Every now and again you come across an idea you wish you’d thought of first. Swoopo Auctions (here) is just such an idea.
An expensive electronic item is put up for ‘Auction’ – it could be a Nintendo Wii, an iMac, whatever – and people bid for it. Every time you bid, the price of the item goes up by 7p and the remaining time is incremented to give other people a chance to outbid you, just like a real world auction. There’s a final end date/time as well, just to stop people bidding forever.
The genius bit is that Swoopo charges you 50p for each bid.
Let’s have a current Swoopo example: At the time of writing there’s an 80GB PS3 console up for grabs, and the current price is £59.15. It started at 7p, which means 844 bids have been placed to get it up to its current price.
844 bids has earned Swoopo £422.50 in bidding fees, and if the current high bidder wins, he’ll have to pay £59.15 on top of however many bids he’s made, so this £299.00 item has sold for a minimum of £481.65 – nice work if you can get it!
Update:
They’re taking the mick now – an auction for £40 cash has brought in £80+ so far. As someone here said: “Well that’s one way of laundering money.”
It’s at £68.74 now – that’s 981 bids at 50p each, or £490.50, plus the £68.74, so they’ve sold a £300 PS3 for a minimum of £559 – they’ve almost doubled their money, even if they paid full retail.
These guys must be richer than astronauts!
It is a good money making idea, but for the people who do manage to get a PS3 or Wii for 20-25% of what they would pay in a store, it can still be a good deal for bidders…
And people are bidding for bids. They are actually bidding for 300-Free-Bid vouchers. This is a money tree!
what a load of horse shit
Maybe this will work but its so frustrating every time it goes to 1 second loads of people put bids in so you can get it and thats another 50p down the drain ugh!
It’s annoying cause its not 5p or something its 50p so you’ll be spending like 20pound and not even get anything. the Fuckers.
i agree-this is crap.
If you’re the sort of fellow (a.k.a. a “mark”) who enjoys carnival midway games, you’ll love Swoopo.
Yet more proof that incorporating a business = purchasing a license to steal.
dis is a great idea
just placed loads of bids right at the ‘end latest’ time limit,had the highest bid and the auction didn’t end. They just changed the ‘end latest’ time, is that even legal?
^^ Wow, that sounds really dodgy. Are you sure you were right at the final end time? Perhaps there’s a get-out clause in their T&Cs…
This site is a rip off. If the counter ended like ebay than maybe it would be worth it. but you have to sit there for hours wasting bids because the timer keeps increasing… even after the final bidding time is up. My advice! don’t bother with this site. One person gets a good deal will the other 50 people bidding on an item get nothing for their money. Waste of cash if you ask me
They have a clause in their T & C that states that they can extend the auction so what is the point in pretending they have an end time. It’s a joke!
at least dick turpin wore a mask/ these b———-,just dont give a f–k………
just watched a £499 camera reach £1,183.16 which is over 16,000 bids and equates to over 8 grand in bids 8 f***ing grand placed.stay away from this site it is worse than a gambling site
Thank you for enlightening me,was just about to enter bidding.Won,t bother now .x
they never answer their emails either
thanks you lot could not beleive the prices on this but wont bid now i know how it works.
‘They have a clause in their T & C that states that they can extend the auction so what is the point in pretending they have an end time’
Oh my god, I was actually thinkn of using this, what a load of… another example of a legal way to rob people, their the real criminals that damage our society and economy…
its no different to horse racing, you get an idea wen you think others have spent their quota, and buy £100 of bids for an item worth £700 bid away and hope to outstay the others, if you win great, if not you lose, same if your horse falls ect, nahhhhh not for me
i can’t believe these clever gits. i wish that i had thought of it! that said, thanks for comments from you all and enlightening me on realities of this site. glad i didn’t buy any bids. it just to prove that if it seems to good to be true etc etc
It’s such a con. Presented so you think you’re getting into a ebay type auction, but swoopo are just cleaning up on money they get for bids. Bought the fewest bids to try the site, but clearly I’m unlikely to win anything as I have better things to do than sit staring at a screen for hours. You have to watch what you’re spending too, as you are paying the cost of the bids and p&p on top of the price on screen. A dangerous game and to be avoided. I have no intention of carrying on with this.
lol i looked at it & thought yer right screw that what a scam
funny,within 15 seconds of fully grasping the whole bidding thing,and Watching a few auctions,the thought occurred to me,that YES,it would be nothing to run a program that just keeps that timer going–aka-FAKE bidding,so no legitimate buyers//bidders Actually Win Anything…ive been researching this all nite and guess what,i still havent found ONE person who actually WON an auction…a real person,that is…..Anyone…?..anyone..?….i didnt think so..
there is a distinct possibility that you are also not biiding against another human, they probably have software bidding for them to entice you to bid more. anyone out there actually won an auction and received the goods? let us know.
never liked gambling it should be outlawed to protect the innocent.
THESE LILY LIVERED GOVERNMENTS SHOULD STEP IN AND BAN THESE EVIL MONEY MAKING SIGHTS LIKE SWOOPO AND OTHERS,IT IS AN ABSOLUTE DISGRACE,THEY ARE LYING AND EXTORTING LARGE AMOUNTS OF MONEY OFF HARD WORKING PEOPLE AND FAMILIES,BRING BACK THE MAFIA AND LETS SORT THESE COMPANIES OUT AND STOP THEM THE OLD FASHIONED WAY.
Check this out!!!
http://www.swoopo.co.uk/auction/300-freebids-voucher/138992.html
£120 of swoopo bids went for near on 2 1/4 times its value. And people say it aint a scam lol – anyone on this planet know anyone that would pay that much?
If you look carefully and in red letters underneath the “300 FreeBids Voucher” it says “100% off”. The winner paid absolutely nothing apart from the £2.80 in bids.
Quite a bargain really, £120 worth of bids for £2.80. Mind you Swoopo made a killing out of it in excess of £1400.
just stumbled across it myself 3 words
genius & legalised robbery
just wish id thought of it myself LOL!
theyre probably paying the government backhanders thats why they get away with scams like this. crooks usually stick together
would you believe i “stumbled” on this site by searching for POLICE auctions in a search engine LOL!!
If you check through the won items there seems to be a few winners who have won several digital cameras etc and a bidder/winner called Castyville has won items in Swoopo sites in several different countries. I have only bought a small amount of bids and wasn’t amused that when it got to 2 seconds at some stupid time in the night, I placed a bid and the timer froze, and I thought I had won, then it carried on and some other guy won! One item the other night went between 2 and 13 seconds for over 6 1/2 hours! Sod watching that!
same hear it is a load of horse shit iv been paying alot of atention to it and nobody has fucking won Wat is it with thes Dum ASS INVENTORS THESE DAYS
is it true???
It seems in the swoopo auction the only winer is the bidbutler. I watched auction after auction and the bidbutler always was the winner. I wounder if the bidbutler is working for swoopo?
The only winners on swoopo are swoopo and the people who work for them, the same user names are bidding thousand of times they must have a money tree in there garden, it would be interesting if any genuine past winners posted there comments.
so this is safe\?
you bunch of moaning cunts!!! they are
a business just like any other business in the world. you are all bad loosers! why would a business that makes as much money as swoopo con people read the f***ing site properly and u might all actually figure it out eh!!!!!
Won Tom Tom latest model for £2.79p. Must have been lucky!!
@Robroy
Nice one! How many bids did you have to place to win it?
Ye I never played it, I been sad enough to watch alot of bidding wars on items I would love to own.
For me, this is much worse than gambling on Poker. It’s not a scam site, it’s just pure unadulterated luck that you win your item. No strategy, no nothing. I’d rather walk into a bank, withdraw a £100 or £120 and casually place them on my footsteps behind me as I walk home so I can find my way back to the bank again.
Winners say there is a strategy, but there isn’t because you never really know who is going to outbid you and when. I think they are just so proud that they’ve LUCKILY won that they think they are amazing punters. Someone could beat your bet by atleast 1000th of a second. I’ve seen overlapping single bids everywhere, and they just get outbid.
It is pure luck, because the only way to win is if nobody else bids. The ONLY way to win an auction. You win your item cheap not because of strategy, but because of: very, very few people bidding, lagging, or the final very few people simply being distracted. i.e. your opponent has to:
(for example, and by pure coincidence, if there is 3 or 4 bidders left)
answer the doorbell,
take a phonecall and forgot to bidbutler,
all fumbling to add more funds
They see a Gazelle mixing Cement outside their front window.
They get up to have a hot drink and forgot to bid butler.
There is NO STRATEGY, its not POKER, or another gambling game that demands an element of skill and reading. It is PURE LUCK. You could read a bid war all day, then say, ahaaaaaaa, put your bid in and then somebody will simply put a new bid in or not.
Yours irritably Annoyingmus
SWOOPO:
Very clever
Pure Genius
BUT BUT BUT BUT……. SWOOPO POOPO, watch out. Quit while your ahead or make as much money as you can, because once the likes of the forchan and imagechan world raid websites, your empire will crumble and fall.
Take a look at this blog before you consider playing swoopo.
http://tomorrowsshopping.blogspot.com/2009/10/website-that-will-sell-me-brand-new.html
Nice post on Swoopo. It’s actually some of the controversy/skeptical interest that has led us to create a review website with detailed penny site info. Our site lets you see the average savings people can expect to get (ie. 15%, 38%) for any product on any auction site. It’s all arranged by category (ie. Giftcards, Video Games, whatever) and you can see rankings sorted on any level. If it helps your readers, here’s a link to some detailed Swoopo Reviews.
Solid post on Swoopo. It’s actually some of the controversy/skeptical interest that has led us to create a review website with detailed penny site info. Our site lets you see the average savings people can expect to get (ie. 15%, 38%) for any product on any auction site. It’s all arranged by category (ie. Giftcards, Accessories, whatever) and you can see rankings sorted on any level. If it helps your readers, here’s a link to some detailed Swoopo Reviews.