When I first started preparing auctions for Christie's in 1990, I told them
I did not want to know what any absentee bidder had bid on *ANY* item, and
then told me that this information was *HIGHLY* confidential, and never
given out in any way. Over the years I came to find that this was pretty
much an "in name only" policy at every auction house I would come in contact
with (for example, when I became friendly with the owners of several other
auctions, they would freely volunteer to me what items had high absentee
bids, and how much, when I would show up in person at the preview on the day
of the auction).
Obviously, this is a huge conflict of interest! If the auction owner tells
me in passing that someone placed a $9,000 absentee bid on a $1,000 item the
morning of the auction, I can later go to that auction and, with an absolute
certainty, bid up to $8,500, *KNOWING* I will be outbid. Of course, that may
well mean the absentee bidder pays $9,000 instead of maybe $5,000 (or
$3,000, or $1,000), but the auction house makes a lot of extra commissions,
and they get the prestige of selling an item for a sky-high price, and it is
a "perfect" crime, for there is no way for them to get caught, and there is
no paper trail whatsoever (they can say a "floor bidder" was the
underbidder, and they don't even have to have a record of who that bidder
was).
I detested this, and never took any part in it in any way (either as an
auctioneer or as a consignor), but saw it happen with regularity in auction
after auction, and it made me sick. When I switched my major auctions from
Christie's to Howard Lowery, one of the biggest draws for me in doing so was
that Howard assured me that this practice never occurred in his auctions,
and I believe that was 100% true.
This is why I was so drawn to switching over my entire business to eBay in
2000. The greatest benefit to auctioning through them was that *WE* could
not in any way see the high bidder's secret high bids, and what was even
better, it seems certain that, unlike every other auction house, eBay
protected those bids from *ANYONE* accessing them (other than people in
their tech department, and I never, ever heard of anyone breeching that
security in any way).
When I left eBay, I found Auction Anything, a wonderful auction host, that
offered everything I wanted in running my own auctions. But once I had the
auctions set up, I discovered to my dismay that there was a "secret" view I
could go to that would show me bidders' "secret" high bids. I immediately
called the owners of Auction Anything, and asked them to get rid of this
view, and not surprisingly, their people told me that *NONE* of their other
auction clients had ever asked them to do this, and that they did not have
that capability!
I asked them what it would take to remove this from my auctions only
(because they said they were sure many other clients did *NOT* want to
remove it!), and they said that not only would it cost a lot, but that also
it would take a lot of their time, and that they had more urgent things to
do at that time in adding features that would benefit all their clients, so
they could not then spare that time.
So I made certain that I never accessed that "secret" view, and I told my
employees to never access it either. But a couple of months ago, I started
thinking about how I had 23 employees, and that I could not really guarantee
their actions, and so I again called Auction Anything, and told them that
this was a "deal breaker" and that they would have to find the time to get
this changed. They agreed to do so for a considerable fee, and a couple of
weeks later they told me that the "secret" view had been removed, and I
checked and it appeared to be.
But over the next few days, I found a "back door" to access that same
information that they had not closed, and once I found that I then searched
their entire site, and discovered two more "back door", and I called them
and they apologized and closed those, and now I can say with a certainty
that neither I, nor anyone at eMoviePoster.com, can access any high bids
placed by any of our bidders in any way.
Not only can we no longer view the hidden high bids, but we can also no
longer "look up" bidders' passwords, so *ALL* we see is what any user of our
system sees (except we don't see what they themselves bid on). This does
mean that when a user forgets their password they will have to go on the
site and click on the link there to have it e-mailed to them (rather than
calling or e-mailing us), but this is a small price to pay for knowing that
your bidding information is 100% protected.
We know of no other auction house (other than eBay and now us) where those
who run the auctions do not even have the ability to access their bidders'
proxy bids. We urge all other auctions to implement the same software, and
we urge all bidders to inquire of auction houses they are considering
bidding with *to find out if their employees are blocked from viewing high
bids and passwords as ours are*.
I first announced the above in my e-mail club message #472, sent December
13th. A few days later, one of my longtime buyers called me and told me the
following story:
"I have been a buyer in major poster auctions for over 20 years. I have
bought some in your online auctions, but not that much, because I am not
that comfortable with computers. I have been learning how to do so, and have
been bidding with you, and I recently noticed that one of your competitiors
has online auctions as well, and I looked at them.
I found 11 items to bid on, and I gave my secretary 11 bids to place on
those items for me. A couple were between the estimates, but most were over
the estimates, and I had bid odd amounts (like $235, etc).
A few days later I got notification that I had won all 11 items, and I
told my secretary to pay for them, and she asked me why *EVERY* item was *
EXACTLY* the price I bid! I looked at the list, and just as she had said, I
was the high bidder on every item at *EXACTLY* my limit.
Now I could see that happening on a few of the items, or even five or
six, *BUT ALL ELEVEN?* I mean, that is astronomical that it could be caused
by chance. It would be like picking the winners of 11 straight horse races!
It makes me very sad and angry, but it is easy to figure out what happened."
I told him that many other people had told me very similar stories over the
years, and that the best way to deal with this is to either not bid in such
auctions, or, if they have items you would like to have at some price, then
go ahead and bid, but assume that they will "make" you pay your maximum, so
only a bid a price you will be happy to pay.
Of course, it is very sad that they have to have this charade of an
auction, and that there are surely many, many, people who don't "catch on"
for years, if ever, but until the government ever steps in and regulates
this completely unregulated industry, it is likely to not change one bit.
Incidentally, I have heard auction owners defend their actions by
saying that no one is really hurt by this, because after all, the buyers are
getting to buy items for the price they themselves set as the price they
were willing to pay, but I don't buy this for one second, because there is
gross misrepresentation in "how the game is played" (even if the auctions
put in the fine print that they can bid on their own items, that consignors
can bid on their own items, that reserves can be over the estimates, etc).
A couple of weeks later, that same longtime buyer called me back and said
that once he got over being so mad, he took my advice and simply bid prices
he was willing to pay. He said he had just placed three bids, and he bid
three *VERY* odd numbers (like $171.50), and in all three cases, he "won"
the items for *EXACTLY* his limit! But at least now he knows "how the game
is played", so he is not as mad, although he said he will likely bid less
and less high in the future in those auctions (but he mentioned how he had
bid $400 in an eMoviePoster.com auction recently and won the item for
$160!).
Does anyone know of any place that auction movie paper where the auctioneers
*CAN'T* see the hidden high bids, other than eMoviePoster.com and eBay? And
what do *YOU* think of this? Have you had experiences where you felt an
auction house took advantage of their knowlege of your "hidden" high bid?
Bruce
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