Do you guys report this when it happens, or do you just go on with life?

eBay's claim is that offers to buy/sell outside of the eBay environment leave you without their protection - the thing is I don't know what that really means.

Getting back to your question though; the high volume eBay seller account that I help manage has become aware of a lot of bogus Second Chance Offers to failed bidders recently and I'm sure that bad offers are being made. In our case, we have noticed that the bogus sellers have attempted to impersonate us, a seller you might readily trust, by using similar eBay account names/email addresses amongst other things.

eBay's fees are pretty good and you have to ask yourself the simple question "why the hell isn't the seller just offering their wares at public auction" if the deal is real. It's beyond me to say that it isn't genuine and if you decide to persue the sale then I'd urge you to use some form of escrow.

Oh, and lastly, it is against the eBay rules and you should consider reporting it, if not for your benefit then for the benefit of others less suspicious than you.

The deal is definitely bogus. Or at least it is for me. It's for piece of software at about a tenth of the retail price. Which means it's probably a pirated copy. What I don't want is some kind of backlash if I report the attempt.

I've only purchased about five or six things on ebay in the last two years, so I use it pretty cautiously. I don't like it when people try to take advantage of me.

It's doubtful much wrong could be done to you if you report this like a good little eBayer. I think It's likely enough that the imposter has contacted many people with "offers" like the one you received, and thus wouldn't be able to figure out who reported him.

If you really want to get them you could buy the pirated software from them and then report them to the software maker.

And let's not confuse this with honest off-eBay sales. My good friend does a lot of eBay business but also has a 1-800 that anyone can call at any time to place an order outside of eBay. Also, if you're not a winner of one of his auctions and don't feel like bidding on a new auction, you can email him, call him or go to his off-eBay online store to make purchases. Of course he doesn't contact anyone to ask them to do any of this. He's too busy managing all the money coming in from eBay.

Bruno

I have made purchases from sellers that do this several times when I don't want to wait for the auction to end. The ones you have to worry about are the people that just send you a message when they see you are bidding on something.