This is important, because if you click the wrong thing at the wrong time, you'll miss your bid.Īfter bidding on a few items this will become second nature.ġ.) Be sure you're logged in. It's unlikely that you'll actually have to pay as much as you enter as your "maximum bid." You should have arrived at this a week ago.
I credit eBay for making this easy to check, and for keeping accurate time, even if they hate pro bidders who keep prices low.įor your "maximum bid" amount, enter the absolutely, positively highest amount you'd be willing to pay. You can check yourself against eBay, who keeps remarkably accurate time, by clicking the "eBay official time" link at the bottom of every page.
The easiest, and probably best way, is to use the free TIME app for iPod, iPad and iPhone.
Mac clocks can vary a few seconds before they resync, so once you've set these options, on OS 10.4.11, simply opening the Date & Time control panel will resync your Mac to the fraction of a second the next time you bid. Close the window, and the clock on the top right of your Mac is now dead-on to a fraction of a second. Select the Clock submenu, check "Display Seconds," and you're done. This automatically syncs your Mac to God's own atomic clock. Be sure "Set Data and Time Automatically" is checked, which is by default.
Buy a Mac or a watch, or ask someone else how to do this. (Sorry Windows users, you're on your own. Be sure to check for the sync icon, since I've met many people who thought their watches were set, but in fact were several minutes off because they'd kept their watches in the wrong place at night.Īnother good way to tell the correct time to the second is to click on the clock on the top right of your Mac and click on Open Date & Time. Be certain that the "Sync" icon (ironically a satellite dish) is lit, otherwise, your watch didn't set itself today. Bid in the last second, and no one else sees your bid before the game is over.įor most people, any Casio Waveceptor atomic watch syncs itself to WWVB broadcasts automatically. Bid ten seconds early, and just about everyone will have the chance to react. Personally I've been doing this since being a kid in the 1970s, when I would sync my wind-up watch to shortwave broadcasts from WWV's time signals.įor every second of inaccuracy, that's one more second early you'll have to bid to be sure you don't miss it, and one more second you give early-bidders to try to outbid you. If you have a way to do this, you can skip ahead. You'll need a clock accurate to a fraction of a second. Oddly, I've bid competitively with my iPod Touch over WiFi, using my mechanical Swiss watch for time, and won within seconds, but I'm a nerd who knows how to measure time. On my desktop Mac connected via cable modem, I see between zero and two seconds delay, so I click my Confirm Bid button at T minus 3 seconds.On my slower laptop over wireless, I may have to click at T minus 10 seconds. The way to see how long your system takes is by practice, and by noting when you clicked the Confirm Bid button and comparing that to eBay's time stamp for your bid in Bid History. That's the whole point.ģ.) Presuming you know the correct time to the fraction of a second (covered below), click your Confirm Bid button (also covered below) some couple of seconds early so that your confirmed bid actually makes it to eBay in time.ĭepending on your computer and connection, there can be anywhere from zero to ten seconds of delay. You should have decided on your maximum bid days ago, and when you bid professionally at the last second, there's no time for anyone to place any more bids. If you can't be present for the end of an auction, bid on something else for which you can bid at the last second.Ģ.) Never enter a bid more than once. I can't vouch for ads below.ġ.) Bid only at the last second.