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Online auction sites

Advantages

-Easy to search for products

-Trust others' reviews

-Secure - 3rd party payment

-Lots of sellers can lead to a good bargain

-guaranteed sell

-wide market range

-guaranteed buy

-can get things that you cant buy locally

-trustworthy websites such as amazon and ebay have good customer service in case something goes wrong

disadvantages

-ratings only trustable to a point, yet companies can hire someone to write positive feedback for a company

-scams

-buyers need to know what they're doing

-a method of payment

-have to have a means of payment

-delivery weight

-very difficult to send back if dissatisfied

-misleading items

-you don't know the seller

-bidding wars

-fake websites

-International sellers; longer delivery wait and P&P costs high - expensive to return

-quality

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features

-similar to traditional auctions

-the highest bid wins the product

-worldwide service

-can end up paying more than expected

-automatic bidding

-some listings have a "buy it now" feature

-some have a best offer feature

how they work

both the buyer and the seller need accounts

-the seller requires a description and a photo of the item and a time frame for bidding.

-buyers bid

-the highest bidder then pays

-once payment has arrived, the seller sends the item

-the buyer can leave feedback

safety

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