A warning about "Do not bid without my permission" listings:

There are a bunch of listings going up for classic cars offered at ridiculously low "Buy it Now" prices, with no Buy it Now option. They're using many different accounts, all are most likely hacked accounts. The common theme is a warning that they're eBay email address is very slow, so they give a gmail account in the listing, usually a different address for each listing. They also include a warning not to bid without permission or they will cancel your bid and leave negative feedback. This is impossible, you can't leave feedback for people whose bids you've cancelled.

There are lots of variations on this scam, but the common theme seems to be the mention of an impossibly low buy it now with no real Buy it Now option in the listing- this is to force you to contact them so they can give you some story as to why it's so cheap and to part you from your money. They may not always tell you to only contact them through e-mail and not through eBay- if they've set up a bogus account or hijacked an existing account that isn't often used, they can communicate through eBay as well to try and look more legitimate. Many times with a little searching you can find the cars they're listing on other websites- either on the sites where they stole the pictures and descriptions, or on other sites where they're running the same scam with the same vehicle. They're even runing these scams here in the reviews and guides, advertising cars using guides.

It's all an attempt to get people to contact them directly, obviously so they can scam people overwhelmed by such a great deal into sending them money. Remember folks, nobody is going to sell a $40,000 classic muscle car for $6800, not even on eBay.

Update: The latest trick these scammers are using is to make the entire listing a link to e-mail them. Clicking the "Report this Item" or "Place Bid" or anything else opens a new e-mail pre-addressed to the scammers. So how to report it? It's a bit tricky, but if you're comfortable with cutting and pasting and terms like "URL" and "Address Bar", read on... First you'll need the actual item number, which you can find in the URL- look for a string of numbers after the word "item" in the address bar. Select only the item number and copy it to the clipboard. Then open any other valid listing and click the "Report this Item" link. When the page comes up, delete the item number at the end of the URL in the address bar and paste in the number of the scam auction. Very Important: you MUST click the "Go" button or press enter so that the page reloads with the correct item number, so you don't report the wrong, and most likely valid item.

Update 2: An even newer trick is where they have the listing "redirect" to a fake eBay page- if you hear some extra "clicks" and see the address change, you may notice you're not even on eBay anymore- right now they seem to be using Geocities to host these fake listings. If you find yourself on one of these pages, get out quick! There's no telling what kind of nasty code and/or links they have on these pages that eBay has absolutely no control over.

Hopefully as soon as eBay becomes aware of this latest scam they'll start scanning for it and remove the illegal auctions as soon as they're listed. Until then, we all need to be on our guard and help out if we can.

Also remember, guard your eBay password! Don't click on links in e-mails and then enter your password on the page that comes up, no matter how much it looks like an eBay page. This is how these people get your account info so they can put these listings up in your name. If you need to respond to a question, go to My eBay from your own bookmark or type in ebay.com yourself and log in first- if you click an e-mail link to lig in, and that e-mail is bogus, you could be in for a world of hurt. See my other guide "Sign in and GET HACKED" for info on this scam- and how despite my advice, I almost fell victim myself.

Lastly, eBay doesn't try so hard to keep you from making deals "outside" of eBay just because they don't want to lose fees- they want to protect you. At the least people offering outside deals are trying to rip off eBay- but they may very well be trying to rip you off too.

If you found this infomation helpful, please help us spread the word by clicking the "Yes" button below. The more "Yes" votes the higher the ranking, and the more people will see this warning.

Thanks and Happy Bidding!