Yep, seems the seller hopes to make as much money as he can… And, if the ebay thing doesn’t seem to be getting to were he wants it, he’ll pull out and sell to the private viewer (who, most likely, already gave him a good price.)
The Prospective Buyer might just have the option to say that he wants it at $ Price, effectively a Buy-It-Now price, avoiding eBAY fees.
Now you’ve got me curious. Are you saying above that the set came to you set up the wrong way and Harrington intended it to be that way so you kept true to Harrington’s bad design? Or are you trying to say (maybe a typo) that they came to you set up not at Harrington intended, and knowing full well this was wrong, or at least not how originally intended, you preserved this “alternate” orientation simply because that’s the way they came, or perhaps because you preferred it that way over Harrington’s?
Guess I’m just lost in the debate, but it sounds like there’s a universally known “right” way and a “wrong way,” not just two ways of equal worth, because as you look at the full/half sets of these they’re pretty obviously meant to be very neatly snaked together.
Also, that drone angling off is sometimes due to a warped drone (doesn’t appear to be the case here) or just having the stock bored at an angle, which may be a defect or the result of shrinkage of the wide part of the stock pulling toward the middle more than the narrow end. The NSP guys deliberately do this all the time so you have a little spread in the stand of drones but I don’t think this is the desired result here.
And a last, universal warning perhaps, I noticed on your Ebay item description that you reserve the right to remove the item at your discretion because you’ve already got several interested or at least possible previous buyers. That’s fine for you and them, but as far as Ebay is considered, your posting of the item in auction is your bond, and if you fail to complete the auction you can and will be heavily penalized, up to and including being banned for life. My advice to you or anyone else in a similar position, is to allow the auction to carry on as it will, and direct any previously interested buyers to enter a bid like anyone else and complete the purchase through Ebay, however it originally came to their attention. If it doesn’t sell, you can deal at will afterward.
However, if you are caught making a pact to get people to not bid on it so you can back out of the auction and sell outside Ebay you will, again, be banned for life.
Royce
eBay help topics explain how to end a listing early:
http://pages.ebay.com/help/sell/end_early.html
(excerpt)
Sometimes something goes wrong and you can’t complete your listing as planned. If needed, you can choose to end your listing before the scheduled date. If there are bids on your item, you can cancel them.
Reasons for ending listings early include:
- The item is no longer available for sale.
- There was an error in the starting price or reserve amount.
- There was an error in the listing.
- The item was lost or broken.
‘Something goes wrong’ does not include a sale to a private individual. The intent of starting an auction is to complete it and not have other ideas and/or intents about completing the auction.
The whole idea that one might lose the sale due to the vagaries of the seller (‘hey, I found someone whom I’d rather sell to’) actually discourages bidders and thus would likely depress the auction results.
Although the drone placement issue has been discussed and resolved in private, a final word. The pic posted above makes a lot more sense.
Davey was slightly huffed about my ‘not an indication of having a clue’. This was not meant to give offence but given the fact Geoff makes a point of setting the drones up the way Harrington did, very compact and practical, completely reversing them does, as I explained to Davey, give an impression of somewhere having missed the point of the whole exercise. And really, there’s only the one way they go in properly: as the maker intended.
That all said, my initial remark was just that, a remark that the drones hadn’t been put in right and that it looked wrong. It was not in anyway to suggest the set isn’t functional or was structurally manhandled in any way.
Jim, you’re trying to ‘read into’ something that’s not there.
eBay simply states “The item is no longer available for sale” as a valid reason for ending a listing early.
Again, selling to someone else is hardly ‘something goes wrong’. eBAY intends for all auctions to be binding.
One reason for canceling an auction, you dropped a porcelain figure and it was smashed. Or you were selling a TV set and just now discovered it did not work.
or it was detected in the photos listed, the bass drone wasn’t on correctly and the auction was ended early…
Photos can be swapped; descriptions can be modified. Canceling auctions early smacks of ‘fee avoidance’. The Seller might be using pressure of the Auction Bidders to force a decision from their private Buyer. Or some Bidder might privately contact the Seller and say what’s it take to close this auction. In these case, eBAY loses its Sales fee from the Seller and Bidders get frustrated with eBAY and tend to bid less.
Are you worried eBay will loose their fee? Don’t be.
Jim, did you bid on the set?
All of this speculation of fee avoidance and buyer pressure is a little goofy and are not character traits of Dave Boisvert.
Actually, it is the desired effect. The drones are often drilled into the stock at an angle to make more room to access both drones and regs (even though currently this is only a half-set). I know Joe Kennedy does this intentionally, and since he got his basic designs from Wooff, I surmise that Geoff does the same.
djm
Say folks could we possibly moderate this a wee bit? This is why Dale wants to shut down our forum.
Royce..blast! I re-read my post and it indeed parses a bit awkwardly…I taught HISTORY, not English! Let me try again.
The set came to me in configuration “A”. This was not* Harrington’s/Wooff’s INTENDED configuration. The set was given maintenance and returned to configuration “A” following the owners desire to maintain it in it’s current state. BUT during the maintenance it was repaired and cleaned so that configuration “B” (wooff’s and harrington’s intended configuration) could also be used. This was not an arbitrary decision on my part due to preference or whimsy. It was based on the owners desire to maintain the set as is. Does that read better??? I hope this clarifies things a bit.
As applies to pipes in general, there is no right or wrong way to set up drones. As applied to a particular maker’s design, there can be a right and wrong way as the maker designed/intended.
The baritone drone is not warped or bent in any way, the hole in the mainstock is drilled at a slight angle as to result in the appearance of such.
I only made the above posts to help clarify any questions as a public service. At this point however, any further questions must be directed to the set’s current owner.
Perhaps the matter were best dropped and any ebay debates taken into a private forum?
I think what Jim means to say is that eBay intends for a transaction to be binding between seller and “winning” bidder. EBay makes it clear that this is a contract, a binding agreement, after auction ends, to assure both parties they will be required to carry through.
Like Tony says, an auction can be cancelled for just about any reason, but this can only happen up until 12 hrs. prior to auction ending. The last 12 hrs. of the auction is locked for most changes, except I notice some bids have been withdrawn during this time frame. I assume that a seller can also cancel bids he/she doesn’t like during this period also.
So, bidder can withdraw a bid and seller can cancel the auction, up to a point that is (the 12 hr. deadline). Happens all the time. Seems unfair on both accounts, but ebay lets both off pretty easy. When a potential bidder asks seller a question, there is a substantial warning not to participate in an off-ebay transaction. This is not tolerated by ebay and they provide many contacts where to report this offense (offense being defined as one party even suggesting an off-ebay transaction–in which case the other party reports it).
Actually, it is the desired effect. The drones are often drilled into the stock at an angle to make more room to access both drones and regs (even though currently this is only a half-set). I know Joe Kennedy does this intentionally, and since he got his basic designs from Wooff, I surmise that Geoff does the same.
djm
2 degrees per Garvin.
The 12 hour rule is really only for description changes (really description text additions, if there are bidders in the auction).
Is it possible for a Seller to back out of an auction? Yes, if ‘something goes wrong’. Changing one’s mind about selling, selling the item to someone else, etc are NOT valid reasons. Is there a way to police and prevent that from happening, No. When a pattern emerges and people identify that for eBAY, eBAY does shut down that Seller ID for life. Can the seller resurface and repeat the behavior? Sure.
I do not know who the Seller is. David B name has been brought up but it sounds like he is clearly an agent and not the Seller (although he may be the eBAY Seller of record).
Oh for goodness sakes! I am NOT the owner, I am NOT the seller, I am NOT an agent. I was simply given the task of cleaning the set up and undertaking long overdue maintenence. That is my only involvement.
David Boisvert (Davey)
Just a note on Ebay. I wouldn’t count on them to penalize anyone. Fraud runs rampant on Ebay and they generally don’t do much about it. You can pretty much count on them taking their fees and that’s about it.
Dionys
May I just tip toe into this lively legalistic evisceration fest…and congratulate you on the elegant architecture of your chanter design’s, David. They really are nice! 