks.

 

[james haw]

You are only human and make mistakes like everyone, and misreading a TLD is a human mistake, I've done it myself (fortunately I was outbid).

However, I also agree with Eric's arguments that there is nothing that can be put in place to assist with such issues. If you can come up with a "viable" solution I'm sure the team would discuss it.

Do you not see the points Eric made are valid? Every time someone wants to back out they'd just put "sorry honest mistake". And you know that a fair number of people would do this.
It would become tiresome and messy with all the auctions having their bids re-shuffled around.

It would be unpleasant:

• To be part of all these auctions, not knowing what bids are valid and where you stand.
• Selling, with your auction being adjusted all over.
• For mods, as sometimes sellers quote bid posts and lists bid amounts, and if they are changed or invalid those posts need to be edited as they're also invalid

Too much complication imo.


All that said, and honestly I repeat "it was a basic mistake which anyone could make and I include myself", however:
.net
.net.in
They are very different. And just like someone selling "casinoss.com", you make sure you read it properly and know what you are bidding on


Is there a bidder prior to you? Would they not buy it for their bid amount, and you can re-coup 90% of your loss?