PublicSurplusReviews 87

Won an auction, paid right away and got email instructions to call and arrange with vendor for local pickup. Called, left messages and couldn't get anyone to get back to me for 2 weeks.

Emailed PublicSurplus Support about not being able to get in touch with anyone about my items. I was asked for proof & dates as to when I called the phone number, as if I was lying about trying to contact them to get the items I PAID FOR. I don't have the dates that I called the place over the last 2 weeks. So, frustrated, I asked for a refund.

I was told: "if you want to request a refund, you must reach directly with the agency since this is between you and them and not us."

How am I supposed to get a refund from the "agency" I purchased from, if the entire reason I reached out to PublicSurplus support is because I can't get through to them to get my items?

This is horrible customer service. They weren't even willing to try to contact the vendor in my behalf unless I provided proof that I messaged them already. Don't use this site, it's not worth it just based on the customer service alone. I'll be disputing the charges to get my refund.

I have been bidding at Public Surplus for 2 years. I have purchased 7 vehicles from auction. Also a set of golf clubs.
I fly up, drive back vehicles i purchase.
Have a Chevy Colorado i picked up with 28,000 miles. Great truck. Picked up Hybrid Ford Escape for my son. Bid on a dozen before i got one for the price i wanted.
Public Surplus has been great to me.
All of the agencies i have purchased from very helpful. I dont know why others are having problems. Everything i have bought has been in great condition. You must pay attention to detail.
I plan to shop public surplus auctions for years to come.

I have bought many auctions and made a lot of money off this site. I read all of the reviews and nearly every bad rating is from people that just don't understand how auctions work. 1st MOST online auctions happen within the last 2 minutes. I do this myself. People bid with emotion so if you wait till the last couple minutes, you hope they are away from the computer or don't have the time to make a good decision. 2nd Yes it goes up in bid increments because that's how the site is set up. Also I am one of those guys that will bid you up at minimum increments. This is how I feed my family and if you are going to bid me out, I'm going to attempt to make you pay your maximum for it. 3rdly Many of the complaints are about the sellers not the site. I've also had bad experiences and I don't buy from those people anymore which is one less bidder to drive their prices up.

I'm sorry but there is definitely something suspicious and crooked about this website. The very few times I have used it to try and attempt to win an auction, it has been near impossible to win. The fact that it seems as if someone is working with them to just consistently outbid you. Not to mention the fact that they extend the auction as many times as they want. The last three (3) times I have tried to bid on a vehicle one single person that goes by the name of Felix outbid me 10 times and this crooked website allowed the bid to extend 7 times. 7 TIMES! Are you kidding me? This literally just happened now, September 10th 2018. This person was bidding on 4 other vehicles yet only the one I was bidding on was continued 7 times. Weird, ok that's normal. This is absolutely ridiculous and unfair. This site and those affiliated with it need to be investigated and supervised. Not to mention that these bids should not be allowed to extent more than twice. Absurd, ridiculous and straight out criminal!

I had problems being able to pay for an item I finally. No bids except mine until the last 5 mins of the auction (on 20+ items I bid on) then all of them just magically got tons of bids and they always were $5 more than mine on their first bid - which I can tell from bid history.

I had a problem paying, there was no payment option on the winning page and when I contacted the company it took over 5 days for a response, which was automated, and I lost the chance to pay for the auction.

The seller came back and said that the reason I didn't see the payment option was because I had 4 profiles (all different user names) and 3 haven't been used since 2008 when I started using the site and had problems with being limited to bidding on one item per week, so I made more accounts b/c I bought stuff. This company it telling the seller my account details (which they aren't supposed to do) and they have NO SUPPORT, no phone number.

Go to GovDeals, they have excellent phone support and MUCH better selection.

Hidden fees and your bidden against the owners / cities, or owners of the equipment, or cars etc... That is not an auction. That is a garage sale with using the word auction to lure you in. Hidden bidders or reserves in the Auction biz is
Called in the auction business world is ghost bidding. That is a extremely dangerous way to buy anything. Auctions were meant to find the true value of the market since 500 BC. Which means selling to highest live bidder online or present in front of you without hidden reserves, or ghost bidding or any other ways to set a hidden a price.
There are almost no real auctions out there at all anymore...
May be I should come out of retirement.
Col. Cole Wyatt Davis
If you find this review helpful please click Helpful button or I will not sharing all my knowledge and honest reviews any more. It took me a life time and a ton of money to become a expert in.

I've bought about 5 items on the website. All were said to be of "unknown" condition but when I brought them home, they all worked fine. Just needed to reinstall operating system. The buyer needs to understand that they are buying surplus equipment. So the equipment may or may not work. You should be able fix it if you bid on it. I love this site and would recommend to others. Best deals on used equipment. May need some fixing. But you can't really buy an 27 inch iMac for $400 anywhere else!

I have been dealing with Public Surplus for about two years. The site is not a scam, one needs to know how and when to bid. You need to pay close attention to details... times listed for end of auctions to change (not sure why) times zones vary. My biggest issue is most sellers require items to be picked up. This limits their potential buyers... Washington State and Colorado are an exception. This is not a required by PublicSurplus but the sellers issue. PublicSurplus needs improvement in customer service... contacting seller via email is a plus. Just keep in mind you dealing with a computer and the learning curve is totally up to you. PublicSurplus really dose not care one way or another. They are a broker working on a percentage to provide liquidation of misc goods for small city police departments. From what I have experienced they do not bump bidding and will extend auctions based on activity. You can find deals.

There Def boosting the prices up with inside people, also i watched a van for 5 days jump from 660.00 to out 1625. 00 then sat 4days then 5min before the end of the auction i bid max 2000. 00 and they had a proxy up to 1850. 00 i was up. There auction says that if a bid is made within the last 5min auction will extend for another 5min at the end of the auction time so they ended the auction at 3:04:02pm it was suppose to be 3:05pm. The other person won it for 2025. 00 dollars. So for 4 days no one bids and at the last min it jumps when i placed the bid bull$#*!.

Extensions

If a bid is placed during the final 5 minutes of an auction, the end time will automatically extend for an additional 5 minutes. This will continue until no bids are placed during the last five minutes.

They decided to give me a refund for falsly charging me and then "Lost" the Refund.
They gave me the run around for days and days saying they sent it then they say they lost it and I bneed to find it with my discover company when discover has said they never recieved it. Im out over $20,000 waiting on this to be resolved. You would think this business would care about 20K just missing but guess not. I suggest all Goverment agencies to pull from them and try a different agency. Happy to share paperwork if I need to.

I won a bid on a 2005 ford f150 listed as
"good running condition"
"good tires"
"A/C working"
Overall condition "fair"
Paid and picked it up
A/C works on and off mostly doesn't work
Leaks oil like crazy
3 tires are ok 1 is bald
I'm probably looking at $2000 in repairs.
Before I bid on this truck I called the government office that had the vehicle listed to make sure the information on the listing was 100% accurate. Mr. Witmer assured me that is was... hah! I got this truck from daytona beach shore. If you see any listed by them I recommend seeing the vehicle with your own eyes 1st before bidding. Or just don't bid.

I have purchased two vehicles that had undisclosed salvage history and this was not disclosed on the website or by the seller on the damage disclosure statement on the title. I get a new title in the mail and it says total loss claim on it. The website referred me to the seller and they said too bad your purchased it as is! Twice I have had to have the State of North Carolina DMV intervene and force them to buy the car back. There is No buyer protection on this website! BUYER BEWARE!