There are plenty of opportunities to buy bids as part of the auction.
Zbiddy reviews
121 reviews
121 Reviews for Zbiddy.com
Review Highlights
Then I went for the $25 american express credit card.
ZBiddy is a real online penny auction site as per my view.
Rating Distribution
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9/7/11
this site isn't worth the time. at 60 cents a bid and no set end time for any of the auctions, there is very little chance of getting an item at a good price. Further, I've been watching this site for a couple of months now and its the same items over and over again. Also there have been comments by people that the site itself has set up phoney bidders to keep the bidding going and I won't be surprised, you watch an auction and it doesn't make sense the number of bids a bidder is making on an item worth like 50 bucks. DO BOTHER WITH THIS SITE IT SUCKS
8/24/11
pure scam!!! don't waste your money here. ebay is definitely much better and more guarantees in terms of product availability and time. i bided on something where 13 seconds was 4 hours and still counting...!!! this place is a joke.
8/18/11
I have had a terrific (so far) experience on the site. Began with a $10 buy won, won, then won again. (ok the last win was a buy now execution) But seriously if you have some time to burn this may be your cup of tea. *** its nothing like ebay***
8/10/11
zbiddy is underrated. I'm honestly kind of surprised at the two-star rating here. I had an issue with one of the products I bought and the customer service I got was incredibly friendly and helpful. One thing most sites suck at today is service - look at facebook and google, where you have to dig and dig to find their contact information. I've seen complaints about zbiddy, but if people have issues they should contact the site directly. As for the site itself, the auction format is fun and engaging and theres a pretty wide range of products and gift cards. Make sure you read the fine print though - when you create your account you're also purchasing a bid package. There's no free signup.
8/10/11
As far as penny auctions go this one is pretty good. Would like to see more bid package options and more apple products. Overall great site though
8/2/11
good site. 3 things you must know.
1. must be patient. (big items can take hours to win)
2. choose small items first (they close much faster)
3. you need to pay to bid.
7/28/11
The last 15 seconds of the bid went on for over 24 hours. You never will win it. I used EX buddy which increased the chances of winning as it bid for you automatically. Towards the end of the bidding, it never bid for me or many others but it did for the person that won the item 6 times in a row. They suck. The winners are fixed ahead of time. Their practices are almost illegal. Don't make these crooks any richer
7/26/11
Zbiddy was really cool. I am not sure what the other users couldn't see but the price was right on top of the place i put my Credit Card in. I didn't understand the site 100% when i signed up so I called the number on the page and a really nice girl helped me out. Then I tired it... I did exactly what she told me to do. I tried the beginner auctions first and it was an easy win. I won 20 Bids. Then I went for the $25 american express credit card. Tonight I think I am ready to go for the iPad... I love Zbiddy.
6/30/11
ZBiddy is a scam - I have been onitoring this auction (I did sign-up and I bought a 'bid-package.
I NOticed that the same 'bidders' seem to be bidding on the auction running up the price - and eventually winning, over and over. They are obviously 'bots' - (roBOT bidders - not real people)- so the real people who bid, have no chance of wining. Unless it's for a $5 Chilis Gift card - big deal....
Total SCAM - don't waste your money !!!!
6/26/11
Thought I was getting bids for 60.00 but was charged 60.00 plus 59.00. Also bidding was crazy with .60 a bid for individual .01 bids for these products. Near the end of auctions I was blindsided by the 10 second extension of time for last bids and when the bidding stopped a lot of the same people were winning. I won one 5.00 auction for a Chilli's gift card that had a seven cents bid on the books for
6 hours. THESE PEOPLE ARE FRAUDS!
6/24/11
This Penny Auction site looks like a big problem and I personally wouldn't use zBiddy. Just looking at how many complaints filed on zBiddy http://www.scambook.com/browse/index/company/274/zBiddy
6/4/11
I didn't anticipate being charged for bids when I was registering. Thought I was just providing inf in case I win an item. They hit my debit card IMMEDIATELY for $159. Thought maybe I could recoup by winning an item. Unbelievably frustrating. You have to be glued to the computer for hours to have any chance. If you glance away, you may waste all your time and bids. I was bidding on a 22" LCD TV last night. I clicked immediately when the timer said "GOING", which I have done several times, but this time they closed the bidding. That happened to me twice, and both times the item went to someone with an 'auto bid'. I am very suspicious the company 'bought' the item, since it closed IMMEDIATELY.
I tried to log on this morning (6/4/11) and my AVG blocked it because of a virus or malwear threat. Never going back
6/3/11
This used to be called z bid.I. used them....what a ripp off! Tell all your friends to stay away! Call the consumer protection agency and file a complaint...if they get enough complaints they will close them down. I feel that the bidders are in fact employees, and since an employee wins the prize, it can be re sold or people.bid on something that nobody will win! The consumer protection agency should outlaw such businesses? They probably are already aware of this scam! Everybody get a hold of them and voice your anger..there IS strength in numbers!!!!!!
5/8/11
Credit card billed $157 without my permission & phone # is difficult to find on site.
to complain. This is definitely a scam. Stay away!!!
4/27/11
ripped off, will dispute the charge to my credit card, then they had the nerve to call me the same day and ask how was my experience! You can guess what I told her and she offered me 25 free bids to lure me back. Stay away from this fraud and scam site!!
4/26/11
it's a scam they keep resaling the same items check the list of fallowers and you won't see any of those names bitting they make there own names is a SCAM
4/19/11
Crooks, a scam I sholhd have won an auction as my bid was deducted before the auction end but it still went to some else. Crooks, scam artists, shut them down but the FTC will not do that
JG
4/14/11
This is a business that sells bids for $.60 apiece that yo can use ot bid on a product. It is set up so that your chance of winning is remote and that the bidders (Bettors) will cumulatiely spend much more than the item costs.
Calling this gambling game an "auction" is a perversion of the language. It is a scam through and through.
4/1/11
WARNING WARNING WARNING This site is a TOTAL TOTAL TOTAL RIPOFF. It is not an auction site it is a roulette wheel lottery. I'm going to every review site and can find and put this out there.
3/26/11
i thought i was just signing up, i didn't know i was being charged for signing in, this web site is a scam.
3/12/11
Bottom line: You can save a lot of money on individual items if you have the time and are willing to pay up to 60 cents for each bid even on those you lose.
Pros: If you are lucky enough to win the item you will pay much less than retail price.
Cons: Costs up to 60 cents for each bid and it might it could take a lot of bids to win. There's an upfront cost of $159 for 259 bids to start which isn't very clear when you start checking out the site. The selection is very limited. Since each bid in the last 10 seconds adds another 10 seconds or so it can take hours to complete a sale.
The company's method for making money is based on the number of bids. I watched an iPad go for about $87 which means it took 8700 bids at a penny each to get there. If all those bids were at the maximum cost of 60 cents that means the Zbiddy made about $5200 on bidding which more than covers the cost of a $500 iPad.
Bidding is very frustrating. There's no sense in bidding until the last 10 seconds which is when everyone gets involved. However, its really not the last 10 seconds since each bid adds more time. There seems to be two main strategies. One is to bid with about 10 seconds remaining and hope you're the last bidder and time runs out. The other one is to wait until the last second which allows you to wait to see if others will still bid without always wasting a bid. However, it adds about 10 more seconds and allows more time for someone else to bid. To help in bidding you can look at the history to see what the item has sold for in the past but it's often quite different based on how many people are on at the time. I've seen an iPad go for about $27 and up to $87 which is a difference of about 6000 bids. That's potentially a lot more bids you put in for yourself plus a lot of additional time considering every 10 seconds counts for about 3-8 bids on average.
When you buy bids they are 60 cents each. There are plenty of opportunities to buy bids as part of the auction. I did this once using 3 bids to buy 50 bids for 47 cents plus $1.99 processing fee. Buying this way got me more bids at about 5 cents each versus 60 cents. Another time I tried bidding on another 50 and it got to over $3 and I used about 12 bids before finally quitting. If you like Zbiddy though this is the only way to get more bids.
I think one of the keys to being successful is to bid at odd times when there are less people on. On weekends and evenings it just seems like the prices go up a lot higher. Another thing is to watch and see how many people are bidding. If action is pretty heavy just wait a while before you start wasting bids. You risk people just all of a sudden stopping the bidding but you won't waste as many bids. The site does provide a tool to bid for you when you're away but you have to have some idea what price it may go for. You can put in multiple prices for up to a total of 25 bids. I tried this but on a couple it never triggered because the price didn't get high enough and on another I wasted 10 bids because the price went a lot higher than what I predicted.
If you do waste a lot of bids the average cost of all the bids you've purchased can be applied against the retail price of the product. I bid on some Bose headphones and was getting frustrated so I just threw a bunch of bids on it and then bought them. This was when I decided I had enough of Zbiddy.
For those who like the challenge of winning and have the time to watch you can get great items at a much cheaper prices. However, you almost need to think of this more as a lottery. The more bids you put out there the higher odds you have but you're paying for each of those bids like paying for tickets in a lottery. Also, when you get an item don't forget the cost of your bids are part of your overall cost which Zbiddy does show you when bring up the item individually. Personally, I prefer eBay where there's an unlimited selection, you can predict a price, and when time runs out, time runs out.
About Zbiddy
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