QuiBids.com is the largest penny auction website currently operating in the United States. Penny auctions have been around for awhile, but have only recently gotten lots of attention from people outside of the penny auction community.
Penny auction websites attract people to them by promising expensive, big ticket items at unbelievably low prices – for example, QuiBids shows a new iPad, which retails at $499 for the most basic model, selling for $22.54. But this winning bid of $22.54 is misleading. This isn’t the truth of how much it costs to win that iPad.
The way penny auctions work is that you are only able to bid a single penny at any time during the auction. However, at QuiBids.com, you must purchase each 1 cent bid for 60 cents. So an iPad that retails for $499 but was won for the grand total of 2,254 one cent bids (or $22.54) which actually cost 60 cents each means that the iPad just sold for $1352.40.
Though the person who wins the item usually has paid less than retail for what they have received, citing $22.54 as the winning bid is extremely misleading.
So is QuiBids a Scam?
All penny auctions, regardless of reputation, are a bad idea and should be avoided.
First of all, QuiBids.com and other penny auction sites require people to pay for the option to bid, but don’t allow them to bid in increments of their choosing. This means that QuiBids is forcing the price up and profiting all the while.
On eBay, the seller and buyer have the auction monitored by the website, which is the trusted third party. On QuiBids.com, there is no trusted third party. QuiBids is the seller and the auctioneer. It works in their favor – and their favor only – to drive the price up in these small 1 or 2 cent increments.
QuiBids attempts to redeem themselves by offering you the “By It Now” option, which is when you can take the total amount of your failed bids and apply that toward the retail price of the item you were bidding on. Say you bid $80 total on an iPod Nano that cost $150. For the remaining $70, Quibids will sell you a Nano. Well, $70 plus tax, fees, and shipping and handling.
With the added “fees,” tax, and S&H, that Nano will cost you more than it would at Apple, and usually much more than it would at a discounted retailer like Amazon.com or Target. In addition, QuiBids is not an approved retailer of Apple – or any major brand name – products.
This means that if you get the item from them, the manufacturer warranty is void – if it breaks within the first 60 days, you will not be able to get it repaired or exchanged. If you have a problem within the first 30 days, QuiBids will refund the final auction price you paid, but not a single dime of the bids it took to win the auction.
It’s much better to stick to legitimate auction sites like eBay, instead of spending lots of frustrating time and effort on penny auction websites like QuiBids.com.
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I played for seven or eight days straight at random times because it was exciting and I limited myself to how much I spent. In total I spent $120.00 and that included the fee to join.
Read the rules and re-read them again and understand how to play because it isn't just a matter of throwing down your bid; I followed the tips. I took notes as well and kept them by the computer so I would know how to bid and this is what paid off. I always noticed too that when the clock was ticking down I automatically assumed that I did not win that round because it appeared someone else got their bid in before I did but that was not always the case.
I did win and was totally surprised. I recall there was a winners page you could search and that is where I saw my username three times.
Every item is brand new and this is what I won: Two Nixon Coolpix Cameras, one was purple and the other was silver. One camera cost me $41 and the other was $17. I also won a Hamilton Beach Roaster for 22 cents. I was skeptical about the roaster and wondered if I would ever get it. It came UPS about ten days later and arrived in their branded Hamilton Beach box, and sure enough it was a roaster. I was totally thrilled and used it at Christmas time to cook our turkey. It cooked the turkey in four hours and we put a browning sauce over top to make the skin cook. The turkey was moist and so delicious. Go online and see what this roaster looks like because it is a fairly big appliance. I still have the turkey roaster and continue to use it year after year, plus I have lent it out to my brother and sister. It is still making the rounds and was the best gift of them all because I paid 22 cents and this is the story I share with everyone who asks me where I got it. As for the cameras one of my children got one and I got the other. I used it so much it conked out after seven or eight years and the other won is still in good to use.
Would I recommend Quibids? Yes I definitely would recommend it because it worked out nicely for me; I was able to use the camera as gifts and saved hundreds of dollars on both these items and the roaster was the best gift of them all.
PS. I am planning on joining again for Black Friday 2016.
Are you one of the founders/owners of QuiBids?
LOL LOL LOL!!! Don't you just LOVE IDIOTS!!!
Nowhere in the registration process is there an explicit confirmation of purchase of 100 bids.
Registering requires entering credit card information which then automatically forces the surprise purchase of 100 bids for $75 CAD.
Beware of the "FREE" sign-up and registration, it is designed to take advantage of unsuspecting nice people. And the purchase of 100 bids is probably in the fine print legalese of the contract.